After a fun time in Minnesota, Gwen and I drove back down to Chicago on Monday. Stopped at one of Wisconsin’s many shrines to dairy products for sandwiches, ice cream, and fresh cheese curds. After that, we drove through very heavy rains for about 90 miles–disconcerting in a big truck with bad handling. Took US 14 in from Jaynesville, because I-90 was under construction on the way out, and we’d rather not pay tolls for the privilige of driving slow. Just inside Illinois, in the town of Harvard, we drove past a huge and completely vacant corporate campus–no signs to say who once had occupied it. We later learned it was a Motorola site. Made it to my parents’ place in good time despite the weather.

This was Gwen’s first opportunity to see their place. It doesn’t seem to have scared her off yet. My mom gave Gwen the tour, showed her numerous examples of porcelain that might be interesting to some collectors with a deep appreciation for certain sub-types of dinnerware, etc. We spent the night there and took the Northwestern line into Chicago late Tuesday morning. Rendezvoused with my sister Lissy, who is putting us up. We dropped our bags at her place, and then took Lissy’s car on an errand.

Tuesday night, my parents were having a party at a restaurant to celebrate their 40th anniversary. When we were all younger, my parents would often observe special occasions by bringing home a schwartzwalder cake from a Viennese bakery in town, Lutz’s. My sisters and I decided this would be a suitable occasion for a schwartzwalder, so I volunteered for the mission. It also gave Gwen a chance to see a little of Chicago, which she has never visited before.

On the drive up there, I observed that lights in Chicago cycle much faster than those in Austin. I also realized that Chicagoans don’t buy new cars as readily as Austinites do. My guess is that because the city is so hard on cars, people are less willing to splurge on them–but those who do, do so quite lavishly.

We had some time after taking care of this, so we strolled the trendy shopping area around Armitage and Sheffield. Found an excellent paper store, Paper Source.

The party my parents threw themselves was quite nice–more of a to-do than I had realized it would be. Quite a few people of their generation who I hadn’t seen in at least a decade. Time is a bitch.

Today was a walking tour of Chicago for Gwen and me. We had breakfast at a nearby old favorite of mine, Nookie’s, and wandered north along the lakefront to the place where I grew up on St James Pl near Clark St. As always, it was interesting seeing what had changed and what remained the same in the old neighborhood. We then worked our way south to Michigan Avenue, in particular to take in the troika of brand-porn, the Apple store, Niketown, and the Sony showroom, which are shoulder to shoulder, all occupying one block between them. I had never seen an Apple store before, and was suitably impressed by the spare, ethereal design (the glass staircase is a nice touch). Niketown was much less the onanistic shrine to Nike wonderfulness than it once was–and much more a retail store. The Sony showroom (no retail–that would be too crass) was pretty much what it always is. We goggled at some HDTV images.

I observed that Chicagoans seem to be a little more trend/fashion-conscious than Austinites.

At various points during the day, we ducked into shoe stores. Gwen tried on lots of shoes, and we laughed at many more, but she couldn’t find any that were comfortable and stylish enough to buy. Shoe designers seem to delight in mixed messages these days, with painful pumps borrowing details from sneakers and hiking boots, or from dominatrix wardrobes. And I don’t understand the current vogue for high-heeled shoes with impossibly long and sharply pointed toes, which look more like weapons than footwear. I have dubbed these “dueling slippers.” Despite her unwavering avoidance of uncomfortable shoes, Gwen was sufficiently seduced by one such pair to at least try them on, though not enough to buy it.

Having made the rounds, we resolved to go home. Slowly, because our feet were killing us after all the walking. Walked up Dearborn, which has some of the best residential architecture in the city. Apartments renting for $4000/mo (hardwoods, 2/2, no dogs allowed).

Having made it home, we were quite hungry, so after massaging each others’ feet and taking a little siesta, we hit the pavement again to grab a bite. We wound up at Pasta Palazzo on Halstead near Armitage, which we enjoyed immensely.

Another day in Minneapolis. Gwen and I started off by walking around Lake Phelan, just down the road from our hosts. Very pleasant, with a pair of trails for running and bike riding, both of which were getting plenty of use. The powers that be trucked in some sand and created a beach at one spot on the lake that nobody was using–but there were buoys marking off a swimming area too tiny for anything beyond a little splashing around.

After that, we drove into Minneapolis again to visit the Walker Museum. The first thing that caught my eye was something outside that I had read about before, the Mobile Dwelling Unit by Lot Ek. This is a 40-foot shipping container that has been converted to a living space, with almost all of one wall, and much of the opposite, converted into slide-out units, each for a specific function–toilet, shower, kitchen, bed, storage, TV viewing, dining–so when deployed, the center area is empty. The concept is quite clever. The thing itself seems incomplete–most of the interior was unfinished plywood, with pencil marks showing cut-lines and the like; the soft surfaces were raw foam. Curiously, surveillance cameras were everywhere inside, even though there’s nothing to obstruct your view from one end to the other (and, well, who puts surveillance cameras in their home?). A museum staffer explained that the idea was that the cameras would be on the outside in a real MDU. Apart from the unfinished quality, I have more serious criticisms of the MDU: it has poor connections to the outdoors, with very limited window exposure, none of which open, and only one door to only connect to the outside. My guess is that it has no insulation to speak of, and only a window-unit air conditioner, so it could become intolerably hot in a hot climate. But it’s still a very nifty concept.

After taking in the MDU, we wandered around the nearby sculpture and botanical gardens (which were fodder for my camera–I will upload pictures when I get back). The weather was especially nice, and I think none of us were in hurry to go indoors. Eventually we did. The current exhibit–of which the MDU is a part–is of cutting-edge industrual and architectural design. Some of this was high-concept wankery, like the chair that responds to electromagnetic radiation to make you conscious of the high-tech world we live in. Some of it was self-mocking, like bottles that look broken. Some of it was mind-boggling, like a presentation for “pig city”–a self-contained pig-farming skyscraper that’s designed for maximum efficiency. One of Shigeru Ban’s cardboard-tube emergency shelters (used to house victims of the Kobe Earthquake) was on display, and I was glad to have a chance to walk around in that.

The permanent exhibit at the Walker pretty much left me cold–navel-gazing modern art. Everyday objects presented as art. When Marcel Duschamp did it, it was a clever gag, but you can only get away with that once–you can’t build an entire movement out of it.

After we finished with the Walker, we fortified ourselves with coffee and snacks, dropped in on an old friend of Gwen’s, and then went to the home of the parents of my friend Jen, who just happens to be visiting the ancestral abode at the same time we’re up here. We all had a chance to catch up, her mom overfed us and guilt-tripped us about not eating enough (you’d think she was Jewish, but she’s Chinese), and we generally had an excellent time talking about disturbing movies and feral Chihuahuas.

Gwen and I have begun a trip to Chicago and Minnesota. Two days ago, we flew to Chicago, met my parents (who were setting up for an antique show), borrowed my dad’s truck, a ’91 Ford, and lit out on I-90 for St. Paul.

I think my father has a predilection for vehicles that have loose front ends. This truck was also loud and primitive–possibly one of the last pickups that was built primarily for hauling loads, rather than for personal transport. Also very loud, and hard on gas–a fill-up cost $47. Cheaper than flying, though. Getting onto the interstate was stymied by construction, and we wound up going quite a bit out of our way before we actually found an on-ramp. Driving through Illinois, we encountered a frustrating pattern where we’d be backed up with road construction, get to a toll booth, and for about one mile after, the road would be clear. Then it would be down to one lane, more construction, and another tollbooth. Repeat until the Wisconsin border. After that, it was pretty much smooth sailing.

We reached St. Paul while there was still light and navigated with little trouble to the home of an old friend of Gwen’s, where we are staying.

Yesterday morning, we were up at a relatively early (for a vacation) hour to go kayaking, which I’ve never done before. We were right on the Minnesota-Wisconsin border. An outfitter dropped us off at an upstream point, we paddled along for about 4 hours (with a few stops for snacks and sunblock on the way), and we got picked up near the outfitter’s storefront at the end. It was fun, though my enjoyment would have been greater if it weren’t for a comparatively mild migraine. We saw at least six bald eagles close-up–I’m pretty sure that was the first time I’ve seen them in the wild in the USA.

Today we drove into Minneapolis and wandered around Gwen’s old haunts. Her old neighborhood is an awful lot like my old neighborhood in Chicago–I felt right at home. We also spent some time downtown, looking at nifty old Art Deco buildings and walking through the human habitrail system. Tomorrow we’ll be getting together with a friend of mine, Jen, who lives in Philadelphia but was raised here–it just so happens that she’s visiting at the same time we are.