For any Chicagoistas interested, Looptopia is back this Friday night/Saturday morning. Here's hoping that things are better organized and ready for the big crowd they're sure to get than they were last year.

Keep me posted on your shoes, ita, because I have patent shoes I want to stretch, too.

I'm at the Cincinati airport! On the internet! The world is magical!

You know you're in Kentucky, right? Just checking. Also, hi! You're 20 minutes away from me!

I'm not eating, so I don't know if the food is crap.

You're from Texas, right? AVOID SKYLINE CHILI.

Freaky. I just checked online banking to see if I had any bills outstanding I might have missed with the computer changeovers, and so was paying more attention than normal to my credit card account. I had been being so good on this one card, but I had had a finance charge! I called in to ask what I had to do to get rid of it, and he explained that I had a late payment in February, and those usually result in two months of finance charges. And then he credited them for me.

It's really scary how much people can actually do about your financial situation. I mean, I was all "what do I have to do to make it go away?" but I didn't expect credit. Huh. Neat. Guess they keep me as a happy customer for the next little while. Funny how that works.

The 11 manliest cocktails in the world.

No Boilermaker? Pfah.

I do love a good Irish Car Bomb.

I also love the fierce factions that arise when discussing a "proper" martini. My brother insists that basically, you keep the bottle of vermouth on the shelf next to the gin, and that's as close to his martini glass as the vermouth ever needs to get.

It's really scary how much people can actually do about your financial situation. I mean, I was all "what do I have to do to make it go away?" but I didn't expect credit. Huh. Neat. Guess they keep me as a happy customer for the next little while. Funny how that works.

Generally, you just have to call and I've found companies to be pretty good about credit if you can point to a good history with them. But you have to be vigiliant.

I have $10000 of my grad school loans on a credit card because the interest is 3% forever. Except "forever" means you have to be in good standing. I didn't get a bill one month so I was late in paying because I forgot all about it. I called on the due date and sent out a check but still they automatically raised my interest rate to 8% (which meant $75-80 bucks a month in interest). I got it straigtened out and got them to refund most of the charges, but I'm sure they only did it because I had a good history and could make good on my threat to shift the money to another card if necessary.

Most people aren't so lucky and get screwed by companies raising rates as high as 30%. Thanks Congress!

Is a Boilermaker a beer and a shot? I don't think that counts as a cocktail.

And bringing things back to eating in airports, when I had dinner at the Dick Clark restaurant at the Indianapolis airport, my receipt specifically noted that I had NOT had a shot with my beer. Cracked me up.

Most people aren't so lucky and get screwed by companies raising rates as high as 30%.

That'd be me. Well, 23.99%, fuck you very much Bank of America. So I took my CC balance over to a 0% card from my local bank. I have about $8,000 left to pay off, which I should be able to do easily by the end of the calendar year. Unfortunately the 0% only lasts until October of this year, and then it goes up to a rate that I really ought to figure out well before then, so I can either talk to the bank or re-transfer the balance.

But really, nothing was as sweet as moving $12,000 away from BoA. Fuck them and their deceptive shit, like moving the due date UP without informing the customer. Suck it, BoA.

Is a Boilermaker a beer and a shot? I don't think that counts as a cocktail.

You fancy New Yorkers and your cocktails...

Suck it, BoA.

Due to some shit they did to us earlier this year, Imma second this.