This morning I walked around the neighborhood (Michigan and Delaware) taking photos. I finally got a shot of The Casino, next door to the Hancock Building (below). No signage necessary. Members only. If you don't know what the building is, you don't need to know. We, on the other hand, have actually eaten there. Bwahahahaha! (smirk smirk)
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The poor guy below tried the entire week to catch a cab.
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Robin and I took the El so Jim and Don wouldn't have to drive into town. What the Hell, I've always wanted to El, and now I've got video footage to prove I'm an El of a guy. It was a nice, uncrowded and leisurely ride on the Green Line.
I'll be glad when they put an El in Santa Fe.
Hmmmm... (fantasizing): "Take the Mauve Line to Lamy, take the Burnt Umber Line to Canyon Road, or take the Thalo Blue Line to the Plaza."
As we enjoyed mid-morning coffee at a Starbucks, we all decided Jim should really get a new iMac so he could donate his older iMac to Don. So we drove to a nearby town with an Apple Store. The shopping center was larger than Santa Fe, and the Apple Store was bustling with activity, hardware flying off the shelves to eager, fanatical customers, big bucks being spent. And that was just the four of us — you should have seen all the other people and what they were buying.
On the way back to Jim and Don's house in Oak Park, we stopped for lunch at one of their favorite places, a Thai restaurant that's spectacularly delicious. After taking a detailed tour of Thailand's cuisine, we hot-footed it over to Jim and Don's and began unpacking the goodies. It took the rest of the afternoon to migrate files from Jim's old iMac to the new one, zero-out the hard disk on his old iMac and install Leopard on it, create a complete backup on Time Machine, give a few tutorials of our favorite tips, etc.
We barely had time to grab our stuff, jump in the SUV, and drive to The Shakespeare Theater at Navy Pier to see A Comedy of Errors. It was a great production. Great actors, great stage design and scenery. It was staged as a 1940s movie production company filming A Comedy of Errors. There were added scenes (an additional plot) in which the movie director and actors played Hollywood people producing the movie version of the play. Occasionally, the director would shout "Cut!" and the actors would leave the Shakespeare dialog and start playing the plot of egotistical actors, a young actor having an affair with the director's wife/lead actress, an actor who kept trying to work in the St. Crispins speech into his role of Dromio. When the actors were doing the straight version of Comedy of Errors, they were the best I've seen and made the play more understandable and funnier than any version I've seen. In fact, it made me appreciate the play for the first time.
After the play we went to a new restaurant discovery of Jim and Don, restaurant/food critics. They love this place (so did we). It's name is The Drawing Room, in case you find yourself in Chicago. Very chic chic. Exquisite and unique food and cocktails. Open late, like in a big city. Charles, the "Mixologist," prepared our drinks at our table, a show in itself. He's created all of the concoctions that appear on the menu and gave us detailed information about every ingredient of the drinks we ordered. This bar and one other bar are representing Chicago in an international bar tender/mixologist competition in New York. The finalists get to compete in New Orleans. It was an amazing after-theater experience. We left there after midnight, around 12:30 I think. Fortunately our apartment was just a couple of blocks away, although Jim and Don had to drive back to Oak Park. Those pooooor people.
A Chicago great time, a successful trip from the Mary Sidney presentation perspective, and some new friends. Thanks to Jim and Don, Virginia and Jim, and everyone else we met.
I'll be glad when they put an El in Santa Fe.
Hmmmm... (fantasizing): "Take the Mauve Line to Lamy, take the Burnt Umber Line to Canyon Road, or take the Thalo Blue Line to the Plaza."
As we enjoyed mid-morning coffee at a Starbucks, we all decided Jim should really get a new iMac so he could donate his older iMac to Don. So we drove to a nearby town with an Apple Store. The shopping center was larger than Santa Fe, and the Apple Store was bustling with activity, hardware flying off the shelves to eager, fanatical customers, big bucks being spent. And that was just the four of us — you should have seen all the other people and what they were buying.
On the way back to Jim and Don's house in Oak Park, we stopped for lunch at one of their favorite places, a Thai restaurant that's spectacularly delicious. After taking a detailed tour of Thailand's cuisine, we hot-footed it over to Jim and Don's and began unpacking the goodies. It took the rest of the afternoon to migrate files from Jim's old iMac to the new one, zero-out the hard disk on his old iMac and install Leopard on it, create a complete backup on Time Machine, give a few tutorials of our favorite tips, etc.
We barely had time to grab our stuff, jump in the SUV, and drive to The Shakespeare Theater at Navy Pier to see A Comedy of Errors. It was a great production. Great actors, great stage design and scenery. It was staged as a 1940s movie production company filming A Comedy of Errors. There were added scenes (an additional plot) in which the movie director and actors played Hollywood people producing the movie version of the play. Occasionally, the director would shout "Cut!" and the actors would leave the Shakespeare dialog and start playing the plot of egotistical actors, a young actor having an affair with the director's wife/lead actress, an actor who kept trying to work in the St. Crispins speech into his role of Dromio. When the actors were doing the straight version of Comedy of Errors, they were the best I've seen and made the play more understandable and funnier than any version I've seen. In fact, it made me appreciate the play for the first time.
After the play we went to a new restaurant discovery of Jim and Don, restaurant/food critics. They love this place (so did we). It's name is The Drawing Room, in case you find yourself in Chicago. Very chic chic. Exquisite and unique food and cocktails. Open late, like in a big city. Charles, the "Mixologist," prepared our drinks at our table, a show in itself. He's created all of the concoctions that appear on the menu and gave us detailed information about every ingredient of the drinks we ordered. This bar and one other bar are representing Chicago in an international bar tender/mixologist competition in New York. The finalists get to compete in New Orleans. It was an amazing after-theater experience. We left there after midnight, around 12:30 I think. Fortunately our apartment was just a couple of blocks away, although Jim and Don had to drive back to Oak Park. Those pooooor people.
A Chicago great time, a successful trip from the Mary Sidney presentation perspective, and some new friends. Thanks to Jim and Don, Virginia and Jim, and everyone else we met.
