As Seen in Rogers Park

1. Out to lunch at the Heartland Cafe (mmmm!) with my friend Cara yesterday, a middle aged couple showed up on the sidewalk next to our table. They had a small baby stroller and took turns making googley eyes at the little one inside. Mummy took baby for a walk up and down the sidewalk while we finished off our lattes and I wondered idly if they were parents who were starting later in life, or maybe the grandparents.

"Oh my God!" whispered Cara suddenly.

"What?"

"I - I think that's a dog in there!"

I couldn't look. You already know how I feel about the babyfication of dogs.

"It is. I think it is!!" she said. They were about 5 feet from us.

"Just please tell me this animal is not well - or injured: two broken legs?"

"Umm, no. I really don't think so," she replied.

When I finally gathered the strength to turn and look, this dog was walking quite normally around on the sidewalk.

"I'm speechless," was all I could come up with.

Cara acknowledged that neither my speechlessness nor seeing a dog in a stroller happens every day.

2. I'm sitting in the home office this morning when a kind citizen roller blades through the alley, hollering in a food-hawker-at-the-Cubs-game voice, "Street cleaning! Move your cars! Save some money! Street cleaning!"

Now that's a public service I'd pay for.