Sun King

As spots of sunburn invade my body, I happily ignore the itch knowing that it represents that summer might finally be on its way. Yesterday was a rare beautiful weather day in Chicago and I wanted to take full advantage. I decided to take the twenty-five minute train ride to Evanston, Illinois and enjoy the weather. Evanston is home to Northwestern University. I loved Evanston. It is only nine miles from downtown, a quick train ride to Chicago, and a great college town. If I were to sculpt my perfect college town, Evanston wouldn't be too far off. I don't like the idea of a perfect college town to be in a large city (such as Univ. of Minnesota or Boston College.) Yes, there is a small pocket of Minneapolis (Dinkytown) that is obsessed with The U but nobody is calling Minneapolis a College Town. On the other hand, my perfect college town would not be hours away from a major city like Ames, IA - which is about a three hour drive from Kansas City to the South and Minneapolis to the North. Places like Ann Arbor (Michigan), Evanston (NU), Lawrence (KU), Palo Alto (Stanford), Tempe (ASU), et cetera are perfect. They have all the benefits of a small town, plus they can enjoy all the benefits of a big city. Anyway, after walking around NU and downtown Evanston for the day, I went to the beach and for the first time in months, took my shirt off in public to expose my paleness to the world. Hopefully, in the next few weeks, I will be able to get a little color.

1. Did anyone watch The Office season finale last night? I thought this whole year has been pretty unfunny, but yesterday was actually very good. Thoughts?

2. I was watching Sportscenter this morning and in an unbelievable amount of chauvinism, last night The Round Mound of Rebound Charles Barkley said the only thing a woman could do better than him was cook and clean. A woman staffer at ESPN challenged him to a push-up contest and kicked his butt. I would assume video of this will hit youtube quite quickly; I just haven't looked.

3. I like starting my morning with Robin Meade.

4. This morning the Gallup Poll came out with interesting finding about Americans' views on abortion. According to politicalwire.com, more Americans describe themselves as "pro-life" on abortion (51%) than "pro-choice" (42%) for the first time since the Gallup Poll began asking the question in 1995. These results were confirmed in two other recent Gallup surveys and a recent national poll by Pew Research recorded an eight point decline since last August in those saying abortion should be legal in all or most cases, from 54% to 46%. I find these poll results very interesting. I would have thought actually the results would be flip-flopped.