monzyummylunch

Busy!

Busy, busy day! Barbequed chicken breast on turano whole wheat bread with an apple anda can of Diet Rite. Have a fun New Year's Eve and try to avoid Dick Clark!

Dinked!

Monz mixes the expected with the unexpected: BBQ chicken on whole wheat, apple, and some Sabra (tm) hummus.

You know, there's lots to worry about in this worrisome world. Like crime, health, and...retirement! Recently the financial editor (FE) visited Dinky Town to see how much a typical strapping youngish attorney might prepare for his or her retirement. Estimating all figures, he received some bracing results as to options needed to achieve the desired goal:

Increase contributions to 70.38% of your income.
Increase your rate of return before retirement to 23.54%.
Reduce your required income at retirement to 7% of your final year's income.
Delay your retirement until age 115.

We don't know about you, but we're going to Binny's as soon as possible!

Looks Can Be Deceiving!

For a lark we zillowed the Monz' palace. It returned an estimated value of $....a lot! From this amount one might infer that the Monz is rich! Only in munificence! The truth of the matter is that home value is deceiving -- who knows how much the mortgage is, how accurate the estimate is, how much better halfs are contributing, etc.

You can't judge a book by it's cover. And you can't judge a lunch by it's trover, as is the case with Monz' lunch of bbq chicken breast on untarnished whole wheat bread, an apple, and a cornbread muffin from Boston Market(tm). We were expecting "unbelievably yummy" or "eh." We got "far too sweet"! And yes, looks are deceiving -- we made up the word "trover"!

UPDATE!
It's only the muffin that's sweet, the lunch as a whole was yummy. Monz' impression of today's post "...(imitating the editors) and we decided to take our orneryness out on the Monz - yay!"

Clark McDerment!

Today we introduce a new editor, no-nonsense Pulitzer Prize nominated (by us) newshound, Clark McDerment.

BBQ chicken sandwich on Turano (tm) multigrain bread -- Monz was too tired to go to Subway(tm) though he wanted to. Over the weekend there was a chickenella [fanciful word for poorly wrapped chicken contaminating nearby food in the refrigerator, inserted at the insistence of the Literary Editor and not CM] crisis in Monz' fridge, which forced a complete overhaul in inventory. No spread in the Monz' life, but as a result of the fridge adventure a new horseradish sauce (Boorshead) was tried. It's superfulous today but may be had later on. No accompanyment. Too tired. We asked the Monz if he believed that this relatively light lunch will have an impact on dinner? No -- Monz is in charge of dinner tonight and doesn't know what it will be yet. Shopping will be required. Dominick's or Jewel? Monz doesn't know. What's that crunchy sound -- an apple?! No, it's the crusty burned side of the chicken! (Clark feels bad but he will allow nothing to soil his journalistic rep). If you skip making dinner and go to a resturant, where would you go? Nick's newly opened Fishmarket in the north suburbs.

Listen, Do You Want to Know a Secret?

Dittolunch from two days ago, except Sara Lee whole wheat bread. We implored Monz for more information about this and whatever else is going on in his life. An appologetic Monz replied "Nuttin' Don't know nothing, I've got nothing to say."

Maybe because Monz is preoccupied. As we've mentioned in the past, Mark Monz has a secret admirer. Actually he has lots, but this one sends him Christmas presents. As we have also mentioned, he believes that someone on the editorial staff (specifically, the EIC) is "the Secret." The EIC has strongly and consistently denied this, to no avail. He's offered to take a lie detector test and split the costs. Monz believes this is the pretending-not-to-be-The-Secret version of disinformation. Monz argues that the handwriting on the various items sent by The Secret vary, and that the postmarks on these packages are from places the EIC either lives or works near. The EIC counters that 1) he has never been shown these allegedly different handwriting specimens, 2) he lives and works in the city of Chicago (the same metro area as Monz grew up in and has many longtime admirers, of which The Secret can be many) and if The Secret truly wished to remain secret she (or he) would try to disguise their handwriting by various means (a typical Monz remark towards this end: "ok, you obviously got some chick to write this"). On and on it goes. We at MYL think it's time to get your input, dear reader. What does your intuition tell you?

Is the EIC "The Secret"?
	Yes!
	No!
Free polls from Pollhost.com

What Monz "B"!

Monz has a momentous lunch, returning to his old company for their annual Christmas party, because even though old company parted company with the Monz, their appreciation for Monz and his MonzMu never waned. It was so festive we could barely hear the Monz and he had to leave before telling us about lunch other than it was from Olive Garden (tm).

We've got mail!
>>"What we really want to know is what Monz looks like. Come on!"<<

Ok. Take...

1/4 Brad Pitt
1/4 Brian Urlacher
1/4 Brian Williams
1/8 Bobby Sherman
1/8 Benny Hill

And you've got the Monz. Told you it was beauty week!

UPDATE!

"Ok, I've left the party -- call me and I'll tell you what I had for lunch, if you haven't already impertently and impatiently blogged"

...

Festo Italiano! Lasagna with breadsticks and salad, chicken parmesian, meatballs, and available but not consumed alfredo fettucini and sausages. Catered from Olive Garden.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall!


Continuing beauty week on MYL, Monz never hid his love for great beauty or the band ABC (though truth be told he didn't love them as much as thought a couple of their tunes were good. Monz does hold Ern in high regard...). So without further ado, we relay the big news from the current issue of Consumer Reports: Oil of Olay Regenerist(tm), subtitled "Enhancing Lotion, Perfecting Cream and Daily Regenerating Serum," topped the wrinkle cream effectiveness ratings, and was the third lowest priced of the nine products tested, 1/3 the cost of several of the products. Interestingly, CR's tests found no correlation between performance and active ingredients.

Monz' lunch was a beaut: bbq chicken breast on yummy, chewey bagel bread. The chew of the bread ballanced by the crunch of an apple!

Skin Deep!

To get to yesterday's puzzler (better late than never), Wally Phillips was an inexplicably megapopular morning radio host on the middle age-centric WGN-AM (also home of the Chicago Cubs). Phillips was so popular that when he published his book it made the national bestseller list despite his lack of a national following. Anyway, in the book he recounted a late 1960's study from Laussane University in France where international students were questioned about beauty. A composite sketch of features was made from the results (those are Egyptian eyes, if you didn't know). Since beauty is ageless, we compare a picture of actress Scarlet Johansson, who Esquire magazine recently named the world's paragon of beauty. Theoretically they should look alike, right? Judge for yourself!

In this spirit, Monz travels around the world...well, to another town for a great Indian lunch buffet!

Hello Wally!



What do these two images have in common? We'll let you ponder that riddle until tomorrow. Meanwhile, Monz ponders what happened to his lunch plans. He awoke with vigor, planning to seize the day and take a long lunch road trip. But somehow he wound up going to the CSC for a turkey sandwich and a large chili (which for some strange reason is a CSC "seasonal offering." Wonder if Tank Johnson tried it!

Just Call Us Angel of the Morning, Angel!

Monz' faith in the power of bird does not falter: home bbq chicken breast on thin blackbread. And an apple.

Some may wonder how we at MYL can afford to give out the great prizes to our contest winners. Many felt it was Monz' munificence until Monz, beacon of truth that he is, disabused readers of any such notions. But the question remains, how do we do it? Could it be this and this?

We Be Illin'!

With chills and pills and down-filled fills. Wish we were chillin' with some Hussey's chilli (like the Monz!) or get to grillin. We're gonna give it to the world,peace lunch and monz. The undeniable magic of the burgony lunch box. Nyquil kicking in...

End of an Era!


Monz informs the world of today's lunch: corned beef and swiss on wholegrain bread, apple. He also decrees that the editors' promissed beauty secret be delayed so as to allow the music editor (ME) space for the following reflection...and poll!

Yesterday I got stuck downtown after work, and didn't start heading to the "el" station until 7pm. Across the street I saw the sign on the Tower Records window: "Only 8 Days Left!" In other words, 8 days until the store, and all other Tower Records establishments, close forever. Having speant so much time (and money) at Tower, I felt obliged to stop in. They had turned off the air conditioners/heaters/any sort of ventilation and stopped running the escalator. The well picked over remains of dvds and cds were being picked over again by a rag-tag assortment of music hipsters and bargain seekers. "All CD's 70% off lowest marked price, all magazines a dime, make us an offer on fixtures, if you come back tomorrow it might be gone!" I went up and down the ailes, most of them bare, and up the escalators until I reached the third floor hoping to find some quirky spoken word thing but none was to be had....exiting the stuffy/humid/warm store and heading to the el stop, I didn't look back.

And now a quiz in the form of a poll. See the "...." in the ME's melancholy story? That represents what may have happened before he left the store. Our quiz provides a fun way for our readers to guess what happened, as well as provide some input as to what the Monz would say had he been there (though Monz sightings in Tower are historically very rare. No wonder they're going out of business!

What Did the Music Editor buy at Tower's Firesale / What Would Monz Have Bought Instead?
	Jerry Jeff Walker compilation / The Byrds Sweetheart of the Rodeo reissue
	Karyn White Facts of Love / Marvin Gaye's Greatest Hits
	Fozzy All that Remains / some Twisted Sister comeback album
	Nothing -- just a bunch of music and political mags for 10cents a pop / Nothing
Free polls from Pollhost.com

"Ultimately They Mean the Same Thing, But It's the Phrasing That's Important!"

The above wisdom was imparted by the Monz just moments ago (if you really need to know the context, er, email him). We here at MYL put monzwisdom to work right away: beauty is only skin deep, but a pin pricking the skin can hurt like hell, so we will reveal a great beauty secret in tomorrow's report. And we can get away with such a slight post, because Monz' lunch was very hearty: corn beef sandwich on wholegrain bread with swiss chese and horeseymustard, apple, and 2 corn bread muffins (leftover from Boston Market).

UPDATE!

We just learned that it's Mrs. Monz' birthday! Happy Birthday Mrs. Monz!

MYL "That sounds good. But you should augment it with something funny. You know where you might find something funny and quirky?"
Monz: "Where?"
MYL "The tollway oasis"
Monz: "Dude!"
MYL "What?!"
Monz: "That's the worst idea I've ever heard!"

Disappearing Lunch!

Today is a day for new things. In that spirit, today I had a Wiener Schnitzel sandwich on WG bread with Swiss Cheese, an apple and some yogurt. It was very good. Mrs. Monz wanted me to give the Schnitzel to a beaver that was running around in the backyard. I said, "No! This schnitzel shall become my yummy lunch!" and it did.

Big Bucks, No Whammies, Courtesy of Monz Yummy Lunch!

Announcing the third annual Monzyummylunch "Yummify the Monz' Lunch" contest!!! To play, submit via the e-mail link on the blog (not the comments section) a suggestion for a yummy Monz lunch. Entries will be judged on ease of preparation and/or ordering/retrieving, uniqueness, and of course yumminess! Each entry gets a chance to win $1,000.00!!! (shout out to Andy of season 2 of The Apprentice for the idea). The winner gets a gift certificate to a resturant that Monz has eaten at!!! Here are the lahyaheese rules: one entry per e-mail address (so make it count and please don't cheat by sending different entries with different e-mail addresses!), all decisions of the editors final, void where prohibited, limit of 25 entries total (first come, first played), all entries must be received by December 31, 2006, no Wisconsin residents because they have barred out of state residents from entering their state's short story contest, no Alabama residents because the editors think that outside of Birmingham, the free state of Winston County, and a few other places Alabama ain't no sweet home but rather it sucks, contestants will be assigned heads or tails by editors depending on their mood then a coin will be tossed a lucky thirteen times and if the coin turns up the same pre-picked side each time a pair of dice will be rolled which if turns up the same number of characters as are in the smallest segment of the e-mail address the contestant will receive $1,00.000 (U.S.) in equal installments over a period of one hundred years, however the award will not be paid if the submitted lunch makes Monz sick except in the case where lunch is purchased from a commercial food establishment or preparer in which case the entrant is off the hook unless he or she is in cahoots with said establishment or preparer, employees/friends/family/other relations to either the eidtors or the Monz or his place of work are allowed and encouraged to enter this contest. A note on the photo -- we took this from a Press Your Luck fan site which we would normally attribute except for the snarky note about screenshots, as-if he were the illustrator and not some dude with a print-key button and Microsoft Paint. Dude, you're out of the contest too! RIP Pete.)

Pizza from CSC:

"How would you rank their pizza on a scale of 1-10?"
"7"
"That's not bad."
"It doesn't suck, you know?"

UPDATE!
"Monz here. I will not be personally liable for any of the prizes the editors have held out, even if the editors are run over by a truck."

What You Krav!

In perusing the Winter Semester Latin School "Live & Learn" Catalog, the Health Editor (HE) came across this course:

Krav Maga®: Hottest New Fitness Craze
Learn what all the "buzz" in the fitness community is about as you try Krav Maga® - the official hand-to-hand combat regimen of the Israeli Army. Once taught only to law enforcement agencies, it is now available for civilians. Krav Maga® training focuses on teaching simple self-defense techniques specifically designed for reality-based attack. It integrates several martial arts techniques as well as a western fighting stance. The class also will focus on conditioning. Sanctioned wraps are required and are available in POW's store.

Shoot, Monz had this stuff down back in high school! Munificiently, we'll give you a lesson from memory right now! (The above photo is not completely accurate, so read carefully)

From a standing-at-ease position, jump into KravMonza Stance (right foot out, shoulders rotated so as to be nearly paralel with the face of the soon-to-be victim), simulatenously raising right arm, fist clenched, so as to be in front of your face at a 110 degree angle from the horizontal. Finally, and the most important part, make a short, sharp yelp that sounds like a cross between "woah!" and "woo!" The combination of this primal sound of manly combat and agressive body positioning will make your opponent cower and run in fear, but only if you do it precisely. Else, box ya dude!

We're getting hungry just thinking about this. How about a turkey club / salad heavy on the beets combo at an unusual place: Louie's! But dudes, where's the bread?!

Panther Dash!

Here's the deal: sitting in the office fridge is a delicious 3-chicken tamale lunch from Whole Foods (plus apple, also from Whole Foods). But, something stands in your way: 3 angry, deposing lawyers! Do you give up on your chosen yumminess and head to The Place for The Usual? No! You stalk the kitchen like a nimble wilderbeast, then strike like lightning when an opening appears. In tribute to the Monz' bold move(take that, Ford!), the editors went to The Place for The Usual, but with added honey mustard.

Smack!

Today the Literary Editor (LE) was walking to McDonalds for lunch when he came to a crosswalk with a red light. It's a cold and blustry day in the Windy City and the LE turned his face to his right to avoid the stream of cold wind that was abraiding his face. There he saw a middle aged couple, embracing each other through their winter coats, kissing their goodbye. "Smack!" he heard as the two bobbed their heads towards each other, their lips meeting and pulling apart. "Smack!" he heard as they did it again. The LE turned his head back to the wind so as to give these lovers their moment, and a seemingly never-ending string of "Smack!"'s ensued, making the LE uncomfortable. The light switched to "Walk," the LE enterred the crosswalk, hearing the fading sound of the lovers muttering words that sounded like a sweet-sorrowed parting.

As he ate his Chicken McGrill, the LE thought this was quite the Stuart Dybek moment. For those new to the blog or not part of the literarti, Dybek is a local writer who gained fame through "photograph of life"-like short stories of Chicago. He was all the rage during, if the LE recalls correctly, late 70's through mid 80's, then he dropped off the radar until the turn of the millenium. Or at least it seemed like he did. Monz keenly observed something to the contrary, reflected by his oft-quoted remark "Hey, it's me, Stuart Dybek, oh yes I'm here, again, surprise!"

And with this we recall that Monz sometimes describes characters such as this as a "smack." And we suspect there were many "smacks" caused by his lunch, so yummy it's a carbon copy of yesterday.

Checkers and King Timahoe (or Something Like That!)

We give thanks to Mark Monz and his lunch of a turkey sandwich with stuffing from Whole Foods on whole grain bread (from Antons). We can hear the apple ("Pinova") and some Organic Valley (tm) string cheese.

With all the talk about Presidents lately, we gave Monz the "What Modern President Are You?" Poll.

You Are Most Like Richard Nixon

Oh sure, you give people plenty of reasons to call you "Tricky Dick." But you're actually quite diplomatic, even though you secretly hate your enemies.

How Do You Like Your T-Bone, Part Deux!

It's a wintry, blizzardy, burrrrr!-y day in Chicago. Monz plays hooky from work...and from the blog, as deadline has past without word of lunch (though we had heard it was going to be an extra special homemade delight, so check the comments!). In its place we provide thisextra special audio track which we feel is in keeping with the myl spirit.

UPDATE!

Like the day, lunch goes awry, but salvaged by bbq chicken, string cheese, braided pretzles (honey mustard).