Chicago, June 2011

Last weekend, Mike and I made a quick trip to Chicago. I got to speak at a library instruction assessment symposium at University of Chicago, and we were able to spend some time in our favorite Chicago places together and we visited some new places, too.

As you may know, Laramie is a somewhat remote location and it takes a while to get from here to . . . anywhere. So on our departure date we drove for two hours to Denver, parked and took a shuttle to the airport, had a two hour flight to Midway, took the train into the city, dropped off our stuff at a downtown hostel (more on that later) and THEN took a bus to Chicago Pizza Kitchen and Oven Grinders, home of the best pizza we've ever eaten (and we go there every time we visit Chicago). In other words, we left home at 8 a.m. and made it to dinner at about 5 p.m. and we both agreed that it was totally worth traveling all day long to eat that pizza. Yum!

After dinner we saw the play "The Gospel According to James" at Victory Gardens Theatre. It was a fantastic show, and as a bonus one of our friends from Utah State, Chris Martin, was in it. We got to chat with him a bit after the show.

We stayed two nights in a hostel near the downtown public library in Chicago. We had never stayed in a hostel before, but our funds for the trip were limited and this hostel was less than half the price of a downtown hotel. It was also recommended by the librarians at University of Chicago, so we went for it. Here's a photo of our room:

It was narrow, to say the least, and kind of like staying in a dorm room, since we shared bathrooms with the other people staying in our suite. Overall, it was not bad. The location and the price were definitely right!

My presentation at University of Chicago went really well. I won't bore you with too many details, but I presented on a mixed methods study I'm still working on this summer that attempts to measure the impact of library instruction on student achievement through focus groups with graduating seniors and a transcript analysis of a large sample of UW students. There were some great presentations at the symposium and a keynote address by my librarian hero, Megan Oakleaf.

The University of Chicago campus is really beautiful. Here are a couple of photos:

This is the Quadrangle Club, where we ate lunch during the symposium. (This is the fancy faculty clubhouse. Feels like a men's club, with lots of dark wood paneling and tweedy professor types.)

This is the reading room of the Mansueto Library, which is a brand new robot-powered library. It looks like a greenhouse from the outside, with that glass dome, and 3.5 million books are stored in the basement. You can call up a book by typing your request at the front desk, and a robotic arm gets the book for you. It's pretty cool, and obviously a popular space for students to work.

While I was conferencing, Mike went to the Adler Planetarium and to Millenium Park:

Here's a view of the museum campus, which includes the Shedd Aquarium, Field Museum, and Adler Planetarium. Maybe you can tell, we had beautiful weather for our 3 days in Chicago. It was warm and humid, but overall pretty nice.

Millenium Park

Mike and I met up at the University of Chicago and had a refreshing beverage at a cafe just off campus. All the servers were wearing t-shirts that said, "Obama Eats Here." The Obamas do, in fact, have a house in Hyde Park, which is the University of Chicago neighborhood. We went from the University to Navy Pier specifically to see the stained glass museum there. (I really wanted to go because I recently read a historical novel about the women who worked for Louis Comfort Tiffany in the first years of the 20th century, designing and creating stained glass windows and lamps. The book is Clara and Mr. Tiffany and I highly recommend it.)

Here's a stained glass window designed for a Chicago home, meant to go in a staircase.

And here's a Tiffany window. Honestly, the room full of Tiffany windows made all the others in the museum look a little bit dull. The colors are so brilliant and the landscapes so evocative.

Also at Navy Pier we enjoyed some Garrett's popcorn and the view of the city skyline.

If you visit Chicago, you must visit a Garrett Popcorn Shop and order the Chicago blend. It's caramel and cheese popcorn mixed together, popped fresh, and it's sooooo delicious.

On our last day in Chicago we visited the Art Institute, which is another of our favorite places. Last time we were there (two years ago), the modern wing was not yet open, so we were excited to have a chance to see it. The new space has an awesome, open design created by architect Renzo Piano. Here are some of the interesting pieces of modern sculpture we saw there:

Venus de Milo with Drawers by Salvador Dali

A set of sculptures by Constantin Brancusi

Chicago is our favorite city. Public transit makes it easy to get around, the architecture of the place is fantastic, and the Midwesterners who live there are pretty darn friendly. It's a fantastic place to spend the weekend.

Wait Wait . . . Don't Tell Me!

Most readers of this blog (family members and Facebook friends) already know that last weekend I was a listener-contestant on the NPR news quiz (from Chicago Public Radio) Wait Wait . . . Don't Tell Me! But, since this blog functions not just as a news-spreading tool but also a scrapbook/journal, I thought I'd record the experience here.

It was really fun to play on one of my favorite radio programs! Mike and I went to a live taping of the show in Chicago in August 2008, which was one of our favorite Chicago adventures, so I had an idea of how the taping would go. A few months ago I called the radio program to see if I could be a contestant. Then one of the producers called me just a few weeks ago to let me know that I'd been chosen. (I don't know why. Because I live in Laramie, WY? Because I'm a librarian? Because my voice sounded good on their voicemail? I have no idea how they choose contestants.) So the producer called me at the beginning of the show and I waited for the host, Peter Sagal, to ask me some questions. I'd been following the news extra closely that week and got all three questions right. My prize? Carl Kasell's voice on my home answering machine!
Now we just have to figure out what we want Carl to say and email the script to producer Emily Ecton. Then Carl will record the message in studio and we'll get a CD in the mail. Call me in a few weeks to see what he says!

Another Trip to Chicago (The Last for a While?)

Last weekend we had a super-fun, super-quick trip to Chicago. It may be our last visit to the Windy City in a while, since we're hoping (planning) to move back to the West this summer. (More on that later, once I actually have a job. Don't want to jinx it by saying too much too soon. But I have a few interviews in the next few weeks.)

We ate dinner at one of our all-time-favorite Chicago restaurants, Chicago Pizza and Oven Grinders. Problem is, it's everyone else's favorite, too, and we waited an hour and twenty minutes for a table. But it was worth the wait. After dinner, we went to The Second City for a hilarious show, America: All Better! We spent some lovely quality time at the Art Institute. One of the best parts was an exhibit of portraits by Yousuf Karsh. He photographed everyone, from Elizabeth II to Walt Disney to Audrey Hepburn, and the exhibit was really fantastic.

We went to the Chicago Public Library main branch for the first time and it's a lovely place. The picture above is an atrium on the 9th floor. They also had an interesting Lincoln exhibit.

This was one of my favorite "library" quotes on the walls of the Chicago Public Library. "The very existence of libraries affords the best evidence that we may yet have hope for the future of man." T.S. Eliot.

One more picture from the library -- a future librarian!

The main reason for our trip to Chicago was to see This American Life, live at the Chicago Theatre. It was amazing! We got to see it again in a local theatre on Thursday night, and it was maybe even more amazing in the movie theatre because we were seeing Ira Glass's face up close and huge on the big screen instead from 2 balconies back. We're huge, giant fans of TAL. You should listen to it if it's available on your local NPR station. My favorite story from the live show was Dan Savage's story about faith, loss of faith, and his mother's death.

Below are just a couple of random photos from our walk around Chicago. First, some cabbages growing in a flower pot and second, a giant "American Gothic" statue with the two iconic people as world travelers.

Visit from the Bowles parents

Mom and Dad visited October 17th-22nd and we had such a fabulous time! We're so glad that they took the time to come and visit us in central Illinois.

We showed Mom and Dad around campus, including (of course) several libraries. Dad is one of the most curious people I know and he had loads of questions that I couldn't always answer (though I nearly always make an attempt to B.S. some kind of response). It made me think -- maybe this is why librarianship is so right for me.

We went to an Illini football game and they beat Indiana 55-13.
The game was a lot of fun and Memorial Stadium is truly impressive.
At church on Sunday, the children in our congregation presented a special program. I direct the kids' singing (I'm the Primary music leader) and so my parents got to see all the kids that I teach each Sunday. They all did a wonderful job singing and saying their spoken parts.

Last Monday we went to Springfield, IL together to the Abraham Lincoln Museum and Presidential Library and to the Lincoln House (pictured below). This is the home where Abraham and Mary Lincoln lived from 1844-1861 (when they moved to Washington, D.C.).
We spent two days in Chicago together and we got to see Wicked, go on a Chicago Architecture Foundation walking tour, and go to the LDS temple in Chicago. It was an action-packed visit and we all nearly walked our feet off, but it was a fabulous time!

M&M in front of the Chicago Temple
Tiffany glass in the dome of the Chicago Cultural Center -- absolutely stunning!

Chicago: August 7-8

For Christmas 2007 I gave Michael two tickets to one of our favorite NPR shows, Wait, Wait . . . Don't Tell Me; the show is taped live in Chicago on Thursday nights. Mike was finally able to cash in his Christmas present last week (talk about delayed gratification!) and we went to the show on Thursday, August 7th. It was all we ever dreamed of -- funny, clever, lots of dirty jokes that they edit out for the radio broadcast . . . etc.

Last week's major joke was the Paris Hilton campaign ad that Funny or Die produced in response to McCain's attack ad against Obama (starting line: "He's the biggest celebrity in the world."). Great stuff.

We spent two days in Chicago, and besides the radio show we also:

• Went to the Museum of Science and Industry.
• Walked around Grant and Millennium Parks.
• Ate some awesome Chicago pizza. Nom nom!
• Went on the Chicago Architecture Foundation's river tour -- a major highlight of the trip.
• And spent time on Chicago's trains and buses finding our way around town. We're smitten with Chicago -- it's such a fun city!

We took way too many photos to post in this little blog, so check out our slideshow of Chicago fun.

Chicago!

No, I'm not referring to the musical, but the city! By the way, this is Mike using Melissa's Blogger log-in name. Here's the story. Last Saturday (May 31) Melissa flew back to Illinois from Idaho, and I drove up to Chicago to pick her up. Since her flight was scheduled to arrive at 2:00pm, we decided it would be fun to spend the afternoon and evening in Chicago, so we did.

The first thing we did was check out the Art Institute of Chicago ( http://www.artic.edu/aic/), something we've been talking about doing for a long time. Below are some of the major works of art we had the great privilege of seeing at the Art Institute. They are, from top to bottom, The Bedroom by Vincent Van Gogh, American Gothic by Grant Wood, A Sunday on La Grande Jatte - 1884 by Georges Seurat, Haystacks by Claude Monet, Nighthawks by Edward Hopper, and Sky Above Clouds IV by Georgia O'Keefe








After our visit to the Art Institute, we starting walking around downtown Chicago. It was the perfect day for a walk downtown. It was sunny, the sky was blue, and the temperature was around the mid-to-high 70s. We wandered around Millennium Park and found this really cool amphitheater where the Chicago Gospel Music Festival was happening.


Also in Millennium Park was this really cool bean-shaped sculpture. In the photo at the top of the post, you can see how the sculpture reflects the Chicago skyline.

On our way to Maggiano's Little Italy, where we ate dinner, we passed by lots of interesting buildings and monuments. The most intriguing was the WGN building, which had random pieces of brick and stone stuck in the brick of the building. Included with the random chunks of building material were inscriptions about where those bricks and stones were (supposedly) from. Melissa and I became pretty doubtful about the authenticity of origins of the bricks and stones when we saw a piece that was supposed to be from the LDS Temple in Salt Lake City and another from the Taj Mahal. There were also stones that were supposedly from the Great Wall of China and the old city hall of Aachen, Germany, among many, many others. We didn't have our camera with us that day, so we don't have any pictures of the odd building. We'll have to take some pictures the next time we're in Chicago.

After dinner, we walked down to Navy Pier to check it out. The view of the city skyline from the lake front was spectacular. We estimated that we walked about 3 miles in downtown Chicago that day, and we only saw a small fraction of the city. It's a good thing we plan to take a few more trips to the big city in the coming months. We'll keep you posted on what we see.