Some days more than others, I’m really happy I don’t cover any one particular municipality; I’m quite sure I’d have to be shot with a tranquilizer gun before press conferences such as the following, where this gem came out of Gary’s finest, Mayor Rudy “I pass out business cards the size of bookmarks” Clay. The story, written by Jon Seidel, with the parts of interest emboldened:

By Jon Seidel
Post-Tribune staff writer

GARY—Mayor Rudy Clay and Police Chief Thomas Houston touted the city’s June homicide rate Friday and accused media of ignoring the story.

Since a new police administration took control, Gary’s homicide rate has been cut to a fifth of what it was in May.

Fifteen people were killed in Gary last month, while three people were killed in the city in June as of Friday.

“We couldn’t even get it in the classified ads,” Clay said.

During a news conference held to swear in police reserve officers, Clay told his audience Gary recorded one homicide in June.

“Gary, Indiana, has had less homicides than Munster, Indiana,” Clay said.

According to the Lake County Coroner’s office, though, Gary had three homicides in June. Munster had one.

Later that day, a Gary Police Department spokesman confirmed the coroner’s records.

He said the mayor meant to say Gary had one homicide in 23 days.

On Friday afternoon, Clay emphasized that two of those occurred in domestic situations. A domestic homicide, he said, doesn’t mean the city is violent.

“I have continued to stand up and say to the world that Gary is not a violent city,” Clay said.

At the news conference, Houston said people would not be safe to march in a violent city, making reference to the Gary Catholic Diocese’s Golden Jubilee celebration.

Houston and Deputy Chief Thomas Branson assumed their new roles at the police department last month. ...[snip]

Here’s something special for y’all to ponder, especially if you like your cooters bald as ping-pong balls:

Lookit

Nope, haven’t looked at the illustration and not gonna. Sure makes me glad I feel no particular urgency to rid myself of ALL my Eastern European hair coating, though. Oof.

[Via Gawker]

that the guy I dumped for Shmollis was nicknamed “Zygote” by my friends and me. Dorky though he was, he didn’t particularly LOOK like a zygote, so no, I don’t remember how that came about.

So this Myspace thing has kind of taken off like a cancer for me, like it do—you know, getting all excited about having a shit-ton of “friends” and being all disappointed when someone doesn’t “friend” you back. My biggest disappointment? My junior prom date.

Backstory: Shmollis (not his real name, obviously, but if you look real hard, you can probably figure it out because you’re all smart like that) and I met when we were competing in Speech & Debate; he was a cute little (emphasis on “little,” since he was about 5’7 tops) ginger kid and I—well, I was dating this guy from yet another team who wrote me badly-spelled letters every single day and who was also really dorky looking. Shmollis and I clicked, and he asked me to go to prom. I ditched the other guy, Shmollis and I went, had a fantastic time and ended up going out for about half the summer, as much as you can call liking someone who lives an hour away “going out with” at 17. Had his class ring and the whole 9 yards.  Then, for reasons unclear to me at the time, he asked for his ring back. I of course was rather crushed, but we agreed to be “friends” (as you all nod knowingly).

I might’ve mentioned here a time or two that back in my younger days, I was never known for my tact; that little detail never became more apparent than when one day, I was at a card store and found a card that you send to people you haven’t heard from for awhile. I can’t remember the exact gist, but the punchline was three check-off boxes with answers—the third of which was “Go Fuck Yourself.” At 17, that’s freakin’ hilARIous, so I checked off No. 3 and sent it to him, knowing that he would think it was hilarious, too.

Yeah, I called that one wrong. He spent most of our senior year ignoring me at meets. I know, right?

Well, then a year goes by, and I’ve finished my freshman year at college. I was getting ready for work and the phone rings. I pick it up, and wow! It was Shmollis! I was stunned and happy to hear from him, so I did that nervous talking thing that people sometimes get and blathered on about this, that and the other. And at the end of the conversation, he says, “You haven’t changed a bit.” Huh? What’s that supposed to mean? I thought to myself, but I don’t remember acknowledging it in any way at the time. But never heard from him again.

Ten years later, 1999: I’m at the magazine for which I used to work, and googling people has become my latest obsession. I google our old friend Shmollis and find that he’s at college in state. I’m sure I was depressed at the time, so I send him what I thought was a friendly e-mail with the line, “You know, I never understood what you meant when you said I hadn’t changed until [whenever it was that it occurred to me that, I don’t know, maybe he felt I was self-centered], but now I do ...” blah blah blah, and to e-mail me back sometime. You know, because I’d gained some perspective or some shit. And he never did, but it was easy to pass that off as maybe I sent it to the wrong e-mail address, although with a name like Schmollis, it’s a little hard to get that wrong, even for me.

So now, it’s 2007, and for fun I look up our old pal Schmollis to see if he has a Myspace page. Sure enough, he does—after a stint in the military and graduating from school, he’s back living in his hometown. I debated—It’s been 20 years since we were in high school and since I showed him my ass in that card. Should I “friend” him, thinking that hey! it’s been 20 years, he’ll be amused at the blast from the past; or should I leave it alone because he’s still pissed. I threw caution to the wind. That was about a month ago. No Shmollis.

I mean, seriously, people! I went on a ROLLER COASTER for this guy during the day-after prom at Great America. The LEAST he can do is put me on one of his back pages as a friend.

So the other day as I was going through the Gawker comments as I’m known to do, one of the regulars was commenting on how, when he feeds his dog people food, he/she/it “farts like a mental patient.” I swear to GOD, that was the funniest thing I’ve read in about a week (after one of my editors sent me a fake story about how one of the towns was going to use its well-known paraplegic’s guy in a wheelchair’s lap to shoot off fireworks, of course. Yes, I AM fully aware that I’m going to Hell. Why do you ask?) Poppy didn’t find it quite as funny as I did, but Kaffy sure did, and we laaaaaaaaaaaaughed and laaaaaaaaaaaughed about it last night.

In other news, I came to the sad, sad realization yesterday that I can no longer walk out of the house sans bra.