Hot Dogs... Hot Dang!

As promised, here are some more picture updates from when our good friends Liz, Dan, and Lydia came to visit us in Chicago. In one weekend, Michelle and I did more touristy things in Chicago than we had this entire time we've lived here. For those who are familiar with Chicago, this is how sad this fact was: We hadn't even visited Navy Pier until our friends came to visit. For those unacquainted with Chicago, Navy Pier is this big pier (duh) in the middle of Chicago with lots of shops, museums, restaurants and so forth. It's the site of the really famous and (formerly) massive Ferris wheel. This was also the first time that Michelle or I had a Chicago-style hot dog. Hot dang!

Not only did we see Navy Pier for the first time, we got to take an architecture boat tour along the Chicago river to see all the great buildings here in Chicago. That was a great time and helped me get a better appreciation for Chicago architecture.

For your viewing pleasure, here are some selected highlights from the visit. Enjoy!

that's a Chicago-style dog -- onions, relish, tomatoes, pickles, peppers (no ketchup!)

pizza pot pies!

our massively huge burgers

hanging out on the rooftop deck



that bridge is no longer functioning

As an added bonus, here's some video coverage of the tour talking about my school's downtown campus:

Scary!

Let me first preface this post by saying that there is no political motivation whatsoever behind this. Don't get me wrong, I have views on politics, but apparently there's this whole world of people who blog about politics for real... and what I am about to blog about, is, not really for real. It just so happens that I found this photo to be deeply disturbing and scary at the same time... but is not any type of judgment upon the candidate reflected therein.

On with the story... I logged onto my daily news site and BAM I see the picture. It really made me quake in my seat. Literally. I felt chills down my spine. It was just scary. Well, you can judge for yourself how you would react:


Yeah, that's what I thought too.

a post dedicated completely to Liz

We've had the pleasure of having some of our good college friends visit us in Chicago this past week. Many more pictures to come of our fabulous time together, but the following video deserves a post on its own. Because I can not do it justice, our good friend Dan, will be guest blogging to tell us, from his very own words, what he saw...

Thank you, Michelle, for that very warm introduction. Always glad to spend time with the Chans - even when events like the one you're about to see transpire...

Just to provide some context, Liz literally dances to the beat of her own drum. There is no telling what might happen when she's feeling footloose and fancy-free. On the particular day in question we were strolling carefree down Chicago's famous Navy Pier, enjoying the warmth of the day and pleasant company (I should mention that there were others in attendance: my wife Lydia, Jess, and Christie). We approached a Beer Garten (sp?) that was featuring a live band playing popular covers. Now, in my opinion the band was mediocre at best (they were butchering a Melissa Ethridge tune, which is tough to do since it was already a pretty bad song), but it immediately became apparent that not everyone agreed with my assessment: in particular, one more..."seasoned" gentleman who was really, really feeling the music. My man was letting his hip slip and his backbone dip up and down the space in front of the stage. Now, this on its own was an incredibly awkward situation...

...but we had Liz. Before we knew it, Liz was stripping off her coat, lacing up her dancin' shoes, and sauntering up the steps to engage in a little impromptu tag-team two-stepping. For all you DWTS fans, this should be right up your ally.

NOTE: 10 points to anyone who can count all the "dancing" puns...I swear they were mostly unintentional.

happy birthday t-love!

What a lucky guy, Brazilian BBQ for his birthday



An excited Terah showing how he randomly tore a paper towel into the shape of Virginia - he made me look it up and it really does look like Virginia

a local secret

Awhile ago, a friend had told me about a local secret here in Chicago where you can go down to any Chicago public library and check out a museum pass for free admission to some of the city's museums. I decided to test this out at the main downtown library...

It worked! I checked out a free museum pass to the Museum of Contemporary Art...

Here's the view from inside the museum looking out to Lake Michigan...

No photographs allowed inside the gallery, which is fine since I understand nothing about modern art anyway, but they had some cool looking stairs...

Afterwards, I decided to walk the couple blocks to my school to do some work. Here is the infamous Water Tower - one of the only buildings to survive the Chicago fire of 1871.

A beautiful church right on the busy Michigan Ave...

Right across from the church is the Hancock Tower, with the Hancock Observatory on the top that oversees the lake....

Gotta love this city!