Back to Chi Town

Pronounced "Shy Town," by the way. Same CH sound as Chicago.

I'm now on my way to Chicago for the second time in 10 days. I guess traveling to visit your grown up (or in this case semi-grown up) kids is one of the way life pays you back for not being able to travel so much when the kids when they're little. I should note for the record that this absolutely will lead me to encourage my kids to get jobs in places I like or would like to go. "Oh no, honey, you don't want to work in suburban Washington, you want to take that job in the Canadian Rockies."

It appears that July 3 is a good travel day, because I saw when I started to check in online that empty first class seats, which had been previously offered to me for $250 were now available for $75. Well worth it. Then when we got to the airport there was nobody, and I mean nobody in line for security. This made my usual request for a pat down (the magic words seem to be opt out, a grammatical construction that I'd not heard until about 5 years ago that is now omnipresent) not nearly as stress-inducing as when we're in a hurry.

Pat downs weren't a big deal to me at any point. They don't pick jerks to do them; the TSA guys are always nice. If you tell them you've done it before they are very quick and thorough and efficient. It also is easier during the summer because as much as anything they are searching your clothes and a tee shirt and shorts makes that easy. I've still yet to be in a scanner.

The flight was easy. The only bad thing is the horrendous coffee served at the LeBus stand. I like LeBus and I like La Colombe coffee, but these two together. Ugh! Both the latte and iced coffee were awful.

Got to Chicago though the famous Kennedy Expressway traffic and settled easily into our hotel. I'll review the hotel and amazing restaurant in a separate post.