05/24/2015
After a busy day on Saturday, we slept in on Sunday. We planned a day at the ball-game, seeing the White Sox play – and also going on a boat cruise. Rain and cold led us to skip the boat cruise. Even the game was touch-and-go for a while.
White Sox & Twins
It turns out that baseball tickets for the White Sox are insanely cheap. Seats were $5 apiece at the edge of the stands. So why not take a look? (There’s a reason that the tickets were so cheap, which is that the White Sox are not a good team).
View from the stadium
They played the Twins, and we were in the upper seats, but the view was great. It was cold and windy, though, and seemed pretty close to being a rain cancellation. I had fun, and as far as I can remember, this was actually my first MLB game, so that was cool.
Buddy Guy’s Legends
After the game we headed into the city, hoping to check out the park. But it started raining, and then pouring. Alex did some research and it turned out Buddy Guy’s Legends bar was just a few blocks walk from where we got off the L… and when we called, they said a live jazz show was about to start. For free. Sold!
Derek Trucks, Carlos Santana, Jeff Beck, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton, Jimmie Vaughan, Gatemouth Brown. Not pictured: BB King, Albert Collins, John Lee Hooker. Damn!
We hung out for a while: the band was a jazz trio (drums, bass, guitar), and they played almost exclusively Duke Ellington. The highlight was seeing a live rendition of Caravan, the “song” (read: drum solo) made famous by Whiplash. But the highlight of Buddy Guy’s was the insane memorabilia. Tons of great photos, guitars, and so on (including Muhammad Ali’s signed gloves).
Millennium Park on a rainy day
Then we walked back to Millennium Park and the playground (empty, but the slides gave terrible wedgies after the rain), and photobombing people near the Bean. We saw the concert hall in use, but only long enough to capture the final minute of a classical concert.
Our AirBnB room
Dinner was at Geja’s Cafe, a fondue place recommended by Alex’s father. I’d never eaten fondue at a restaurant before, and it was fun. They forgot our wine, so when they finally delivered it, it was on the house. Can’t complain about that.
Strange building… can you guess what it is?
Finally, we returned to our AirBnB. This was north of Wrigley Stadium, and a really nice location. It was just 5 minutes from a bar that used to host Al Capone, and there was this great big building near the main street that we spent two days trying to figure out. Turns out it was the rear of the Uptown Theater. It looked amazing, but was being renovated (or at least, was closed to the public). I’d love to have been able to check out the inside!