Parker got a chance to stick his nose out the window of a moving car both days this weekend:

After some trial and error, and even though he's still unclear on the concept, Parker finally got down and dirty with the tug toy yesterday:

Oh, dear. I can't wait until they start building this, just one block from my office:

Developers went public Thursday with their plan for another race to the sky, this one in downtown Evanston: A proposed condominium tower that would crack the 500-foot barrier and become the tallest building in Chicago's suburbs.

Sure to incite heated debate in a suburb already in the throes of a high-rise building boom, the plan calls for tearing down a two-story retail building on a triangular block bounded by Church Street, Orrington and Sherman Avenues, and replacing it with a sliver-thin, 49-story condominium tower sheathed in glass and metal.

Pity, because the building they're tearing down is actually quite charming. It gets "better:"

The plan also envisions tearing down a 1940s mid-rise office building at the block's south end and replacing it with a low-rise restaurant building whose footprint would be half as large. The developers still have to purchase that property.

I'm torn. I think Evanston has to grow taller, but the old buildings in its downtown are part of its charm.

Another one bites the dust.

(Via Talking Points Memo.) The Senate Judiciary Committee would like Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to return within a week:

We believe the Committee would benefit from you searching and refreshing your recollection and your supplementing your testimony by next Friday to provide the answers to the questions you could not recall last Thursday.

Ouch.

I'm just now listening to the podcast of last Saturday's Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me! Host Peter Sagal had this to say about entertainer Don Ho, who died last week:

Sagal: He also did his patriotic part to populate his home state. He is survived by 10 children, 15 grandchildren, 19 great-grandchildren, and 2 great-great-grandchildren.

Adam Felber: Ho, Ho, Ho!

Sagal: I'm sorry, I was just thinking: He had all these babies...in diapers...that means dozens of nappy-bottomed Hos.

Oy.

OK, it's really time for new photos. I've been too lazy busy to take new ones lately, so it's time for another classic, this one from early October:

People have asked me how big Parker is. Just knowing he weighs 23kg doesn't help much. So, by way of illustration, here is Parker and his crate with a helpful yard (90 cm) stick in the shot:

Hmm. Problems with the new ParkerCam angle have become apparent in short order. Dogs naturally sleep with their backs to the wall. So putting the ParkerCam against the back wall of the room means we get six hours of Parker's butt today:

Back to one, I guess.

Emboldened, perhaps, by his recent successes with tennis balls, yesterday afternoon Parker decided to hunt bigger game. Alas, his spatial-reasoning abilities have not yet fully developed: