A couple months ago, my manager suggested that I take some time off, so last week I spent a few days in Chicago visiting Nathaniel. This was my second time visiting Chicago, and this time I definitely won the weather lottery. Or maybe it was weather karma, seeing as it was 70 degrees when I left California. Whatever the cosmic influence, it was cold. And this is not just the spoiled Californian in me talking; even Nathaniel agreed it was unusually, face-hurtingly cold when I arrived Wednesday afternoon.

Since I hadn't eaten that day, we stopped off at A Taste of Heaven, a coffee shop near Nathaniel's apartment. That particular shop has been the center of some controversy due to a New York Times article about a sign on the door, which asks parents to control their children when inside. In the article, the owner is quoted as saying that most of the protesting parents are "former cheerleaders and beauty queens" who "have a very strong sense of entitlement." Hee. The windows of the place are now covered with letters from people around the world, mostly in support of the owner, as far as I could tell.

Later that night we went climbing at the gym Nathaniel usually goes to, and it totally kicked my ass. Like, gym's foot ---> Sha's ass. It was sad. Apparently the place is well-known for sandbagging (i.e. lowering) their ratings, but it was still a frustrating night.

Thursday Nathaniel had some meetings, so after a quick brunch at a neighborhood diner, I took the El down to the Field Museum, Chicago's natural history museum. Since I was small, er, young, I've loved natural history museums, so I had fun. Among the highlights were Sue, the largest and most complete T-Rex skeleton ever discovered, and a nice special exhibit on Pompeii. Afterwards, Nathaniel met me at the museum and we had yummy sushi at Oysy. Though not particularly inventive, the sushi there was very tasty, especially the white dragon roll. Mmm... We followed our sushi gorging with a showing of Wicked, starring SNL's Ana Gasteyer, whom I love.

When we arrived home, I got a special bonus prize for winning the weather lottery. Sometime during the day, the boiler in their basement exploded, leaving the apartment sans heat for the rest of my visit. Nathaniel was nice enough to let me sleep in his bed with his toasty comforter, but I gotta say, Chicago winters with no heat is decidedly not awesome.

Friday Nathaniel got out of his scheduled meetings so that we could go to the Museum of Science and Industry, which was very cool. One of my favorites was the exhibit on U-505, a German U-Boat captured during World War II. They had the actual sub in the building, and you could even go inside it. Very cool. My other favorite exhibit was the chick hatchery, full of fluffy fluffy chicks! Nathaniel and I had to literally tear ourselves away, lest we fill our entire camera memory cards with images of fluffy cuteness.

Friday night we had dinner with a bunch of Nathaniels' friends at Sticky Rice, which Nathaniel calls "the best Thai food ever." It was very very good, and had a lot of dishes I'd never had before. True to form, Nathaniel ordered way too much food, and I left feeling stuffed. After dinner, we headed over to the Neo-Futurists theater to catch Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind, a show consisting of 30 plays in 60 minutes. "Wha?" you say? Yeah, that's pretty much the reaction I had. But it ended up being a lot of fun, and sometimes even thought-provoking. That is, when they weren't pulling Christmas lights and Cheetos out of their pants.

Saturday we met up with Nathaniel's friend Bill, and after several failed brunch attempts, eventually ate at Kitsch'n. After a quick stop to pick up Bill's sweet new jacket, we headed over to Millenium Park. Apparently it was is not the bestest time ever to visit the park, because all of the fountain was off, and the underside of Cloud Gate was closed. It was still nice, though, and I got a few pictures there.

That evening we caught a showing of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which I enjoyed a lot, despite not remembering a damn thing from the book. We ended the evening at a local Korean restaurant, where Nathaniel and I decided that we are very compatible eaters.

Sunday morning it was off to Midway to catch an early flight, and back to the warm, warm embrace of California. Thank you so much to Nathaniel to being a great host and an even better friend.

Photos here.

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