Chi-Town

Last weekend the boy and I went to Chicago. We traveled there with Tammer's brother, sister-in-law, and nephew. We were lucky enough to even have a free place to stay (college friends of Tammer's brother).

On Thursday the women (not me) had to work, so the rest of us went to the Wishbone for brunch; it was just outside Harpo Studios, apparently Oprah convinced the owner to open a place near her studio way back when and promised she wouldn't open a cafeteria in her building if he did that (local legend?). Then we scuttled on down to Millennium Park, while the kid played in the fountain Tammer and I explored the park a bit. Then the five of us went shopping on Michigan Avenue; I had never been shopping with three men and a seven year old boy...it's interesting. For dinner we went to a neat little Italian place (I have no idea what it's called); the guy we were staying with is somewhat of a foodie, and everything we ordered was excellent.

Friday morning we all met for breakfast at the crazy little place called Orange, they had things like French Toast Kabobs and Pancake Flights (like wine flights). I ordered the Green Eggs and Ham which was eggs scrambled with pesto, tomatoes and ham. Pretty cool. Then the family piled into a rental car (I bonked my head so hard it hurt for two days) for a 3 hour drive south to Moline for a visit with Tammer's mother.

This was an event for me, as it was my first time meeting "the mother". We all took her shopping and then out to dinner at a little surf and turf place on the Mississippi. That night Tammer's brother's family continued on to Iowa to visit other relatives, while Tammer and I got a hotel room next to the John Deere Museum (unfortunately we didn't have time to visit this establishment). Saturday morning mom told us she wanted something else from the mall, so we headed over there again for a little while.

We were lucky enough to have arranged to hitch a ride back to Chicago with our host's father on Saturday afternoon. We spent Saturday night casually with our hosts, going out for Chicago-style deep dish pizza and then to Navy Pier.

We walked the pier, rode the ferris wheel, watched fireworks, and enjoyed the band in the beer garden. There's something magical about that place, and Tammer and I found ourselves enjoying even the (in retrospect) lame fun house maze. The four of us explored all the goodies Navy Pier had to offer with wide-eyed amusement. I loved it.

Sunday morning, our foodie host made an excellent breakfast of eggs, some kind of sausage and polenta. Then Tammer and I went to the aquarium where we got to see whales, dolphins, sea lions, and cool reef dwellers (you know, like at an aquarium).

Sadly, our journey ended there as we hopped on the L for the airport.

That's it folks...next week Vegas!

the most awkward moment ever...

the boy and i were at a party over the weekend, having a smashing time. after we had been there a couple of hours a guy showed up with his fiancee. many of the people there had never met her; the introduction went something like this:

"This is my fiancee, [name1]...oh, I knew I was going to do that...[name2]."

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

He called his fiancee by the wrong friggin' name! In front of a room full of strangers! She immediately looked as if she was going to cry, and his eyes panicked, "please don't break up with me". The room was full of people, all of us looking at our feet, not daring to make eye contact.

Then, my man saves us all...bless him. He asks [name2] something about her shirt; it was from a trip she had taken and afforded us plenty of conversation. When that one died down he kept coming up with new things to talk about until the happy couple took their leave about 15 minutes later. Once they were safely out the door it was like the entire room breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Hope they worked it out.