Hello everyone! I figured I would tell you all about the day I recently had when I went to Chicago this past weekend!

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Now, the main purpose of the trip was to go see Hadestown (my review linked there!) and hang out with my sister and puppy niece of course, but I also snuck in some other fun things. I did want to mention up front though, I really didn’t get any pictures of anything but the theatre and my puppy niece. I am so totally not a travel blogger so I completely forgot to take pictures of all the other fun things I did! Fail!

Even so, here’s my day in Chicago!

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A Day in Chicago

So I started out by taking the train into the city. I was so thankful it was a Friday night event, as it was the weekend before St. Patrick’s Day which is a horrific nightmare in the city. I’ve made the mistake of traveling into the city on those weekends before and I do NOT recommend! Luckily, I was taking an early afternoon train on a Friday when most people are working, so I avoided the nightmare crowds. The train ride itself was uneventful and I managed to get a ton of reading done.

When I arrived I was waiting for my sister to pick me up so I just people watched a bit. There was a school arriving at the station so the teachers waited for all the kids to get picked up. The parking lot at the station I arrived at was honestly pure chaos. Two trains arrived at once, and the lot was tiny, so all the parents and all the rideshares were struggling to get in and out of the lot. Eventually the students left and it was just people waiting for rides and rideshares.

Among the last people remaining were a group of four girls who were clearly ready for St. Patrick’s day already. One girl had a suitcase, another had a little carry case of beer, and all of them were already pretty drunk. Their rideshare showed up and I thought “PARTY CAR!!!!” as they very slowly made their way over to it. The rideshare driver was pretty inconsiderate overall though. It stopped right at the entrance of the lot for pick up, so the girls had to wave it on to go further up as more cars were trying to get in. It did pull into a parking spot and two girls started to slowly walk to the car, thinking it would wait in that spot for them. Suddenly, the car pulled back out of the spot and then stopped right at the exit, again blocking in all the other cars. I saw one of the girls turn back to the others with a “seriously?” sort of look on her face. This time the girls more urgently walked to the car and it became apparent that all four were trying to get into the car. The driver must have decided it didn’t have enough room or just didn’t want to drive four drunk girls around. Either way, all four girls got out as quickly as they got in (so very slowly) as the other cars got impatient and started to go around the Party Car That Wasn’t. One car actually almost hit two of the girls as they were not paying much attention and almost walked in front of the car as it went around them. They then requested another rideshare and one girl would drunkenly call out how much longer it would be. Their second rideshare finally arrived and it did seem to have enough room for them all. Alas, my sister arrived before the girls left, so I can’t say for sure that this rideshare did end up being Party Car, but it was fun while it lasted!

Anyway, after that we headed to my sister’s apartment, and I dropped off my stuff. My sister and her roommates gave me the updated tour of the apartment, as the last time I was there they’d barely moved in. It was so cute! Then I hung out with the dogs Arya and Raven, while they got ready. We soon headed out for dinner before the show!

We ended up at Shake Shack, which was such fun as we’d had Shake Shack in NYC when we’d gone on that trip. It was so good and we chatted at the restaurant while we waited for it to be time to go to the theatre for Hadestown. When we arrived at the theatre the house had just opened so we went to our seats. I already talked about the Covid protocols in my post reviewing Hadestown. We sat down, admired the show, got photos, and then took turns going to the bathroom and to check out the merch.

I love the CIBC Theatre! It was the first Chicago theatre that I saw a musical at, so it is always nice to go back to it. After the show we headed out and back to the car to go to the apartment again. Since it was an evening show, I opted to stay the night instead of rushing home in the middle of the night. It was still pretty early, but the train schedule is pretty annoying at that time of night. Either I have to literally run to catch the train right after the show or I have to wait over an hour catch the next one. By the time I’d get home it’d be almost 1am! So instead I stayed with my sister.

We had tea time before bed, snuggled the pups a bit more, and then got some sleep! In the morning I managed to finish the book I’d been reading on the train, so go me!

The next day I’d hoped to catch the 10:40am train, but we got distracted when leaving and realized we wouldn’t make it to the train station in time. So we instead hung out around Logan Square! We stopped at Intelligentsia Coffee in Logan Square, which was a pretty cute little coffee shop. I should have gotten a picture of the cup because it had a cute sleeve! Ah well. The shop was very small and busy, so we didn’t get to sit down, but we did enjoy our chai lattes and then headed to a nearby thrift shop.

El Dorado was a small but fun thrift shop! They had a big selection of items but it was well organized so it wasn’t overwhelming. They had a small handbag section, some kids clothes, a wall of shoes, a small designer section, and then a large area for men’s and women’s clothing. I didn’t find anything for myself but my sister and her roomie got a few things!

We also stopped at Fleur, a small flower shop nearby. We still had some time to kill before we had to go to the train station, so we browsed a bit. It was more of a boutique type shop so everything was pretty pricey, but super cute. None of us got anything there but there was a few fox themed things that I was tempted by because of my dog (who’s name is Fox). I was very, very tempted by some artwork of a fox in particular, but ultimately we left without getting anything.

And with that, we arrived at the train station, hung out a bit while waiting for my train, and people watched more St. Patrick’s Day insanity. On the train ride back, I continued reading another book and nearly finished it so it was also a very productive ride! I got picked up again at the station and then headed home to a lovely greeting from my little dog! I

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n all, the trip was a little over 24 hours from the time I left my house on Friday afternoon and arrived back on Saturday afternoon. In those 24 hours though I did quite a lot! It was a lovely way to spend the first part of the weekend for sure.

Thanks for reading!

Pamela

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