[Continued from "Chicago:  June 19, 2010."]

When I woke up in the morning I was feeling much, much better.  We took a cab to Jam, in West Town, for brunch.  After putting our name in for a table, we walked around the neighborhood a bit.  The neighborhood was cute and arty, with some nice graffiti, like this creepy zombie dude.

From the looks of things, Chicago is a dog- friendly city, which of course Isis and I require.  We saw several pet-related businesses with cute, punny names.  Like Urban Out Sitters.  And Spotland Yard, which unfortunately appeared to be out of business.

But the best discovery by far was the bar/liquor store combination.  “Oh, you’re cutting me off?  Ok, I’ll take a bottle of cheap vodka to go.  Thank you.”  Cheap vodka because the bar/liquor store we went to was very divey.  Of course I like me a good dive bar.

The conveniently located dive bar/liquor store came in handy after we were seated outside in the courtyard adjoining the restaurant.  It was brunch so of course I wanted mimosas, but Jam doesn’t have a liquor license.  They had fresh squeezed orange juice though.  I popped into the the dive bar/liquor store for some cheap “champagne” and we were set.

Jam’s courtyard was shaded and cool.  Sunday’s weather was also significantly cooler than Saturday’s had been so the outdoor seating was rather nice.  The courtyard had a bunch of really interesting sculptures.  One was a tower of Tonka Trucks that had been allowed to get weathered and rusty.  Another looked like a horse made out of canvas.  It didn’t look creepy at all, I promise. These looked like cattle shells.  Or something like that.

Brunch was really good.  Really, really good.  First, we shared an appetizer portion of French toast served with rhubarb.  Y-U-M.  I had a take on eggs benedict with pork belly and pea hollandaise.  It was really good, but I thought the bread they used was too thick.  I ended up slicing it in half laterally so each bite could contain just a bit of bread, egg, pork, and sauce.  The Viking had a Spanish omelet.  Both were tasty.  I go on so because I really liked the place, as you can tell by this photo.  Or maybe it was the mimosas.

With our bellies full we walked towards the train.  Before we go to the train we saw a sign that indicated that downtown was only 2 1/2 miles away.  That’s an easy walk, especially when everything’s flat.  We walked through some pretty run-down areas, with a lot of boarded windows and medical supply stores.  Not much was open.  It was a Latino neighborhood, which reminded me of the Mission, only not nearly as lively.  We even passed a street vendor selling tacos.

I thought it was great.  In San Francisco we have a taco truck right outside our building.  The Viking, however, didn’t like that the neighborhood was so run down.  He definitely had a point.  I want to feel like I can walk at night alone in whatever neighborhood I live, and with so many empty places, it seems unlikely there.

We walked into the city, and after a stop at an Irish pub for fortification, walked to Navy Pier.  The folks that run the architectural river tour were nice enough to allow us to transfer our reservation from the night before.  We sat on the deck of the boat in full sun at the hottest time of the day.  To combat the heat, there was a bar on the boat.  Thank you vodka and soda.  All of them were very refreshing.

The tour was packed with information.  Both the Viking and I declared our love for architecture.  We’re going to look into a more detailed architectural tour, maybe focusing on particular styles.  Chicago is a great city for architecture.  It’ll be fun to explore further.  The Viking tends to like Neoclassical buildings while I like Art Deco a lot.

We walked back to our hotel.  On the way we decided that we would have a quickie before we had to meet friends of the Viking’s for dinner.  We walked faster.  I did, however, have to stop to take a picture of this fun sticker/graffiti combination.

Once in our room, we had a very fun, very quickie.  Thankfully we had time to shower before we had to walk to the restaurant because between all the walking all over the city and the fast and furious fucking, we were sweaty messes.

We ate at a Brazilian place.  The kind with a salad bar and lots of meat.  Lots and lots of meat.  One of our group was herself Brazilian so other than the meat and salad bar, we also had a variety of side dishes that non-Brazilians don’t know to ask for.

Dinner was good, but unlike the Brazilian places elsewhere, they did not have any chicken hearts.  I like chicken hearts, they remind me of my white trash childhood.  According to the floor manager, they are not allowed to serve chicken hearts.  None of us at the table could figure out why, if they served chicken, they could not serve all of the chicken.  We thought maybe it had to do with the city’s ban of foie gras, that a law might include all poultry offal.  (The ban ended in 2008.)

After dinner the Viking and I went to the bar on the 96th floor of the John Hancock Center.  Due to one of those damn support beams keeping the building up, we didn’t have much of a view from our seat.  I used the ladies’ room, which had a great view of the city skyline and Lake Michigan.  I told the Viking to go to the bathroom so he could take in such a beautiful view.  The men’s room, however, did not have windows at all.  Gender discrimination!

Then back to the hotel for zombie killing.  I’m really into Plants vs. Zombies.  However, I am no gamer.  Look, I made my own Zombatar.  Isn’t she cute?

I killed some zombies, we watched some tv, and napped some.  Don’t worry, we’re not uptight.  We did some fucking.  We put both the flogger and the njoy Eleven to very good use.  The Eleven is so fucking great.  Makes me come with it’s big coldness.  And the flogger feels just lovely on the buttocks.

I left Chicago the next day, so the story is obviously to be continued.

I swear.  True story.

  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •  
  •