I have a confession to make. I have become a huge fan of YouTube. If you are not on the Internet, you really don’t know what you have been missing by not being able to go to that website.

YouTube allows people to put their own homemade movies on the Internet. Or they post clips of TV programs on the net. So for those who missed something, many a time all you have to do is go on YouTube and you can find it.

I get a lot of e-mails with YouTube links for me to check out. Many of those links have been fantastic. There is one link to a performance by a young woman called “African Girl.” She’s a performer from a show titled Africa, Africa. Now I’ve been to Cirque du Soleil and have seen many of the Asian girls who are contortionists. But this young lady’s ability to curl herself into a pretzel shape amazed me. I have never seen someone twist their body into so many shapes. If some folks are “double-jointed,” this girl, who they also call “Snake Girl,” is “triple-jointed.”

Another fabulous video on YouTube, by Will.I.AM, took a speech by Barack Obama and put it to music while mouthing the words of a speech Senator Obama had given. That was great.

I have used YouTube to watch certain debates when I missed them on regular TV and also enjoyed a number of clever parodies that people have created and put on YouTube.

One of the funniest clips I’ve seen recently on the Internet, however, isn’t from YouTube. John Kass a columnist for the Chicago Tribune has his own video on the Trib’s website for ShowerGate. Mayor Daley’s budget director, Bennett Johnson III, recently had a shower installed in his office at city hall-a shower estimated to have cost $5,400, a shower that was being paid for by taxpayers until Mr. Kass found out about it and began to investigate, a shower for someone who makes $156,600 a year.

Kass went down to city hall with a towel and a bar of soap. He asked as a taxpayer for a chance to use the shower, seeing as how the commissioner was using tax money to build it.

After paying almost $1,000 for the permit to add a second story onto my house, I am particularly interested in knowing if Bennett Johnson pulled a permit for the job. Every Chicagoan who has ever had to pull a permit knows it is a very time-consuming process. I want to see the architectural drawings for city hall to make sure the shower isn’t put somewhere where a leak could damage the entire building. I also think it’s fair to ask to see the receipt for the permit prior to the work having been done.

Contact: westside2day@yahoo.com