I was visting my grandkids in Chicago last week, and one of my daughter's neighbors dropped in for a holiday drink. He is a native Chicagoan, and we were swapping tales about interactions we have had with crazy street people in Chi and NYC. He swears crazies seek him out for chats, and later volatile outbursts. Crazy women seem to prefer riding buses, and crazy men trains in Chicago.
He was relaxing on a bus ride through downtown, and an 50-ish white woman sat down next to him. She was trying her best to appear glamourous, but looked like a burned-out old ho'. Conversation started innocuously enough, but then drifted into racist comments about all the goddam lazy blacks and hispanics in town (she wasn't so polite). Steve finally had enough and started responding to her, saying people had a right to live and work wherever they wanted. She shouts out: "You must be a Jew!" Steve (who is Italian) jumps up and shouts back: "You bet I'm a Jew and proud of it!" Two seats away, a guy stands up and says "I'm a Jew!", followed by another 5 people on the bus. A petite Hispanic woman raises her hand and says; "I'm a Shew!" At that point the angry woman got up and stormed off the bus. Everyone on the bus had a warm holiday glow after the incident. Steve did confess that he was actually Italian, but the woman really got him angry. Back at the house, Steve wondered why all the crazies he runs across are racists, homophobes, and anti-Semites. I then observed that he had just outlined the base of the Republican party. So which came first, being crazy, or being Republican? I will leave you with that thought. Happy New Year to all!