I’m travelling to Chicago this week.
It is hot, humid and hazy.
I’m on the Miracle Mile but I can’t see very far up the
street.
I’m on the top floor of my hotel but I can’t see a quarter
mile from here.
I’m skipping the trip to the observitory on top of the
Hancock Tower because I just wouldn’t see any view.
All of the locals are complaining about the heat in June.
Global warming is a pain.

I did walk around the neighborhood I’m in.
There are many residential buildings here and a lot of people
on the street.
People from the burbs are always afraid of ‘downtown’,
but the part of Chicago around the Hancock tower is
very clean and pleasent.

It is a little expensive for my tastes. If you can’t read
picture at the left is says “Elegent Homes priced from
$1.5m”. These are “homes” that are in a several story
building on the shore of Lake Michigan, but still, I’m sure
the “starting at” homes are on the non-lake veiw, setting
sun side of the building. And a deal at only 1.5 million.

This part of Chicago is shopping crazy.
Most of the buildings around here have several floors of
shops. These are all upscale mall stores that cater to
the people who can afford the 1.5 million dollar
residences around here.
Shops range from coffie shops to a Bentley automobile showroom.
The Hershey’s shop shown at the left was very disappointing.
Since I really like chocolate, I check out the shop and
thought I could find things is the special Hershey’s shop.
I expected to find a special dark chocolate the can only
be found at the you-have-to-go-to-Chicago shop.
Saddly, the only thing they sold here was packaged
chocolate that you could purchase anywhere else in the nation.
Another company making a little marketing mistake.

Had to upgrade WordPress again.
Seems version 1.5.1 broke the RSS feeds.
Things are better now.

Last year

I reported

that Christmas started on June 12th.
This year, they are a little late — the first Christmas junk mail
came on June 25th.
I guess the stores aren’t as anxious about Christmas this year.

Last night, my son graduated from high school.
He has been attending a
small high school
and there were only 18 people in his graduating class.
But, there were many scholorships and people going to prestgious schools,
so the experience of the school was great for him.

Now it’s off to college for him, but, in the short term,
there was a
celebration
of the four years of work.