after a brief hiatus...

ok, i'm back now. here's something that happened a few weeks ago:

i was at a party at my friend steve's apartment in wicker park, boozing it up with some bros.

we were down in his basement drinking and i saw an older lady, probably late 50's, wandering around the place. she had this weird hat that looked kind of like a beret and a massive canvas bag clutched tight to her chest. she looked for all the world like an older hippie who refused to age gracefully, vainly attempting to "hang" with the "kids."

after watching her for a bit, i realized i was only half-right; she most likely was an aging hippie, but she didn't seem to care much for hanging out. true to the enterprising entrepreneurship that made america great, she was circulating around the party selling homemade pumpkin muffins laced with (gasp) marijuana. it was like a real-life episode of "weeds."

she eventually made her way over to me, and said "you want one?"

i responded: "what do you have?"
old lady: (snorts) "what do you think?"
me: "i dunno, a bag."
old lady: "are you a cop?"
me: "what do you think?"
old lady: "they're drug muffins. five dollars each."
me: "i see..."

i casually pulled my coat aside and gave her quick glimpse of my shirt, which happened to have something that looked like a police star on the upper left part of my chest.

she was pretty old and she looked like she was about to have a heart attack when i did that, so i only strung her along for a few seconds. but it's nice when you can still make someone's eyes bug out with terror after so many years.