All that jazz.

Last night Moody St. Claire, my old friend Hope Valentine and I, Little Miss Westchester headed off to witness a weekly summer event: Jazz in the Park. Every Thursday during the warm summer months Milwaukeeans from all walks of life head downtown to witness a featured jazz musician perform. There is food to be purchased and blankets to be spread, and if you are lucky you can see the stage. We arrived a little late, so were not afforded that luxury; however, that was probably just as well-because there were a lot of people jammed up in front, and nothing pisses me off more than overlapping picnic blankets.

In addition to the fine live soundtrack, the girls and I were delighted at the Grade A people watching that unfolded before us. There was a BAD Hugh Jackman-wannabe walking his dog in a desperate effort to pick up chicks, an all-American couple whose little black puppy spent the entire night trying to get a sip of our beer, and a DELIGHTFUL stream of teenagers that kept "coolly" parading themselves in front of our blanket.

Teenagers at a distance are ok, I guess....but last night one girl in particular stood out in my mind. Dressed in a tight white wife-beater and an UNbelievable short plaid skirt, she was the epitome of class. Every time she walked in front of our blanket it seemed she was trying to convince some unsuspecting lad in her posse to give her a piggy back ride....ok, fine, that's her business. But when she started jumping up and down with nothing under that skirt but a barely-there nude thong-whether WE liked it our not, she made her business EVERYONE's business.

I guess I should just be thankful she wasn't doing her business as well-because that would have incited a truly messy public health violation.

When it was all said and done we all said our goodnights and then slowly meandered home. Drunk on jazz music and, well, alcohol, I feel asleep quickly. Luckily I was only awakened once last night-by a gentleman whose voice embodied that of the monsters in all of my worse nightmares. While I couldn't see the scene below, someone was clearly trying to get him to vacate my building's front stoop-to which he repeatedly replied "Fuuuuuck you, leeeeeeeave me alooooone." His voice, a dead-ringer for Gollum's evil alter-ego in The Lord of the Rings, sent me running to check my deadbolts and tightly closing every blind. Ah, city living.