Super Bowl Snuffle

So I called up my friend Kiljoong to ask him if he wanted to go see Volver, because it's Almodóvar and I like Penelope Cruz when she's acting in Spanish. (For some reason her voice grates on me something awful when she's speaking English. I realize that I am insane.) He doesn't pick up so I leave him a voice mail saying, "Blah blah blah Century Centre Thursday or Friday would work but if that's no good for you Sunday would be fine too." (As I'm typing this I'm realizing that tonight wouldn't have worked, actually, but it turns out not to be relevant.)

A couple of hours later he calls me up to tell me he's sick as a dog.

"Do you have finals?"

He laughs. In all the time I've known him, the only time Kiljoong ever gets sick is during finals week. Like clockwork. He put so much pressure on himself and works so hard that he invariably develops a debilitating cold. Since he's been in school for most of the time I've known him--he's working on his PhD now--it's become a regular cycle.

No, he tells me, he doesn't have finals. Furthermore, Thursday and Friday are no good for him, and am I SERIOUS ABOUT SUNDAY?!?!?

"What?"

"Sunday."

". . . oh." The Super Bowl.

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

I start laughing, which is perhaps unwise. "I don't pay attention to football, you know that."

"Dave. It's the Bears. You live in Chicago."

Both good points. And of course I see the Bears stuff every day on the TV and the newspapers and the streets and OK everywhere. But it's part of a reality adjacent to my own.

Kiljoong tries to talk me into going to some Super Bowl party with him.

"I wasn't planning on watching it."

"Don't you watch the commercials?"

"Sometimes? I guess? If they put them online."

He sighs, and asks me if there's a showing before the game. I ask him what time the game starts. This sets off a whole new round of apoplexy. I can hear him shaking his head at my apathy.

"If there's a 12:00 show or something, I'll go. But you'll have to understand if I'm tense."

"Think of me as a calming influence, since I'm not worried about it."

"You're indifferent. It's not the same thing."

Suddenly it clicks. "Oh my god! That's why you've got a cold! You're so stressed about the game that you've made yourself sick!"

"Shut up."

"You're pathetic. God, what if it was the Cubs?!?"

"If it was the Cubs," he says patiently, "I wouldn't even be speaking to you."

Tammy Todd's Door

Tammy Todd's Door
Originally uploaded by Snurri.

"The immediate cause of the Exile may never be known. In those soggy April days immediately following the event, when mobs were the rule, accusations and counter-accusations flew with regularity. As Walter Wenstrup pointed out in his pamplet A Call For Civic Order (largely ignored at the time), there are several factors which make isolating the cause largely an intellectual exercise. As Wenstrup states, '[n]either the offender(s), nor their offense(s), nor the aggrieved and/or their agents, nor the precise magickal means of this punitive action are known. One piece of the picture might help bring the rest into focus, but our scope of investigation being limited by our very isolation, patience and diligence are our only recourse.' Wenstrup himself postulated that some collective crime had precipitated the city's removal from common geography. Of course, Wenstrup himself was on more than one occasion singled out as the probable target of the Exile. . . . One of the more popular targets of public suspicion was Micah Ogden AKA Tommy Todd, one half of the popular co-ed burlesque act 'Maggie and Todd' with Alyx Scarpetta AKA Maximum Maggie. Ogden's solo portion of their nightly performances was notorious for the feats of erotic magic he performed, including the apparent summons of a female sex demon with which he simulated intercourse (amidst a complex arrangement of scarves and loincloths in order to circumvent the local decency laws) and a routine in which he danced with his shadow which some observers found offensive for its homoerotic undertones. (Ironically, such performances would be considered tame by today's standards, as any evening spent in the Robinson Tunnel clubs will illustrate.) . . . Todd and Maggie's act (as well as their romantic relationship) had ended some months prior to the Exile, and Todd had dropped out of sight. It was rumored that infernal orgies took place behind the bright yellow door of his home on South Oak Street. A recently divorced fireman accused Todd of seducing him in his dreams. In truth, Todd was in seclusion recovering from recent sexual reassignment surgery; his isolation was so complete that he did not learn of the Exile until a full week after it had happened. By that time he (more correctly, she) was the favorite scapegoat of high-rise demagogues and radio call-in shows. Todd, using the first name Tammy, granted an interview to the Star-Chronicle in which she tried to defend herself from the mounting wave of attacks, to no avail. Maximum Maggie appeared on the Channel 9 news to refute some of the charges, claiming that congress with demons had never been a part of their act and that she herself had appeared, disguised as a succubus, in those portions of Todd's act. . . . The public would not be mollified, however, and on April 14, 1966 a mob marched on Todd's home and demanded that 'he' surrender himself. (In the face of the marvels of the previous ten days, the collective refusal to accept Todd's re-gendering is perhaps unsurprising.) When Todd did not emerge, the restless crowd surged forward, only to be repelled by what one citizen described as 'some force both electrical and concussive, which caused me to lose consciousness for some minutes . . . [w]e soon found that we dared not approach the door, let alone lay hands upon it; even projectiles could not damage it.' It seems that Todd had sealed herself inside, and as far as anyone has been able to determine, she is there to this day. . . . Not long after, Maximum Maggie went into hiding as well, although she is still known to do voiceover work." (p.17-18)