Hokies in Chicago

This weekend some of Dave's college friends, Peter, Camila, and Bebe, came in for a visit, so we tried to show them the best that Chicagoland has to offer: city, neighborhoods, and suburbs.

Each of them had travel troubles on Friday night - two of them had to come in on Saturday morning instead - so we opted for a relaxing afternoon at our annual bunny picnic for the Chicago House Rabbit Society.

Zelda was popular, as usual, although her extreme inactivity led to me taking off the leash and just letting her hop around on her own. This caused some anxiety on the part of some of the HRS folks - who, given their rabbitlike tendencies, are pretty anxious to begin with - but they calmed down when they saw how old and slow she is. There's no way this one is hopping away!


There was another chinchilla breed rabbit at the picnic, though, and it was funny to see Zelda and her doppelganger sitting next to each other. Even though it was overcast, it was another gorgeous bunny picnic for all.

Then it was an evening downtown. We attended a party in Uptown thrown by an old supervisor of mine from the firm I used to work at. We had a good time catching up with the people I used to work with, and, of course, admired my former supervisor's gorgeous apartment!

While we were there, Pete, Camila, and Bebe went to the Chicago Brauhaus with some Chicago-dwelling Hokies, Shannon and Lance, who are living in Lincoln Square during their residency. I thoroughly approved of this outing, and the guys drank some boots of beer to the great amusement (and possible hangovers) of all.

The next morning, we went downtown again, but this time to the Loop area. We had tickets for an architecture cruise, but first Dave and I took the Hokies to Millennium Park for a stroll.


I love visiting this park, and I love it even more when I get to show the lovely sculptures and greens to people who haven't been here before.

The architecture river boat cruise, run by the Chicago Architecture Foundation, was really cool. I have never been on an architecture cruise like this, so it was neat for me to see everything from this point of view.


While I can see my favorite buildings all the time, I got to learn about them, too.

After the river cruise, we had tasty pub food at Elephant and Castle in the Loop. (I've got to get some malt vinegar at home to put on fries.)

And after lunch, we went to the Field Museum for the pirate exhibit. The exhibit itself was OK, but not as good as other ones I've seen there. The artifacts from the Whydah ship were interesting, but I just wasn't sure there were enough artifacts to support an entire exhibit - they were missing clothes from the crew, any parts of the ship, and other things I expected to see. However, the information on the life of pirates during this time was all new to me, and really interesting. It's funny to discover how much of Disney's hokey Pirates of the Caribbean movie is quasi-accurate.

Sue the tyrannosaurus rex, however, did not disappoint, although Camila didn't think that t-rexes looked as big as she thought.


Seems pretty big to me, although maybe not as big as Stephen Spielberg's vision of them.

Finally, we went to the Signature Lounge atop the John Hancock Tower for some sky-high cocktails. Amazingly, they seated us right next to a north-facing window overlooking Lincoln Park. I was pleased with my pear martini - and we were all a little tipsy. But you can't beat the views...


I had a great time seeing Chicago sights with Dave's college friends, and it was really nice to get to know them better. I learned lots of medical facts from the med students, got to talk to them about my bar studies, and we all got to reminisce about Dave stories, which is always fun. (For us, not Dave!)