Whirlwind Weekend- Part 2

Partly to remember what it's like being "Tom & Maria" as opposed to being "Tom, Maria & the kids", partly to celebrate the completion of another semester, and partly to redeem some Amtrak vouchers, Tom and I headed to Chicago Sunday morning. By ourselves. For almost 40 solid hours. We took the train out of Jackson and relaxed while somebody else did the driving. Tom enjoyed some boring book and I read through a stack of magazines that had been collecting dust for awhile, seriously one of my Parenting mags was dated July 2005.

We arrived in Chicago and went to the hotel to check in. We walk into a really nice swanky lobby and I'm thinking, "yeah, this is really nice, and a block off the Mag Mile." The only problem of the entire trip- we were at the wrong hotel. DUH!!! The lady at the desk politely pointed us in the right direction- 7 blocks off Michigan Ave, the other way. Now this is such a duh moment because back in February we stayed at said wrong hotel (which wasn't so very nice then because it was in the midst of a major remodel) and thought we were booking at that hotel. Somehow we ended up booking a room at the Best Western River North. Not so very nice, but, oh well, it worked. We arrived too early for them to have a room ready for us so we checked our bags and then headed across the street for lunch here:

The moment we walked in we knew the kids would absolutely love it. There were huge fish tanks with beautiful colored fish, a waterfall, lots of robotic realistic looking jungle creatures and a "thunderstorm" every 30 minutes. The food was not all that great, but it's definitely worth a visit for the atmosphere.

After lunch we headed up to Michigan Ave to do some shopping. First stop was at the GAP where I had to find some gloves to replace the ones that went missing from my bag that morning. I knew as soon as I reached into my bag and could only find 1 mitten that Eddy had probably sniffed it out at home. (which is exactly what had happened) My dog has issues, you see, he likes to snuggle our shoes and gloves. Anyways, we shopped along Michigan Ave all afternoon. The city of Chicago does such a beautiful job decorating the streets for Christmas!

this display was made up almost entirely of Legos

Shortly after arriving in Chicago my feet really began to hurt from my shoes. I was hoping to pick up a really cute pair of black boots but the cheapest I could find were still $90. I know that's really not a bad price for knee high black leather boots but I didn't want to spend our Chicago money on boots for me. We headed (Tom walked, I limped) back to the hotel around 7 to finally check in. I literally shopped till I dropped. Here's a pic of my feet. If you'll look closely you can see that my big toes are poking through this pair of relatively new socks and you'll also notice that the big red blotch on the side of my left foot is indeed blood from my pinky toe rubbing the next toe all day. Ouch!

I took a bath, which only got almost hot, and fell asleep in the tub. I know, really exciting. We headed out to Dick's Last Resort for a late dinner and opted for a cab so I could save my feet a little. Dick's is a rather crass restaurant where the waiters are rude but the food is good. We knew from experience ( a previous Chicago visit) that if you ask a question, like can I have some ketchup, or where's the bathroom, your waiter will make you a dunce cap with something really crude written on the front, which you then have to wear the entire dinner. For instance, last time Tom was crowned with "I watch midget porn"; I kept my mouth shut and somehow escaped unscathed. Even though we both managed to order without questions our waiter still graced us with caps. So here's Tom thinking about men, men, men, men, men.....

and here I am clapping because "I'm so easy I clap":

After dinner we headed a couple of blocks up to catch a late movie but nothing good was playing. We knew that there was another theater closer to our hotel so we headed that way. Now usually I watch Playhouse Disney and NickJr., channels which don't exactly show previews for movies above a PG rating. Neither Tom nor I had any idea what any of the movies were about so I roused my movie critic bro from his beauty sleep to get some info. He recommended American Gangsters which of course was not playing at the second theater, so we headed over to The Hard Rock Cafe and had some dessert before calling it a nite.

Monday morning, we checked out of the hotel and headed to the train station to put our bags into a locker. We decided to take the bus to the station and waited a good 15 minutes before deciding that if a bus didn't come within the next minute or so we would take a cab. The bus came and as we pulled away only then did I realize that just a few blocks down from where we had been waiting was a Payless Shoe Store- a little slice of Jackabama plopped down in all of the glitz and glamour that it the Magnificent Mile. I made a mental note to stop in later.

We grabbed McD's for breakfast at the train station and then caught a cab to the Museum of Science and Industry. We spent our morning wandering its vast greatness to view the 50 Christmas trees from around the world- beautiful! and a German U-boat that had been captured in WWII, among other interesting displays.

Back on the Mag Mile, our first stop was, you guessed it- Payless. By then I just wanted to be comfortable but my feet were so swollen that none of the cute semi dressy 7's fit right. I actually contemplated buying 7 1/2's so they would feel better, but I knew that once I got home and my feet healed they'd be too big; so practicality won out and I ended up with a new pair of tennis shoes but at least they matched my purse. We spent the rest of our time shopping and browsing through Borders before having dinner at The Cheesecake Factory. You cannot go to Chicago and not have cheesecake from the Factory!!! My highest recommendation- the banana cream cheesecake, so yummy!!!

We made it onto the train with no mishaps and enjoyed another 4 hours of reading time before pulling back into the station in Jackson. Given that this was the first time in almost four years that Tom and I have been away just the 2 of us we really enjoyed our time. Thanks, mom, for watching the kids for us!