We Have Survived

After getting out of work yesterday at 3, I began the adventure to get home. Waited on Columbus for a bit…no 134s…waited on Michigan for a bit…no 151s or 143s. So Lindsay and I made our way to the train, where we smashed in and fought not only for space on the pole to hang on to, but also just space to allow our lungs to breathe. When we finally arrived at Diversey (nearly 30 minutes later), we fell out of the train, on to the platform and looked that blizzard right in the eye as we walked down Diversey to home.

 

Had I hopped on a bus after work, would have had to abandon it on Lake Shore Drive

 

 

Seeing as it was a snow day, we decided to grab Maggie and head to the neighborhood watering hole as we anticipated being locked up for a while. Mags had grilled cheese awaiting us as we pulled our coats, boots, gloves, hats, scarves and socks off. Had we been 10 years younger, we would have been coming home from a sledding day instead of a work day.

 

We just walked through that tundra.

 

 

The storm wasn’t that bad when we walked into Duffy’s. But upon leaving, we walked into something none of us had ever imagined. You couldn’t see anything in front of you and the wind was just throwing us around as we climbed through snow banks to get home.

I should mention the distance from Duffy’s to our apartment building is literally 30 feet. Yet it took 20 minutes and some strategizing as we climbed/crawled across Sheridan.

We got a snow day today from work (woo!), yet this storm hadn’t appeared to lose any of its luster until about 10 minutes ago. I mean, the winds opened our windows twice last night. And our windows have those old school handles that you have to turn to “unlock”, then pull the window down.

Chicago, I love you, but man did you test that love.

 

An abandon bus this morning on Lake Shore

Navy Pier this morning. See that ferris wheel? Exactly.

 

 

Frogger Becomes a Marathoner

This past weekend brought the joyous occasion of the Chicago Marathon. And with it, our building was practically cut off from civilization as the race runs right on the street we cross every day to reach humanity and civilization from the 7 a.m. hour to the 4:30 p.m. hour. While this wouldn’t have been a problem, I had to head down the Film Fest in the city. Buses were out of the question, so I had to walk to the train crossing the Marathon path twice.

The first crossing wasn’t so bad. I made friends with some girls who worked at Duffy’s that needed to cross the street to make it to work. We waited for the gap and gingerly Froggered our way over the other side of Sheridan. I anticipated a lot worse, but we made it to the other side unscathed and more importantly, without disrupting a racer. It is also at this time it dawns on me that I have to cross again at Clark, where the people cattle will be a lot thicker and unruly.

I search frantically for another member of the crowd who needs to cross. Success. Amy needed to cross to get to Jamba Juice (the things we do for that deliciousness). So we walked down to Broadway/Surf to cross, thinking we have a lot of space that isn’t barricaded. We start running diagonal and miss the barricade opening. We turn around to see the mass running straight at us. It was like we were Simba, frantically searching for Mufasa to come and rescue us.

With nothing else to do, we started the unthinkable. RUNNING.

And we thought okay, we’ll just run until there’s another opening in the barricades. But there wasn’t one until we reached Wrightwood. Now granted, the distance is not all that far. But when you’re carrying a bag, wearing jeans and actually running in a marathon, you want this running jaunt to end immediately. People are cheering, “Go runners!” and “Yay runners.” While Amy, dressed in workout gear, and I, dressed in jeans and Film Fest shirt, come lollygagging down the path. At least it was free advertising for the Fest right?

Finally we found an opening and laughed our way, while fighting the massive crowd, back to Diversey. Quite the way to spend the 9 o’clock hour on a Sunday. And props to the rest of the runners who finished the other 99.5% of the race that I didn’t.