So, yesterday I was walking from the Roosevelt Road Metra station to the Roosevelt Red Line, behind a rural-looking middle-aged man and a skinny girl in pink tank top, tight jeans and pigtails. He's barrel-shaped, bald and bearded, with dark blue flood-length overalls and a blue farmer's shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He's also wearing muddy Caterpillar boots in this 90-degree plus steamy early evening, as the low sun shifts its gaze to deep yellow.

Farmer Pa looks like he's visiting his college-age daughter in the city. There are less savory conclusions that could be drawn, but for the purposes of this particular story we shall ignore them.

At the curb near Wabash and Roosevelt stands a lanky, late teen or twenty-something dude with unruly loooong blond hair - not seen since the heyday of Peter Frampton and Leif Garrett - and a knee-length baggy, baggy plaid shirt and ripped jeans so long his feet are entirely concealed. Suddenly, Leif Frampton begins to stomp and gyrate wildly, seemingly in the throes of a Brazilian fire ant underwear siege. For nearly a minute, "Leif" performs some manic knee-slapping, air-guitar-strumming rain dance while moaning loudly and unintelligibly to unheard rhythms.

A few feet away Farmer Pa and daughter look a bit startled at the sudden burst of activity from the odd-looking young man, but keep walking West up busy Roosevelt Road.

"Must be them i-Pods," Farmer Pa says.

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