Chi-town

***EDITED TO ADD ONE PICTURE THAT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CHICAGO***

If I'm being honest here, which I try to do for the most part on this blog, I'll have to admit openly that I did not take my camera.

I knew that out of the 8 of us that went, Avee and I would be the only two that didn't have a camera. And if there's one thing I know how to do---it's mooch. And I'll admit this too: I mooched photos. I said, "Oh here, take a shot of this" the whole time. And pretty much, every picture I wanted taken was taken. But now I have to actively work at getting them from everyone, onto my computer. There's really only one that I really want to show you.

I had a great time. My first day there after getting overwhelmed by traffic and finding places and a long check-in and then driving the car far away to park for less than $50 a day---I was sure that this touristy, sight-seeing business was not my scene.

But I had a great time with my family and friend. I took only Avee with me. I was pretty concerned about leaving Danyo because he and I--well, we're sort of attached to each other. He did great. J marveled in the simplicity and delightfulness that is spending a day with Danyo. And that was good.

Even though I got home at 7:10 pm last night, Danyo was already asleep for the night. It was VERY hard for me to let him stay asleep. I wanted my arms around that squishy little guy. This morning he had nothing but disdain for me. It was tragically hilarious. He laid on J's shoulder like they were peas and carrots and looked at me like I was some nasty lumpy sauce that shouldn't adulterate perfectly acceptable vegetables like peas and carrots.

Then I said, "Diggy, diggy, diggy" and he laughed and called me mommy and offered up all his precious slobber to me. We're best friends again.

We stayed at an amazingly beautiful hotel. My friend who went with us actually summarized it well on her blog. You can go see what I did over there.

We saw Wicked on Saturday. I have been very excited to see it and my expectations were very high. It exceeded every last expectation I had---by a mile. I loved every single millisecond of that show. The woman next to me---not so much. I think my hearty guffaws bothered her. And a couple of times I bellowed out, "THAT WAS AWESOME!" which isn't really all that socially acceptable. But I was completely caught up in the show. I highly recommend anyone who has a chance to see it---see it. If it's in Chicago, we had great orchestra seats, so i can't be entirely sure---but it looked like pretty much any seat in the theater would be good.

I want to go 100 more times. Anyone have $2000 they want to donate to the cause?

As I mentioned, Avee went with me and she was a champion traveler. She wanted to be held a lot, but I can totally relate, so I didn't really think of that as a negative thing. We used the El and the buses for everything and everytime we went on a bus, Avee wanted to swing from the hand grip thingy-ma-bobs that they have for people who have to stand up. I finally let her on our last bus. It was pretty funny. I don't think anyone else thought it was.

We still have visitors and we're a little piled up on each other. 4 teenagers, one tween, my sister, her 18 month old, and of course, the usual clan of Nobodies that hang out here.

I feel like there's a zillion other things I'm supposed to write or that I wanted to write, but it's 11:41 pm and none of them are coming to me.

That 'l do little Nobody, that 'l do.

This picture: Fills me with happiness and makes me laugh everytime I see it. This is Avee with one of her bffs at a Pioneer Day festivity the night before we left for Chicago. They did this on their own. I was not a part of any of it.