Taking Chicago by storm

On State Street, that great street
Originally uploaded by Miss Gab.

You know when you're waiting for something and it seems like it will never get here, and then all of a sudden - WHAMMO - it's right on you and you can't believe it? Well such has been the arrival of Mum & Jems, who are staying with me in Chicago until the end of this month. We are also heading out to Toronto for a couple of days to see the sights of the City and up to Niagara Falls too.

I am steadily uploading my photos of the trip, and you can view the album here.

In the few days that Mum & Jems have been here, the weather has deteriorated dramatically from what it has been. No more days of 90+ degrees and humidity. Now we're back to true Chicago autumn weather - cold winds, crisp temperatures - the perfect time of year to be busting out the coats, gloves, and scarves. And while Mum & Jems did not anticipate such weather (and therefore pack for it), fortunately I've got plenty of spare clothes to go around.

While the girls have been with me, we have done a few local things (like shopping at The Discount Shoe Warehouse (DSW), and heading to some Boystown diners for quadruple chocolate cake!) as well as some tourist things (like a trolley tour, and taking in the Art Institute of Chicago when it is free on Thursdays from 5pm to 8pm - saved ourselves $12 each woohoo!). I took the girls to see a hilarious new musical that Lex has long been recommending to me, called Altar Boyz and it is a scream. Then we scurried across the street and catapulted ourselves in to the stratosphere, more or less, for cocktails in The Signature Lounge, on the 96th floor of the John Hancock tower, which is essentially a tourist thing to do, but I reckon everyone enjoys it. How could you not love to overlook such a beautiful city with all its twinkling lights? Puh-lease.

Last night we went to Navy Pier for Friday fireworks in the lead-up to Halloween. We got a chance to see the pyrotechnics on a very clear night and then retreat inside to browse the many souvenir shops and craft stores as we wandered back to the bus stop.

Speaking of which, we've been very good at avoiding cabs here, electing instead to travel around by public transportation. We have all agreed that where we can, we should take buses and trains and make the most of them. As it was, we had a fairly white-knuckled cab trip from the Art Institute to the Hancock the other day. Not a long trip by any means, but a bumper-to-bumper, peak hour trip where we ran a few red lights, nearly caused a few car accidents, but managed to miraculously get there in one piece. It was pretty awesome.

Today we're off to the Field Museum which is Chicago's Museum of Natural History, do some shopping at Macy's and then Bloomingdales, and then for dinner in Greektown at a restaurant that I incidentally saw on The Food Network. Don't even pretend to be surprised about that.