God, I Love This City...

Parking in Chicago sucks.

A couple of years back, when I was interested in buying a condo here, downtown Chicago introduced me to the wonderful world of the $35,000 parking spot. These babies typically require a separate freaking mortgage on top of the already borderline extortionate dough you put down for the condo itself. I mean, just to park in an attended parking lot, you'll pay anywhere from $165 - $200 minimum. And we're not talking multi-story, valet serviced garages here. We're talking Old Man Jackson packing your car into a sardine can of an open-air gravel lot a few feet from the railroad.

Screw. That.

As an epic cheapass, I find it's more worth my time and effort to park five blocks away on a side-street buttressed by a grocer and a chocolate factory than to actually, you know, pay to park. This outlook has been tested in the past: two slashed tires; an unfortunate incident involving sheet metal and four stories' worth of gravity; a myriad of parking "violations" including what I regard as a monthly, $25 Illegally Tinted Windows recurring charge.

However, nothing compares to this act of douchebaggery:

That's right, I have been robbed. It's actually sort of my fault, if I honestly want to play the "what if" game. I left town for a couple of days on business, and decided against taking my car to the airport. In an effort to save my fiscally concerned employer some Benjamins, I rode the train like any self-respecting Al Gore enthusiast would, leaving my poor little Mazda3 to the mercy of Kinzie Street hooligans.

On top of that, I happened to leave the bracket for my GPS hooked up to my windshield. I suppose that's sort of a dead giveaway that I've got one. You'd think being clever and hiding the device in the last place anyone would look, my center console, would have foiled any actual robbery attempt.

So my GPS is gone, my passenger-side rear window is gone, and they even took my little iPod RF transmitter that lets me listen to static-laced mp3s through the radio! Luckily, a few of my possessions were deemed unworthy of theft. My Dragon frisbee golf disc (it floats!), some Wu-Tang Clan CDs, a basketball, a snow shovel, and my I-Pass all remain.

I guess I have to look at it this way: even if it costs me $200 to replace my defiantly tinted window, and I'm out a $300 GPS device, I would have spent that much on less than 3 months of semi-protected parking.

Chicago, I love you, but you're bringing me down. You know I want your lovin', but honey why are you so hard?