The Windy City

Joe and I spent the last weekend in October in Chicago!  One of our friends was getting married that Sunday, so since I had never been to Chicago, we decided to make a weekend out of it.  We got there on Saturday morning and went straight to our hotel.  Our hotel had this pretty tree.

We happened to run into the bride and groom just as we arrived at our hotel, said our hellos, and then took an hour nap.  :)  (We had been up since like 3am, so we were exhausted.)  The good thing was that because of the hour difference, we woke up the same time we went to sleep.  My one goal for the day was to see the original Playboy mansion, so we did. 

I met a woman out front who said she lived there for four years (about 30 years ago!) and told me all about the inside.  I wish I got her name, I could have looked her up.

Then we went to Navy Pier for a late lunch/early dinner.  They have a gigantic ferris wheel that I could not convince Joe to ride with me.

We had hotdogs here:

Joe thought their accomplishment was amusing...

After hanging out for a while at the Pier (and paying $24 to park!!!) we went to hang out with our friend Tracy and her husband to be, Chris.  Here are Joe and Tracy in her kitchen.

We were only able to hang out for a little while though, because Joe and I had tickets to see a Chicago Blackhawks game.  They play here:

This was very exciting for me, since that is also where Michael Jordan played basketball with the Bulls. 

The hockey game was sort of terrible.  The Blackhawks weren't doing so well at the beginning of the season (when we went), and that night they were playing the Atlanta Thrashers, who only had one win on the season.  
We had fun anyway, and at least there was some good fighting at the end of the third period. :)

Since the game was less than great, I looked more forward to seeing the zambonis clear the ice.  I really wanted them both to reach center ice at the same time, but they just couldn't pull it off.  Talk about having a cool job.

The worst part about the game was that THIS GUY sat in front of me.  His gigantic melon head took up almost the entire neutral zone.  

And as you can see, if was not a great end for the Blackhawks.

Chicago was awesome, and I can' wait to go back.