The sound of a dresser drawer woke me up out of a good sleep. I look at the clock and what do you know… it’s 2:22am.
Not only does my mom leave the occasional dime lying around for me to find, but she likes to check up on me often at 2:22am.
So I say my three “Hail Mary’s” and watch the clock turn to 2:23am. I roll over and close my eyes and can’t sleep.
Friday is beginning a little earlier than expected this week.
First thing that comes to mind are the tasks that need to be done today. The dreaded middle of the month bills… but then I realized it’s Bastille Day. Which means I traditionally watch one of my favorite movies, “Casablanca.”
I’ve watched this classic black and white since it was on WGN when I was a kid. I rented it often from the movie rental place that was on Madison Avenue near Ridgeland in Oak Park all the time.
I finally bought it on VHS so I didn’t have to rent it. I owned it on DVD and now it’s under my “Favorites” tab on Amazon Prime.
So tonight I’ll make a martini and stream it.
Humphrey Bogart playing Rick Blaine is one of the greatest characters in movie history.
Men respected him, women loved him and the bad guys feared him. He treated everyone equal and he didn’t cower down to the fucking nazis.
(Spell check just tried to capitalize that last “N” word. My dad taught me never to do that)
Ingrid Bergman was beautiful, but she was a hot mess. Dooley Wilson as “Sam” gave me my first taste of a classic piano standard and I learned who Peter Lorre was from his scummy character, Ugarte.
Whenever I hear the Al Stewart song “Year of the Cat” I understand the lyric, “You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre…Contemplating a crime.”
So on this day the French celebrate the defeat of the monarchy and gained independence it is fitting that today is National French Fry Day…. Look it up! I’m not bullshiting you!
The Chalkboard quote is by a Swiss guy named Carl Jung.
Basically it means that when we can finally figure out what our purpose in life is we can finally have clarity to live a better us.
I’m not sure I’m close to defining the purpose of my life right now. The definition always changes, but tonight I’ll be at Rick's Café Américain eating French fries with my gin martini.
Happy Friday Chalkheads.
