Sunday Outting

Conner and I spent two nights at the Biblical Zion campground north of Chicago after we dropped Dan off at the airport as he moved to upstate New York.  But the $25 a night price tag was more than we could bear to spend and once again we searched for a place to stay outside of town.  A distant relative of my step-father miraculously pulled through and hooked us up with his high-school friend from 40 years prior.  An older literary couple, Mary and Pat Kerrigan were so terribly sweet to let a couple of strangers camp out with them in Crete, Illinois. 

We took the tram in to town one Sunday since the only thing we had really seen of Chicago had been glimpsed from the car window.  We spent most of the day wandering around without any agenda; we stumbled upon a Chinese festival, a children's festival sponsored by Target, and the Summer Dance.  It was a beautiful city and would have loved to spend a bit more time there.  Conner and I decided that we would definitely have to come back--but when we had more money.  It's a big city with big city prices and as I have inherited my father's expensive taste, I tend to want to throw caution to the wind and spend what money we had on a nice Chicago dinner.  However Conner's way more pragmatic than I and promised that one day we would return and splurge on a really nice dinner-but just not now.

Chicago view from Millennium Park

Sampling the famous Chicago architecture

Cloud Gate, sculpture by Anish Kapoor in Millennium Park.  Conner and I are in the middle.

The Chicago Summer Dance.  The cutest thing ever!  On the last Sunday of every month (if I'm not mistaken) Chicago hosts a communal dance.  They had a big band and a jazz singer and everyone came out and danced the afternoon away.  Cuteness.

A super stylish couple at the Summer Dance.

Chicago Roads

I, like most people, think of Chicago and immediately think of their illustrious gangster past.  I envision beautiful cars driving through downtown, pulling into alleyways to deposit their luxuriously dressed inhabitants into speakeasies where they will spend the remaining pre-dawn hours dancing the night away.  Chicago also brings to mind the vibrant art scene, electric jazz, and deep dish pizza that will make you completely full after just one slice.  But that's about all I know about the place.
Photo via The Exceptional Man

After we made our way back from visiting the wrong-side-of-the-tracks in southern Chicago, we snaked our way through downtown, by the Lake Michigan coast, heading north towards the closest campground.  We had desperately tried to find a place to park our camper in the suburbs but to no avail.  The closest campground was in Zion, IL; two miles from the Wisconsin boarder, where the Cancer Centers Of America in Chicago are located, and where all the roads are named after Biblical characters...in alphabetical order, starting with Abraham at the lake front in the east and going all the way to Zebulun to the west.  There's no booze to be found here and the Zionese idea of a hot date on Friday night is a session of bible study.

Sewing at the Zion campground

As we drove through town we quickly discovered that by-far-and-away the roads in Chicago are horrendous.  Worst roads ever!  I naively assumed that some of the millions of organized crime loot would be used to smooth over the roads.  I thought that they wouldn't want their luxury gangster cars to rattle apart.  Poor Breathless almost rattled apart while we were up there.  No, in fact she did rattle apart--something about a bracket falling off which becomes dangerous when we brake.  Mental note to self: never again try to drive in Chicago unless we have a huge tank of an SUV that we borrowed from a car rental company that's fully covered by insurance so if that car falls apart, it's simply not our problem.

Photo Via No Games Chicago

Silver Tears campers

Some folks up in Virgina have taken to reviving the old classic teardrop campers.  Since we've been living in an old canned ham trailer for the last several months, I've become enamored with cute home-on-wheels.  Silver Tear Campers handcraft these beauties from mahogany and aluminum and can be customized any way you like.  So damn cute!

Vegetable Orchestra

A group of Vienna based musicians created an alternative orchestra in 1998, composed of musical instruments made out of fresh vegetables; they call themselves the Vegetable Orchestra.  That's pretty cool in my book.

Bad Bad Leroy Brown

Jumping back in time to about mid-August...

Why is that travelers inevitably wander into the bad part of town when they first get to a new city?

After leaving my friend Ben in Omaha Dan, Conner, and I beelined our way down highway 80 that cuts right across Nebraska cornfields, heading for Chicago.  Each state map in our 1990-era Walmart atlas is not drawn to scale and we sometimes forget that detail when we're guessing how much time it will take us to get from point A to point B.  It's that minor fact that should explain why we were halfway into Chicago before we realized that we had no idea where we were going or who we were staying with.

So we pulled off and drove around looking for a coffee shop--any coffee shop--but to no avail.  There are simply no cafes to be found south of downtown.  And another thing, we're used to getting looks as we drive through a new place--and for the most part we like the attention--but man, the looks we were getting on the south side of Chicago, they were tough.  No waves; no smiles; none of the usual reactions--just pure stare down.

Later on when we talked to Chicago folk, we were told that south Chicago was dangerous with a capital D and that we were lucky Breathless didn't break down because she most likely would have been striped down before we even blinked an eye.

And we just had to start singing Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown...
Photo via Bamboo Trading

I Got A Job!

I finally got a job!  I started today at Specs Eyecare, a small eyewear boutique in Durham, NC.  I got a huge crash course in optometry today and after 8 hours of trying to understand spherical and cylindrical lens measurements and prescription notations my brain is total mush.  However, after I get it all down I think I'll really like working there.  And damn, it feels nice to have a job again and not worry about our dwindling bank account for a minute...cuz now it's increasing once again.  Yay incoming gas money!
Photo via SALT. Optics

Alcohol Under The Microscope

At Florida State University a company called Bevshots has photographed various alcoholic beverages under the microscope. The resulting pictures are more like modern art and are peddled by Bevshots as affordable works of art with a cheeky story behind it all. Best hung in the restroom over the porcelain throne.

Tequila

Rosé

More photos via Amusing Planet

Water For Elephants

No such luck on the job front yet although Conner and I have been pounding pavement like nobody's business.  I do have a couple interviews coming up this week and hopefully one of those works out.  Job hunting sucks.  I've put in applications at J Crew, Williams Sonoma, Trader Joe's, Barnes & Noble...basically everything at the mall.  And again, hopefully one of those will work out this next week.

In the meantime I've picked up a couple books from the library.  Immediately I got sucked into Water For Elephants which was amazing and I almost finished within the day.  Awesome!  Read it.  It's about a young man who runs away and joins the circus during the Depression.  It's been a while since a book has sucked me in so completely...since the Twilight series but that was "book crack" and I offer no other explanation for that literary blip. 

They have several photos reprinted from the Ringling Circus Museum in Sarasota, Florida.  I had no idea they have a Ringling museum!  We're absolutely going to make a quick stop in Florida and go to the circus museum...I dreaming of pink sequins and cotton candy this evening.

Minus Sound Research 5th Anniversary

When I moved to Austin it took me about a year to really get integrated into my new life.  But that was in a place where I  barely knew anyone.  Now that we're in Chapel Hill--my old stomping grounds...well, North Carolina in general--I'm hoping that we'll ease on into the local culture in a matter of weeks.  After spending a week getting dressed up and going job hunting in places like Barnes & Noble, Anthropologie, and Trader Joe's, Conner and I decided to kick back and go to the 5th anniversary party of Minus Sound Research--a collective of musicians who are also visual artists.  I'm thinking these people might be a cool group to get involved with while we're here.

Radio Flyer Car

From Old Hollywood Glamour Blog

Our Film Is Finished!

My computer is old and doesn't have the same rock-hard operating system that it once did...it can't export the short film in high-def so...ok, ok, enough excuses.  Here it is!

Some Stills From A Fledgling Film

I'm still working on putting my short film together and I'm almost done...yay!  Here are a couple stills from the work-in-progress from Alfred, New York.

Kat and Dan outside of their newapartment

Kat, Brighid, Dan

Conner, Brighid, Kat, and Dan

Conner outside of Terra Cotta Coffee where Dan now works

BriBri and her coffee

All of us