Chicago is split into two, two week stands but the train is parked in one spot for the entire month. Its not in a bad place, we are close to civilisation and a variety of stores and food places, so its not to bad to be here for a month. It certainly could have been worse. The main shops close by were The Brickyard Mall, even though it is outside it still gets called a mall. I use to think a mall was an indoor shopping area but it seems I was wrong on that one.
The main problem though is the journey to and from the Arenas, especially Rosemont, it took so long they had to bring in extra buses and our bus broke down last week as well. Rosemont is a bit of a hike to get to; it is out by the airport, which is just typical for it to be the first half of the month and not the last half when we will be heading out this way again to fly home. To get to the United center was a little bit easier but there is nothing around it really and we kept being told it is in a sketchy part of town, though we get told that so often and wonder what people are on about.
Even though Chicago is the 3rd largest City in America it seems to have past us by. The first couple of weeks Tweedy wasn't that well so rested any chance he got, he has also been really busy working with lots of shows. The weather didn't really help to get us out and about exploring either, it has been cold, damp and getting dark early, getting is adjusted to going back to the UK though I guess.
We did manage to get out and wander around a bit though. We went in but not up Sears Tower, though it is now called Willis Tower.
We went to Navy pier which was OK; I expect it would be really nice in that part of the city in the summer. The pier houses The Children's Museum, a botanic garden as well as shops and a fair ground.
Millennium Garden was really nice with some amazing art work. The gigantic silver bean was just great. Though I wouldn’t recommended head butting it, it’s quite hard.
November is a strange sort of month when it comes to decorating the outside of your house in America. There is a weird mix of Halloween decorations left over with thanksgiving and Christmas ones going up. It really is a little bizarre especially the houses that seem to have a little mix of all of them.
Thanksgiving was a nice evening, not only did Tweedy and everyone else have the night off but we also had a nice meal and Willow had a great time. The only down side for most people was free alcohol followed by a six pack (3 shows Friday and 3 shows Saturday) doesn’t really mix.
Something that we never used to have in the UK but one which has been slowly creeping in is baby showers. So far I have been to a couple here and they have both been Brazilian which apparently is different to an American one. The 2nd one was not your normal baby shower and even someone like me with very little experience on these things could tell that. It was a virtual baby shower which was lots of fun but a shame the Mom to be was on the end of a cam instead of the room, but at least technology made one possible.
A RBBB tradition for the end of the year is the Talent, No Talent Show, which actually had quite a lot of talent despite the name. The main core of the talent this year was provided by the dancers. They worked so hard with the children putting together various acts and the dancing for the main act 'Dancing with the stars' which was really good. Tweedy and Angelica came away with two awards, first place from the judges and first place with the peoples vote. Tweedy and Alex also threw together a comedy magic number that went down pretty well. And when I saw threw together I mean in 10 minutes during the interval in the show before. It was a really good night.
And of course another really exciting thing to happen in Chicago was flying out of it and heading home for Christmas.
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