August Chi roundup: Miles visits and Cubs win

In early August, we all had a lot of fun looking at our wedding photos – can’t believe it was 30 years ago! Here are a few for fun and nice memories!

Long summer days means you can really fit a lot into a day. This year on Friday Aug 5, we worked all day, I went with Liam to buy a car, then we went out to dinner at our local favorite Enoteca. We’ve recently learned that Enoteca is said more like “EN–OhTecha”. We had been saying “en-ah-tech-uh.” Readers may also know this place as the restaurant side of Letizia’s bakery on Division.

Anyway, about the middle-most activity of the day, Liam buying a car, we went to CarMax in Hillside and test drove one car which was rather meh. During the test drive we stopped at my request at a palateria, or Mexican ice cream and popsicle (cold treats of all types, really) called La Michoacana, for me to jump out and get a popsicle. Delicious!

So we then went back to the dealership and asked to test drive another car, with Liam realizing his price range could go up a bit for a less clanky vehicle, and we went right back to La Michoacana for him to get a popsicle. I had strawberry, he had mango chamoy – chamoy being a sweet and spicy salsa frozen right into the popsicle. We agreed that stopping for treats made the car buying experience much more enjoyable! These nice touches helped too!

Monday August 8, Miles arrived! We picked him up from the el and went home for a bit, then walked over to Big Star Tacos in Wicker Park for dinner, meeting Dylan on the way and Liam there.

When Miles is home, it’s nice to have him hanging out by my office! Great co-worker!

Wednesday that week, Debbie had gotten Cubs tickets from work and so I joined her, Nana and Grandpa for a Cubs game at Wrigley Field. We had great seats (in the shade!) and really enjoyed the game. The Cubs won and raised the W flag!

After the game, we came back here and had pizza with John and Miles in our back yard. By chance, Miles had this shirt on the next day – referencing the curse / losing streak that was blamed on Wrigley Field staff expelling a troublesome goat and the goat’s human friend in the 1940s, and the guy supposedly placed a curse on the Cubs that lasted until 2016. There’s not much explanation about how the curse ended, just that the “curse was reversed.”

Continuing this much more exciting than usual week, on Thursday we joined our former Chicago / now in Colorado friends in celebrating their daughter’s wedding. Amelia and Hiro were visiting the US to celebrate with Amelia’s family, and then they were back to Japan. Congratulations!

On Friday, John and I both had summer Fridays where we could leave a bit early to enjoy the nice weather and weekend, and so we cycled with Miles to the MCA to see (again!) the Nick Cave exhibit. So good! We then cycled along the lakefront, through Lincoln Park then back on the 606. We included photos of the Nick Cave exhibit in a previous post, but this piece also on the top floor was new this trip. It’s a large lens that seems like you can’t though it, but you can.

Sunday, before Miles’s flight, we went out to breakfast (lunch?) at Flying Saucer. Classic! Here are the Kennymen trying out some chairs displayed at a second hand store on California. Album cover material!

After Miles went back to Portland, we had a pretty regular week then John headed off for a hiking trip on Friday. This will be one of those blog entries where we have parallel story going! The trip is going well, and I’ll let John fill us on the details when he finishes the hike and has I’m sure amazing photos to share. Meanwhile, I’ve been keeping very busy here stopping to take photos on the way to the bakery in Ukrainian Village

Going to a very cool exhibit of visual poems on maps of the night sky at the Poetry Foundation

Due diligence / deferred maintenance on “proper” disposal of latex paint. Don’t even get me started on this!

Met Andrea for dinner and as we walked over to pick up take out, we passed by the massive roadworks project on Pulaski where Liam has been working. Here I am in the exact spot that Andrea saw Liam in earlier in the week! The crew is replacing sewer pipes. Liam, feel free to elaborate in the comments.

I helped plant a few new native grass plants at Nana and Grandpa’s home in Naperville. We treated ourselves to La Michoacana ice cream after. They got espresso coffee in a cone bowl, I had a mangonada, which is ripe mango, mango sorbet and chamoy. Big month for mango chamoy!

On that delicious note, I’ll dial back the clock a week with this photo of John and Ken heading out on their trip a week ago. Get ready for some stunning scenery on the next posts showing John’s trip!