Day 3 - Chicago

Here I am, about 1 am full of pizza, getting warm, and getting over a few bruises after a long great day of new 'cultural experiences.' I knew that on this trip I wanted to see places and experience things that I'd never seen or experienced before, some of which I'd never get to again. So far, yep, the trip is fitting the bill.

I started off my day with some much needed sleeping in on Sarah's cushy couch. Her roomates weren't up yet and so I flipped around the TV for a little bit. Sarah, if you're reading this, go ahead and pay for the better cable package. Very necessary indeed, apparently Chicago only gets about three English speaking channels. Anyhow, I checked online and apparently the Second City was sold out, but since it would have been just me, it wasn't the end of the world. I'm a pretty 'roll with the punches' kinda guy, so when Kelly (Sarah's roomate) said that they had an extra ticket to a punk rock show that night, I stepped up. We'll get to that in a minute.

First stop of the day was Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House. Remember that my first year of college was spent in Architecture school and I definitely still have a love of well planned buildings. Last summer, I went to see Fallingwater, FLW's other famous American house and I loved it. Since then, I knew that I wanted to visit this place. Quick Architectural History 101 lesson: many architectural historians think that the Robie House is the most pivotal home of the 20th century. Why? This started what's known as the 'prairie' style in 1910. Look at the picture and think about what you generally consider a Victorian era house to look like. Off the bat you can see that they look different as night and day but why? Thing is, until this house no one ever dreamed of designing a house that didn't get its styling from Europe. Ever. This house is all about horizontal lines, like the great prairies of the midwest. The little brick ranchers that all of our grandparents lived in...yeah, this is the grandaddy of all those. It was an amazing place to see inside, unfortunately no photos allowed. ::sigh:: Interesting little sidenote, this house was greatly admired by the European design schools and in the 1930's after the Bauhaus was disbanded by the Nazis, the former head of the school (Walter Gropius) was the man that kept this building from being demolished. This house is actually a lot of the reason that most of the Bauhaus teachers decided to work at Illinois Tech. Anyway, I'll stop with the history lesson, I'm sure its not as interesting as it seemed to me. So after a little GPS hiccup, I headed off to the Art Institute of Chicago.

Apparently there are two 'Art Institutes of Chicago,' who knew? My GPS, that's who. I put in 'Art Institute' and it brings it right up, I hit okay, and off I go. Only thing is, I knew that the Institute (which is a huge Art Museum by the way) was somewhere in downtown Chicago. When my GPS finally said "You have reached your destination," I was in some southern suburb with a taco stand across the way. Not exactly the bastion of modern art I had in mind. Even now, I have no idea what it thought that place was. When I tried again, all of the suddent "THE art institute of Chicago" was an option. Three little letters, big difference. I finally got to the right place, found cheap parking and headed to the museum. Quick shot of the "El" from the parking lot.

I had to make a quick pit stop though, to refuel at Mickey D's. As I walked to the door of McDonalds with my headphones in, there was an angry looking guy shaking his change cup at me. Great thing about headphones, you can pretend you don't hear anything. So when he asked for money, I just played oblivious. Unfortunately for me, the idiot side of me reacts much quicker than the reserved smart side. After he asked for money, but while i was still close, he said "Do you have the time?" Well, I always answer that for people, because if I needed it, I hope that someone would help me out. So I pulled out my cell phone and told him. Of course, a dollar fell out when I pulled out the cell phone. Figures. Well, he looks at me knowing that I'd heard him ask for money...awkwardness abounds. I tell him that I only have enough to buy my lunch, sorry. I walk inside and again, the idiot part of me hands the girl my CREDIT CARD! The guy was still obviously watching and was pissed. Luckily for me, there were two exits from the McDonalds, sweet.

The museum itself was great. I only had about two hours, and this place is massive. I loved walking around all the great art at my own pace with my own music playing in the background. Not only that, they let you take photos! Woot! The best part though was when I was in the Impressionist room. The museum is more or less chronological. So you start with ancient art and move your way up to modern. Well the impressionist room obviously looked different than the room of stately portraits before it. Well these two girls near me were looking at this Van Gogh and the one says "I wonder why no one could paint correctly anymore?? I mean, did the schools close or something?" I love having headphones that you can hear through, you get to eavesdrop without seeming too creepy. Anyway, at about 5 I headed back to the apartment to meet Kelly for the concert.

Now let me state that I'm not a huge fan of punk rock, but I'll listen to most anything. I certainly hadn't been to a punk rock concert before. As I said though, cultural exeperiences and whatnot. About half of the audience was all punk'd out with the shaggy hair and tight girlpants. The other half was like me, normal folks I'd say. At first, we were up in this balcony area but we couldn't see a lot. There weren't any seats, so the closest people were the ones who could see and that was about it. Holly, another girl we were with looked at me and Kelly and said "Let's go down to the stage level." Okay, I thought. She was a seasoned punk rocker so she knew what she was doing. There was this mass of people downstairs, probably 500 deep in a fairly small area. We pushed closer to the front and she says to me "Are you okay to mosh?" I assumed I was, not completely knowing what that meant. Apparently that means have people push you into other people who then push you into other people. I don't mean a light push either, we're talking about a full on shove. Basically, it's like playing marbles with people. I was thrust into the fray, and held my own. It was kind of fun in a 'this is new and kinda bizarre' way. After the second band, Holly told me that we had to try to get up near the front of the stage. This is the other weird custom of punk rock fans. It's this massive battle to get near the front. Everyone is trying to shove each other out of the way and politeness is out the door. Even though the music wasn't exactly my cup of tea, I really enjoyed being in the mix and trying something completely new. I actually held my own pretty damned well and was about five feet from the players. After all that, we headed home and had a deep dish pizza. Great end to a great day.

Tomorrow, I'll be answering the age old question, "Cold enough for ya?" With "Nope." I'll be heading to Minneapolis and in a few days, on to South Dakota. Bring it on.