CHICAGO: If Hepatitis C Were Attacking Your Face Instead of Your Liver You'd Be Doing Something About It

That's better than me. I woke up from a dream in which I was having sex, and I just had soft sheets in real life.

I thought/believed Muppets were real for a surprisingly long time. They were like Germany or Japan -- I knew Germany and Japan existed, but I had never been there. Likewise, Muppets existed; I had just never seen one in person. But eventually I would, if I were in Muppet Country.

i would like to dream about muppets tonight. not a sad muppet dream nor a sexy muppet dream, something like going grocery shopping with grover or having beers with dr. teeth or watching football with rolf. just doing something normal only with a muppet.

Wet dreams seem like kind of a hassle, what with all the mess.

And I am living proof of the opposite as well--holding off does not result in them either. But yeh, you can get off on a regular basis and still have nocturnal emissions.

Wait, now I need to hear that song to get it OUT OF MY HEAD

http://img.slate.com/media/1/123125/123050/2133481/2148159/060912_CB_911pic.jpg

Second reaction: if you can't tell that's Williamsburg from the angle, you can tell from the hipsters.

So I almost got shot last night. I was standing in a bus shelter at the corner of Fulton and Damen around 9:30. I heard a little pop no louder than a firecracker from a passing car, and the middle of the three plexiglass panels at the back of the shelter shattered in a fraction of a second.

My first thought was whether the car - red, something like a Jeep Cherokee - would come back around. Second thought was whether to get off of Damen (no cabs or anything nearby), but Fulton is nothing but loading docks and chainlink fences, nowhere to go really.

After five or 10 minutes a cab finally came by. The meter in the cab wasn't working, the driver starts doing all different kinds of math, figuring out rates at a quarter-mile and how many blocks I wanted to go, and I didn't want to listen anymore, just got out on Damen a block or two north of North and gave him a ten. Tried calling two of my oldest and closest friends, Geoff and Sarah G., who were on the phone with each other so didn't pick up until I called back a few times. Geoff and I went to the Beat Kitchen, and I had a big plate of gumbo and a glass of Makers Mark and ice. There was what looked like a company holiday party going on in the back room, with a stage full of people singing some big finale. In the front bar, surf and Chet Atkins versions of Christmas songs. Closing up the tab, the bartender said my eyes looked normal again.

The good thing is this. On the way home, I was thinking about if the bullet had hit me, and thinking about if that had been the end. And I felt good about choices I had made and what I had done yesterday, last week, all this year, and more (something I don't always feel day by day). For one, I had just been auditioning actors - I'm directing this obscure, tough-to-get-a-handle-on short play - and had a great time working with the actors on solving the play, and it was an engaging productive fun time. After auditioning 50 actors for my play and others, the casting director herself offered to read the scene, and she did great work and got the part. A good moment, and a good story. And that's why I was down near Damen and Fulton to begin with - so if I'd gone, it would've been while on the job doing what I love.

Thought about a lot of good conversations and good times over the past day, month, year; thought about the good work done; felt good about the life I've lead, and glad still to be here.