Ellie's Hoover Birthday

Jonah and Ellie have celebrated every birthday they have ever had with Hoover. This means a lot of the same faces in their birthday photos. People move on. Yet they remain part of our Hoover community. Once a Hooverite always a Hooverite. And that's true for Jonah and Ellie too. They'll always be Hooverites.

Just the other day over breakfast, which really means between spills, because in our house breakfast is made up of a few minutes of feverishly fast eating bracketed by catastrophic spills, I was explaining to Ellie and Jonah the idea behind Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities. That's not the guy who directed The Royal Tenenbaums. That's Wes Anderson. Benedict Anderson is a social scientist, like his brother Perry. In my head I see Jonah and Ellie following in their footsteps. Except instead of writing 600 page backpack busting books, they'll tweet.

The idea in Imagined Communities is that any community larger than a primordial village is an imagined community. Hoover isn't really larger than a primordial village. And we have some of the same problems our primordial ancestors did. Like surviving brutal winters and trying to find subsistence at Bartlett. But - and this is my point, although it took a characteristically long time to get here - once people move on and leave Hoover they become part of our imagined community. Preserved in our photos, but as importantly, in our thoughts. December third we'll reassemble for Jonah's birthday. He'll be four and it'll be the fourth birthday he's celebrated with Hoover. And in some sense, if you believe this stuff about Hoover being, in Anderson's words, "a deep, horizontal comradeship," that goes on and on and extends across time and through space, then every birthday Jonah and Ellie celebrate will be celebrated with their Hoover community. Jonah will be 40 on 12/3/45. That should be easy to remember. Let's meet in the lounge. I'll probably wear a blue shirt.

Trouble with the law

You know those celebrity mug shots that get published in the newspaper and all over the web? It happens every time someone famous gets arrested for something - driving too fast or kicking the authorities or just having bad hair (which is a crime in L.A.). Unfortunately, Ellie and Jonah had some legal trouble earlier today. Now their mug shots are all over the web.

Their legal representatives have told us not to say too much. But here's the basic story. We spent some time up on the north side today. Which always makes us a little nervous. We are all south siders at heart. And the pace of things on the north side, their inattentive drivers, and the price tags on things up there, all take a little getting used to. After a trip to the zoo and a little shopping we wanted to grab a bite to eat. Here in Hyde Park, of course, you can just walk into almost any dining establishment and get a seat right away. At most you wait a few minutes. That's not the way things are on the north side. Up there, restaurants routinely make you wait an hour or more for a table. And that's for brunch at a place that's no better than Salonica. They might have fancier lighting, and the place might be painted lime green and orange, and the chairs are usually deliberately mismatched. But, you know, you get waffles and eggs and pancakes. What's the whoop?

Well, when the hostess told us it was going to be an hour wait, Ellie cried. She's 2. She was hungry. It's understandable she'd cry. But it turns out there is a city law prohibiting crying in Lincoln Park restaurants. It interferes with the joie de vivre that Lincoln Parkers feel they have earned. After all, you don't pay that much for a condo to have it all ruined by someone crying at your brunch spot. There's an exception in the law for Cubs fans. I mean, think about it, how can you stop them from crying? That's what they do.

In any event, the restaurant called the police. They showed up and asked Ellie to quit crying. She couldn't. Then they arrested Jonah too because he was talking about dinosaurs. According to the law, while waiting for their table, diners are supposed to stand on the sidewalk outside the restaurant and talk about pleasant things. And while it isn't explicitly illegal to talk about dinosaurs, the police said it violated the spirit of the law, because dinosaurs are all extinct. And that's a little sad.

If you want to contribute to Ellie and Jonah's legal defense fund, feel free to buy a Hell Does Freeze Over shirt, using the convenient Pay Pal button to the right. Just don't wear the shirt to brunch in Lincoln Park. It might bum out someone.

Dancing in the ER

With injuries and illnesses, Hooverites have had their share of trips to the ER lately. It's so reassuring, though, every time you pull up to the ER and find an army of begowned doctors and nurses waiting to administer care. Well. It's kind of like that.

Please: let's try to stay healthy Hoover. But one thing about this recent surge of visits to the ER - we've gotten to see Hooverlove in action. From friends who stay (and stay and stay and stay) with Hooverites waiting to get treated, to spontaneous song and dance routines in the ER, to Hooverites sharing their phones so complete strangers can make 30 minute calls to 1-800 numbers of questionable pedigree. We've offered to buy candy and soda for non-Hooverites made miserable by long waits. We've even - gasp! - set aside our books for hours at a time so we can sit beside friends when they needed us. Here at the University of Chicago, that is the greatest sacrifice we can make. And a pure expression of Hooverlove.