After about 2 hours of trying on overly baggy shorts and poorly fitting shirts at several stores, I finally find a pair of shorts and a couple shirts I like. By this point, my coffee and scone is wearing off. I need to eat and I’ve broken a sweat.

While their shirts consistently fit well (no prole gap), Express for Men has always made me uncomfortable with their omnipresent over-eager staff and terrible dance music, so when I step out of there, with a mild case of sticker shock and a considerable case of “leave me the hell alone and quit trying to compete with Abercrombie’s soundtrack”, I’m relieved to see that I’m already next to Macy’s. I’m more than ready to leave.

As soon as I walk in, I realize something’s wrong. I bought a pair of shorts at Macy’s on the first floor, when I first walked in, but now the menswear section is on the second floor and none of the displays look correct. I remember where I parked based on the escalator’s location, so I chalk one up to early senility and head out. The parking lot doesn’t look right at all. Oh well, maybe I actually walked in a different entrance. No luck.

At this point, I’m thoroughly confused. I check my bags, because I know I made my first purchase at Macy’s and sure enough, I have a Macy’s bag, but still, nothing looks right.

I must’ve entered the mall through a different store and just forgotten about it, so I leave Macy’s and head to the other end of the mall. As I do so, everything starts clearing up and I remember that I passed the old, nearly empty Caribou Coffee and the new, completely packed Starbucks when I first came in, so I know I’m going the right direction, now. How could I have been so forgetful? How could I have been so confused about where I’d been shopping? All plausible scenarios point towards me getting some professional help, before I become a danger to myself and others, but then I see it. It’s Macy’s.

The Mall at Tuttle Crossing is a Macy’s sandwich.

Due to a series of mergers and acquisitions, Kaufmann’s and Lazarus have both been renamed Macy’s.

The next time I need some new clothes, I’m just going to walk down to the Short North and pay too much for designer jeans. If, for any reason, I find myself back at the mall, I’m parking by the food court.

You can’t tell from this angle, but this is from a topiary interpretation of Georges Seurat’s painting, A Sunday On The Island Of La Grande Jatte.

See topiarygarden.org

1. He’s not as anti-lobbyist as he’d like you to think.
See Obama’s K Street project and the excellent, source-citing Obama won’t accept money from lobbyists… or will he?.

2. He supports, but then declines public financing for his campaign.
See Obama opts out of public funding.

3. He supports a bill that legalizes the Bush-ordered illegal warrantless wiretapping.
See Obama’s support for the FISA “compromise” and MoveOn.org’s call for him to honor his support of a filibuster.

None of these are deal breakers. I’ll still vote for the guy. I’m still loyal to the lesser-of-two-evils philosophy, so I don’t have a choice.

Now, if we really want to dig into this issue, our Democratic congress is going to look really bad. If you have a little over 6 minutes, I’ll let Keith Olbermann and Jonathan Turley explain:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9Xp0xxU

Yeah… That’ll be the day.

You know I’m not talking about poetry. I’m talking about the restaurant here in the Short North. The sushi is great, the drinks are great, the noodles are great, the atmosphere is damn near perfect and the service is always top notch.

I don’t know anyone who works there, by name. We have a professional, not personal, relationship even though I do feel a strong affinity for the place. That said, it infuriates me to think that someone would dine and dash and then do a hit and run. I take it personally.

There’s nothing to be gained by verbally, or otherwise, attacking the perpetrator. He’s in jail right now and I trust the witnesses and the legal system to do what needs to be done there.

There is, however, something to be done for those injured.

Read the full story at Restaurant Widow and then Donate to the Rachel Widomski Medical Care Trust at HaikuHelp.com.

I’ve already donated a little and will donate more in a couple days, now it’s your turn.

Restaurant Widow has the details on the June 6-8 benefit weekend, if online donations aren’t your thing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C80LKZP5d8M