Category Friends
Chicago – Stars! (both the Michelin and the Broadway kind)
There are only three cities in the US that have been graced with a Michelin guide. Chicago is one of them. Naturally, this means that Saturday night found Amanda and me seated in the swanky downtown dining room — complete with snowy tablecloths and witch-hazel stick arrangements — of the Michelin-starred and James Beard award-winning restaurant NAHA. We had […]
Chicago – Catching up with friends
Amanda instigated this trip to Chicago when she told me she was going with her family and asked if I wanted to join in the fun. I wanted to see the city again, and I always enjoy travelin with her and hanging out with her family, so I accepted the invitation. But I also wanted […]
Chicago – The Joffrey does Othello
The Chicago cultural scene has more than just fantastic architecture. It’s also got one of the leading American ballet companies, the Joffrey Ballet, and we were thrilled to discover that our trip fell during their run of Othello. We got to the theatre early and settled into our seats . . . moi, Amanda […]
Chicago – Grandma and the bean
Millennium Park is a great outdoor public space that sits between Lake Michigan and a pack of high-rise buildings that stretches out from the city center towards Indiana. One of it’s more memorable features is a giant sculpture called Cloud Gate. Call it what you will, it looks like a giant bean. A very large and […]
Chicago – City of architecture
Every time I come to Chicago I think, Oh man, why don’t I live here? Then I remember the horrible winters and my hankering to move to the Midwest dies down — but doesn’t go away completely. Because just look at that skyline! Any city with architecture like Chicago’s merits special consideration. In my opinion, Chicago is the best city […]
Chicago!
I’m in Chicago! It’s just for fun — a mini-vacation to break up the holiday-less months of spring. Amanda and her family (parents, sister and nephew, two grandmothers) flew in from Colorado, Utah and California. Two friends of mine from college and law school days already live here. I flew out to join the party. Naturally (because there’s […]
Spring break weekend
What do Cancun and DC have in common? Spring breakers. Cancun gets the party-wild college kids; DC gets the school groups. They arrive in giant charter buses and troop through the city in matching t-shirts while learning about Our Nation’s Capitol. Oh, to be a student with regular buit-in vacations! Normally spring just rolls right by me — […]
All the happy things
I hope everyone had as good a weekend as I did. Here are the highlights: I. There’s nothing like blowing off work on a Saturday afternoon to eat some tasty barbecue with good friends. My original plan had been to spend the bulk of the day working, trying to get a head start on the […]
Inauguration Day
Today President Obama was inaugurated to his second term as president of the United States. Technically he was already sworn in, having officially taken his oath of office yesterday (January 20th being the prescribed Inauguration Day), but since yesterday was a Sunday, all of the public pomp and ceremony happened today. Four years ago I […]
Good friends, good food, and some very beginning ballet
Remember my little rant last week about friends and flakiness and sitting at home watching movies alone? Well, I’m happy to say that this weekend went much more smoothly. I. Yesterday morning dawned chilly and bright. I got up early and checked my work email — a slew of documents had come in overnight that […]
A More Gentlemanlike Manner 