Category: Excursions

Valentine’s Weekend

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I had a fantastic Valentine’s weekend. Yes, weekend.

It started Friday with me coming home to a clean house, flowers, and Joe baking banana bread which we took to BINGO. It was delicious! I didn’t win anything, but still had a nice time with friends.

On Saturday, Joe surprised me with reservations to P.F. Changs and tickets to see Bobby Lee (of MadTV) at the Improv Chicago in Schaumburg. I was very excited!

Dinner was rather disappointing – the chicken was overdone and the flavor was bland. I’ve had better Chinese food at the Vietnamese restaurant nearby. Shoot, even Panda Express makes better food. The atmosphere was lacking too. It was way too loud to have a conversation. Oh well, at least now we can say we’ve tried some place new even if we don’t understand why anyone would eat there a second time.

And boy was the whole area crowded! We had a hell of a time finding parking at Woodfield and once we got inside, it was a madhouse! People just everywhere, reminding me why I avoid that mall like the plague. The restaurant was hopping too which surprised me since we had early reservations (5 o’clock). People were coming in off the street looking to eat and were told there was an hour and a half wait. Not one person agreed to wait, and who can blame them? With the exception of the previous Sunday when we went out for brunch and ran into the after-church crowd, we never wait to eat.

After dinner we had a little time to kill, so we went into the Sephora and I ended up buying $77 worth of perfume. They didn’t give me any free samples though. I thought they always did that? Did I get stiffed? Do I need to send a complaint letter? Because you know I will.

We purposely took our time getting to the Improv since we hadn’t bought dinner tickets and knew we’d be sitting toward the back anyway. Luckily our waitress was a lot friendlier than last time, although this one lady trying to guide people to their seats was bitchy. We didn’t want to get crammed in with the rest of the herd, so we opted to sit in the back by the bar where it’s elevated. It gave us a great line of sight to the stage.

Both of Bobby’s opening acts were ok. I liked the second guy, Nick Thune, a lot. That is until he had the gall to use MY favorite band, The Cure, as a punchline! I could barely believe it. It was along the lines of how it’s better to go to a concert than a sporting event since there’s always a loser in sports. He said “everyone’s a winner when you go to a concert, unless it’s a Cure concert” and then proceeded to talk shit about Cure fans. Douchebag! Joe was laughing at the look on my face.

Bobby Lee is just crazy! Crazy funny, that is. I won’t ruin it by going into specifics in case anyone plans to see him, but that guy sure loves to take his clothes off. Why is it always a thong and socks? Reminds me of “24 with Bobby Lee” from MadTV. We were both a little concerned about Bobby’s stand-up act since we’ve only seen him on TV, but he was great. I only wish his set was longer than a half hour. :(

At 2 am Sunday morning I had what I guess was a panic attack? Acid reflux attack? Stroke? Seriously, I don’t know what it was, but I woke up gasping, my heart was racing, and I couldn’t stop burping. I felt so unreal, as if I was going to die. This has happened a few times before, but years ago when I was still on acid reflux medication. After I got off it and started taking probiotics, I never had that problem again. So I’m not sure what caused it, but it might have been a combination of factors – the caffeine in the latte I shared with Joe that morning, the onions in the tuna fish sandwich I had for lunch, the Chinese food, the caffeine from the regular Pepsi I ordered at the show (I’ve mostly stopped drinking pop altogether), and the rich chocolate cake I also ate at the show (2-item minimum). My left arm has felt weird ever since, though. Kinda tingly/numb, which of course freaks me out because I’m always reading that heart issues for women in particular don’t necessarily present themselves with the classic pain and crushing chest feeling. Joe thinks I just pulled a muscle or have a pinched nerve, and my work friend thinks it’s anxiety related, which is definitely possible. Google hasn’t helped me much since it could be those things or a heart thing. But since I’m pretty young, I’ve been trying to treat it like it’s not a heart thing and just give that arm a rest. Perfect excuse not to exercise after work, which of course is hurting no one but myself but whatever. I hate that Joe has dropped 20 lbs and I’ve got my doctor telling me I should get back in shape. I’m not terribly overweight, but I did gain 20 lbs since last year which for my height is concerning.

Anyway, thanks to that whole fiasco, I slept in on Sunday instead of heading out for brunch and then to an ice sculpture festival as planned. Instead we lazed around in our PJs all day and watched lots of DIY and Home & Garden. And despite being told otherwise, Joe got me a Valentine’s Day gift which he left on my jewelry box so I’d see it after I got out of the shower – chocolates, and a bracelet I had been eyeing at Target for while. I swear, he is way too good to me! I’m very lucky indeed.

I hope you all enjoyed your holiday weekend as much as I did! It was fantastic except for my stroke/anxiety thing. ;)

Windy City Rollers

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I’ve got to hand it to Joe – I mentioned to him on Thursday that I really wanted to go out and do something different this weekend and he rose to the occasion. I’m the one who makes our plans 99% of the time but he sent me an e-mail on Friday with a link to the Windy City Rollers and suggested we attend their season opener. I thought it was a great idea, so we purchased our tickets this morning at the Carson’s so we wouldn’t have to pay to print them or waste time picking them up from Will Call.

I also mentioned our plans to my friend, Jim, who I recently starting talking to again after losing touch for several years, and he said he’d be going too, so we made plans to meet up.

We arrived about a half hour before the first bout and since the tickets are general admission, had our pick of seats. I really like the UIC Pavilion because all the seats have a good view of the track. That didn’t stop us from getting stuck behind some rather annoying people, but that seems par for the course for us. I really can’t understand why people will pay to attend an event yet spend more than 50% of their time walking around, talking, or getting over-priced food and drinks. It boggles my simple frugal mind.

We saved a seat for Jim since he was running late, so we were rather lost for the first two bouts. We were also a little underwhelmed by the two teams. I wanted to see some aggression and it just wasn’t happening. We were extremely entertained by the half-time show, however, which included male cheerleaders.

The second half was when we really got into the action thanks to Jim’s explanations of what was going on and us getting better at following the action. Jim has been to these events before because his sister used to be on a team and a girl he dated is (well, technically now, was, since she’s moving out of state) on The Fury. We were going to meet her after the show, in fact, but he couldn’t find her. It was nice seeing Jim, though. We haven’t seen each other in flesh since 2000!

They started kicking people out less than a half hour after the event ended, so we parted ways. Jim was thinking about meeting up with the teams at another location and we were hungry and looking to get food in our bellies. We slept in this morning and stuffed ourselves with gyros around noon which meant we hadn’t eaten for quite awhile. We were too full before we left for the event and too cheap to buy their crappy food while there. :)

I think it’s cool that a lot of the girls from the teams come out after the event to meet with fans. And even though cameras are technically banned, no one made a big stink about people having them anyway. I left mine at home and the iPhone camera positively sucks ass, but the videos I took actually came out pretty decent. Next time I’ll just bring my P&S Canon and perhaps sit a bit closer so I can see the girls’ expressions.

We had a great time and I hope to do it again, if not this year, next year for sure. We learned it’s much cheaper to buy tickets at the box office than through Ticketbastard. It was only $21 total per ticket instead of the $52.50 we ended up paying for our two tickets. Not that I’d want to stand outside in the cold – the lines were quite long – but when the weather is warmer it won’t be such a big deal to save $10.50. That almost covers parking right there.

Millennium Park

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The plan this morning was to visit the Shedd Aquarium to check out the remodeled Oceanarium. Small problem, however – the Bears were playing this afternoon at Soldier Field so all the parking by the Adler Planetarium was off-limits and all the lots in the nearby vicinity were chock full of Bears fans already tailgaiting at 9 am. Grrr!

To salvage the day we decided to park in the Millennium Park garage and check out the Cloud Gate which I’ve been wanting to photograph for years.

Cloud Gate

After walking around for awhile we found ourselves in front of the Art Institute. We decided to check it out, but then changed our mind once we learned we’d have to check our expensive camera equipment. Good thing, too, since I hadn’t realized that Bank of America was offering free admission today and would have been pissed if I paid to get in when I didn’t need to!!!

Soon we found ourselves walking down Michigan Avenue, also known as the Magnificent Mile, and ended up at the John Hancock Building. Joe has never been to their observatory, so we paid to go up to the 94th floor. It was a bit hazy outside but we still got some great shots.

Lake Shore Drive

From there we decided to check out a little place called the Soupbox on Chicago Avenue.

After our little lunch we walked back to the parking garage and went home. Even though we got home around 2 pm it felt so much later. I really hate this time of the year when it gets dark so early. It must be why this day has seemed to last forever. Not that I’m complaining; I don’t really want to go back to work.

But for now I am going to take a Dramamine and see what happens. See, my therapist suggested I take it for our flight on Saturday but I want to know ahead of time how it makes me feel so there’s no surprises. I hope it makes me sleepy!

Chicago photos @ Perfect Pixels

Always playing catchup

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So there’s been a lot going on but I’ve been too lazy to post about it…

We’re going on vacation a week from today! Yep, I will be flying for the first time in 13 years. I hadn’t flown before due to a phobia I developed over the years. I’ve read that it’s not unusual for people to develop the phobia in their late twenties to early thirties since most people start to really contemplate their own mortality. I think I’ve always worried about dying, even as a kid, but I do think it’s gotten much worse for me the older I get. I think it’s due to 9/11 which still makes me incredibly sad to this day even though I didn’t know anyone affected by it, and also because I have such an appreciation for life and the little things in ways I never did when I was younger. I have always been accused of having a negative attitude, and that’s partially true to a certain extent, but believe it or not, I’m actually quite an optimistic person most of the time. I just don’t always show that side since it seems sappy.

I have a lot of anxiety issues, though, so I’ve been seeing a hypnotherapist to help calm me down. It seems to be working at least a little. It doesn’t matter, really, because we’re going whether it scares the shit out of me or not. Face your fears, or let them control you, right? I’m sick of letting the fear keep me from visiting places. I would like to go back to Disney World, possibly next year, since the tickets we bought on our honeymoon never expire and still have seven days left on them. I also really want to visit Seattle and Anaheim among other places (like Europe).

So anyway, Saturday we’re flying to Phoenix and spending two days there, then driving with Joe’s parents to Las Vegas. We’ll be staying there two nights (at the Monte Carlo), then going back to Phoenix for a few more days, then flying home on Saturday. The week after that is Thanksgiving so I only have to work three days when I get back. It’s going to be great, provided neither plane crashes. ;) I kid, I kid! We’re flying Southwest who has a stellar safety record because yes, I am that paranoid.

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Thursday my company’s new CFO took myself and some other people from the Finance department out to lunch as a thank you for completing a project that was in the making for well over a year. The last few months were the worst however. I’m not the biggest fan of the restaurant we went to, but who’s going to knock a free meal? Plus the chocolate mousse cake was well worth it. The CFO seems really nice and down to earth which is good. I will give my company credit – they are pretty good at hiring people who even at the top of the ladder are not snobby and unwilling to socialize with the rest of us.

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Last weekend we gave the rats a bath, but this time I put them in the bathtub which just an inch of water and some ferret shampoo. They didn’t like the water and kept trying to jump out, straight up in the air which I’ve never seen them do before. Nutterbutter in particular can jump higher than I’ve ever witnessed. It’s usually Templeton who will try and jump over the makeshift walls we built for their playpen. Too bad for them I am giving them another bath on Wednesday or Thursday before we take them to a friends’ house to pet sit for us. They will also be keeping an eye on Oreo even though she’d be perfectly happy to be left alone for a week. She can ration her food, however, whereas the rats cannot. If I gave them a week’s worth of food they’d eat it the same day and starve to death the rest of the week.

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Sorry if this entry is all disjointed. I just wanted to document some things since I often use this journal as reference for myself, but now we have to head out to drop K off since we’re heading into the city early tomorrow morning to visit the Shedd Aquarium. I’m really looking forward to it since they’ve redone the Oceanarium.

You know, I think I just need to find an easy way to post all my Twitter updates to this blog automagically and I will never have to write an entry again! ;)

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Now playing: Owl City – Tidal Wave
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