Tales from a Diary: 'Another Lousy Day'

Diary entry from Nov. 9, 1961.

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A few years ago, writer David Kodeski was rummaging through an antique store on Chicago's north side when he came across two diaries from 1960 and '61. He bought them, took them home and began to read. The result: "Another Lousy Day," a one-man play that details his quest to find the diary's author -- a single, working woman who lived on the south side.

The diary's author wrote meticulously about her everyday life: how she flirted with her co-workers, fought with her dad, shopped for things she didn't need, and searched for happiness as she worried about her weight and hairdo:

June 26: Another lousy day. Went to our new jobs on colored TV and are they ever awful and feel like I'm in Siberia. I asked Mike a couple of times about the controls and later on he called me over and showed me a book about a Baptist. He was so cute. Went to bed late.

Kodeski and producers Elizabeth Meister and Dan Collison, in association with Chicago Public Radio, have adapted the play into a radio story for All Things Considered.