Monday

I know that it has been pretty quiet here for a few days. But the holiday weekend has kept me otherwise occupied.

The trip to C-town yesterday with 2 was a great success. We were able to connect with 4 with little trouble, and made our way to 3's place with similar ease. We has rock-star parking immediately in front of 3's building for the day.

Some observations of the day-trip:

1. Sunday morning vehicular and pedestrian traffic in the Water Tower area was just as congested as most any other day. Maybe not evening rush-hour traffic, but certainly not low-key, nothing-goin'-on, everyone's sleeping-in stuff.

2. Iowa football fans don't know when to go home.

3. No more than half the people who head to Wrigleyville for a weekend afternoon actually have intentions of going to the game.

4. I never thought I would see the day when there would be bathroom attendants at Wrigleyville bars. At least attendants who weren't either bouncers or cops.

5. Living and working in C-town may not be that much different than it was 30 years ago except that things are more expensive.

6. Open-road tolling is a huge improvement. Don't leave home without your I-Pass. (I wonder what the payback period is on the re-built, hi-tech toll plazas? 3 may need to push around some more future value calculations.)

7. It remains a personal comfort to be able to make a relatively stress-free trip to a major city, get to various places in the city, either by car or by public transportation, and be able to accomplish the day's goals without making it a big deal. Chicago was not the fav four years of my life, but getting to know the city then has made my frequent visits to C-town in the last 27 years much more enjoyable.

8. You can still have the C-town traffic.

9. Invest in Starbucks.

10. There's always lots to do in Chicago. Even for us old folks.

I was surprised to discover that the Wrigleyville bars ID'd people at the entrance to their establishments. This threw a bit of a wrench into my plan to sit at the outdoor tables at The Sports Corner for lunch after the game started, but we made do with the limitations. We even did a switch-the-ID's to get 4 into the Cubby Bear after we had eaten our community bag of peanuts outside the bar. My guess is that the cops have put their foot down on underage drinking and checking ages at the door discourages more violators. But if you were like us, looking for Chicago-style hotdogs, limiting entry was a little heavy-handed. Which is why I participated in the Cubby Bear ruse.

I'm not sure if the eat-the-peanuts-on-the-street incident will make the same history as the broiled-chicken-at-the-airport story, but it may make the Honorable Mention category. They were good peanuts. But we were hungry.

The area around the ballpark really hasn't changed much since the '70's except that everything is more expensive. Mom and I would sit in the bleachers for $2-4 per ticket, and bring in a 1 and 1/2 gallon cooler with iced lemonade/rum, and 3-4 beers to boot. None of this $5/beer stuff for us. List price on the bleacher tickets now ranges from $17-42 depending on the date. (I just checked e-Bay and a pack of four bleacher tickets for tomorrow sold for $88.77.) There were lots of scalpers around the park, and we heard some outrageous quotes for standing-room, even after the game had started. It's a different life.

Other items of note:

1. ND stinks. If Saturday is any indication, they may not finish above .500.

2. Summer's over.

3. One more week in the cast.

Oh, and an observation on AM's comment from Friday about teachers' titles. I have a fairly old-time acquaintance in town whom I see out and about a bit irregularly, both for social and business things. I used to do some tax stuff for his business, and he played with us on a men's C-league basketball team in the '80's. My pal Roy and I ran into him and a group of his buds at a Village of East Davenport saloon one nothing-special Wednesday night last Spring. Roy and I were there to give a friendly needle to a bartenderess who also worked at SB's. When we asked this other acquaintance of mine what the occasion was for his group, he said it was their regular Wednesday night "coaches' meeting". And as to our inquiry about their sport/team, it was, "There's no team. We're just coaches." Roy and I were impressed.

Hope eveyone has a great day.

Be careful out there.