It happened

Chicago: Day 2

After our Lollapalooza day of music and rain, we headed out to see Chicago. All of Chicago. While the day started out cloudy, it quickly turned very sunny and veerry muggy. I started removing layers after about an hour and my sweater and scarf became awkward weights in my bag for the next ten hours of walking. By the end of the day, I had an impressive sunburn and several blisters on each foot. I had also seen some of the best spots in the city.


We started by train-hopping over to a great little cafe in Wicker Park called Cipollina. Right under the tracks, this place had awesome food/coffee/atmosphere. We walked around the neighborhood a bit before heading over to the Steppenwolf theater. On the way there, I saw Cynthia Rowley's store. In case you are unaware, I looove Cynthia Rowley's stuff. My sweaty grossness, Puma's, and bag full of discarded clothing kept me from going in. A few hours later (I might add that I was tired/hot/thirsty/cranky by this point) we ate an amazing lunch at Costello's. This was one of my friend's favorite spots when she lived in Chicago, so it was a nice return for her.



We followed this up with more walking, heading down to sit by the lake for a while. We took some really awkward photos and tried to avoid looking at the Speedo-sporting sunbathers nearby.


After heading to the apartment and cleaning up, we headed out for dinner at Wishbone. After our day of public transportation, we decided to drive my car and find a parking spot. We had made plans to meet up with some friends for an aftershow, but our plans fell through (ah, so much confusion) and we decided to drive around a bit and find some dessert.

And that's when it happened.

My car started shaking. The whole car. We happened to be right by Shell station with a service center (this does not happen!) so we pulled in and tried to figure it out. Half an hour and one phone call to my sleeping parents later, we decided to leave the car there. Assured that the mechanic was in on Sundays, we left with his number in hand and a renewed sense of hope.

Then, we took the right train. In the wrong direction. We realized this at 12:15, after three stops had passed us by. We got off the train at the most desolate and distant stop we had been to yet. This is when we realized that the trains had possibly stopped running for the night, meaning we could be stuck in a not-so-awesome part of Chicago at 12:30. We ended up catching the second to last train of the night and made it home, exhausted, at about 1:30. Little did we know what was ahead...