Life's always more interesting

So, Dave and I were watching TV the other day, and that Robert Goulet office commercial came on. We were making fun of it, and I said I had actually seen Robert Goulet in a play, "Camelot," when I was a kid. Dave sat thoughtfully for a moment and said, "You know, sometimes I think your life was more interesting before you met me!"

He was kidding, of course - we still do lots of traveling and such, but we definitely don't go to as many shows, concerts, etc. nowadays. That's partially law school's fault, partially our stay-at-home habits.

Well, yesterday went a long way toward upping our culture content! In fact, lately in general I feel we've been going out more. For one, I went with the law school people the other day to a free day at the Art Institute; my mom also scored us some free tickets to the Field Museum through her work; and finally, in late March, we have tickets for a special ISU alumni presentation of Body Worlds 2 at the Museum of Science and Industry!

So we started off yesterday by visiting the Block Museum at Northwestern University for a symposium on German Art in the Weimar Republic: "From the Trenches to the Street: Art from Germany, 1910s to 1920s." We caught the first speaker, Reinhold Heller, who presented "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times: German Artists' Representations of World War I."

Heller's presentation was interesting to me as a former scholar of World War I, because he really highlighted the differences in the art of the time - the anti-war paintings were silenced, and the pro-war monuments only solidified in the German mind their military superiority. Viewing the art as a "typical German," which he encouraged us to do, it is easy to see how the country was ripe for the Nazis to funnel that nationalistic pride into more war.

So, that was the culture for the morning. Last night, we had a night on the town at the Barrister's Ball, a sort of law school prom where everyone gets dressed up, drinks, and dances. It was fun, and I got to wear my fancy new shoes! (I actually managed to keep them on the whole night!)

So, I don't really know how much "culture" there was in watching drunk law students dance and run for the bar, but it sure was fun.


The party was at the W City Center Hotel in downtown Chicago, where they have a very nice mix of modern and classic decor, in addition to very fancy bottles of water, as Dave is displaying here.

After that, it was off to another law school party at Joe's in Roscoe Village, but we didn't stay there too long. (Heels were starting to hurt at that point.)

As there was a mild blizzard occurring last night, it was quite the trek home - I almost had a panic attack on the road while Dave tried to negotiate the slush-filled lanes of I-90.

My own snow-related car crash in late high school has always spooked me for winter driving, but there was the additional fun of two accidents on the interstate. (One had actually occurred on the frontage road, but the cars broke through the fence and slid down the embankment onto I-90.) Luckily we've got that sweet, sweet four-wheel drive of the WRX - gotta love it!

Well, it's back to homework, but just wanted to share some of the more amusing parts of yesterday. Property, here I come...