Chicago Beach Squatters

Yes, you're about to be force fed another several postings of our antics in Chicago. We've always said that our favorite part about Milwaukee is Chicago, and perhaps these pictures will prove it. Randy and Diane have been as seduced by the Windy City as we have, and during their summer trips to the midwest, we usually take two drives down there to sitesee the skyscrapers and snarf the pizza. During this particular trip we experienced a new side of Chicago, that of the beach resort.

I didn't believe it at first either, but Chicago actually boasts the "most swimmable" metropolitan shoreline in the US (whatever that means). I haven't the foggiest idea how this could be the case, and surely anyone that has been to South Beach would be just as skeptical. Perhaps it is considered the most swimmable because the tourists that are pushed into Lake Michigan by their mischevious family and friends swim like crazy to get the heck outta there . There must have been hundreds of people prancing around in the tide, and much to our surprise, very few of them were developing strange rashes or legions on their bodies from the polluted water. Sara and I have heard plenty of news stories in Milwaukee which lead us to believe that every time we flush our toilet the lake gets a few gallons deeper. Apparently that is not the case in the Chicago portion of our country's Northern Shore. Perhaps I'm just a little paranoid that I'd get pulled under by a cement shoe wearing ex-mafia man of bygone times.

Big city people get big ideas that lead to big projects (especially if there's a big budget). As I was looking up information about the beahes of Chicago I happened upon one of those huge projects that the modern metropolitanite is most likely oblivious to as he or she enjoys a beach day in the shadow of the world's tallest buildings. Like so many other Chicago stories, it all starts with the great fire of 1871. 15 years later people were still trying to dig out, and most of the excess debris was getting dumped into the lake. A dude named George Streeter decided to bank in on this and let his river boat run ashore 451 feet off the shore and payed rubble dumpers to do so next to his boat. Since the boat belonged to him he had legal rights to squat on the island that was accumulating below it, and before too long he had enough land to establish the "United States District of Lake Michigan", which was not subject to any laws of Chicago or Illinois. Eventually his island became a peninsula, and Streeter sold many deeds to people of low repute for a lot of cash. To make a long story short, for 32 years he fought against the local policemen and politicians to keep his ill-gotten land (which he cleverly called Streeterville) through use of shotguns and boiling water. I can imagine how relieved the policemen (I picture them being Irish) were that the water was purified before it became a deadly weapon.

George Streeter's land remained in his family until 1928, when it was finally ruled to be part of the city of Chicago. Of course by that time it had become a substantial chunk of urban real estate, valued at over $300,000. You'll never guess what stands on top of the exact spot where George Streeter's boat was beached for those 42 years...Chicago's fourth tallest building, The John Hancock Center! That's the double spired one behind Sara in this picture, you know, the one that Clark Griswold works in. I just love to think that all those gigantic buildings are standing on the land dumped there after the fire, and the only reason it was put there was because of one completely deranged guy. This is very similar to the history of Manhattan, don't forget that the entire United Nations complex in Eastern Manhattan is sitting on top of the land that was excavated when building the World Trade Center and dumped into the East River.

The First McDonalds - Krok Style, Boom Like That!

The city of Des Plaines, Illinois decided to nickname themselves "The City of Destiny". This is far better than their previous slogan of "A Great Place to Stop and Get Gas On Your Way to O'Hare". The current nickname was aptly chosen as it was from this Chicago suburb that Ray Kroc launched a little "restaurant" called McDonald's. We aren't really the type that eat at McDonald's very often, though we occasionally enjoy an Angus Third Pounder, or an Egg McMuffin. Ever since I found that long curly red clown hair in my Big Mac I've been trying to stay away. We do, however, appreciate American culture, and what better way is there to celebrate what's made our country the juggernaut it is today than by eating at the spawning pool that brought to light one of its most greasy stereotypes.

Now here's a bit of fast food history for you. The sign under which I'm enjoying a delicious frozen gelatinous substance on a cone claims that at this locale was born the national chain of McDonald's. This is not to say that McDonald's itself actually began there, rather, Ray Kroc's national chain of restaurants called McDonald's was. The restaurant in Des Plaines is technically the 9th McDonald's, the first one having been established by Dick and Mac McDonald is in San Bernardino, California. Dick and Mac were the inventors of fast food as well as the idea of franchising, and they had successfully opened eight McDonald's restaurants between 1940 and 1954. Enter: Ray Kroc, milkshake machine repairman. Ray saw the potential in the McDonald brothers' idea, made a handshake deal with them, and built his first store here in Des Plaines. The store where we dined was at the company's like 90 billionth location, which is across the street from the original store number 9...or is it number 1? I guess that depends on if you're eating at McDonald's or Kroc's?


So if any of you blog readers are anything like Sara and I, the first thing that comes to your mind is, "Next time we're in San Bernardino, we absolutely must go and see Dick and Mac's original store!" That'd be a waste of time because she's been demolished and turned into the corporate headquarters of America's second favorite fast food chain, Juan Pollo (who dat?). We'd have to go to Downey, California to see the oldest operating McDonald's, which was Dick and Mac's fourth store. I love the original sign in Des Plaines, which has touts the proud claim of their one millionth customer. Currently, McDonald's serves 47 million people daily. In 1984 the company had Dick McDonald himself flip their ceremonial 50 billionth burger. Believe it or not, there are actually more Subway sandwich joints out there than there are McDonald'ses. And the rich get richer.

Baha'u'llah, The Bab and The Ba'hais

The Ba'hai faith embraces the teachings of the prophets from various other denomintions, including Abraham, Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, and their modern prophet, Baha'u'llah. If you zoom in on the top picture there, you'll notice the intricate etchings in the top of the pillar that I'm holding up. Some of those etchings are the common symbols of the world's many religions. We had to toss Sara up very high in order for her to snap this picture. That's Lake Michigan up there, making this land beachfront property. Notice the nine pools around the building, which has nine arches and nine main doors. I'd reckon there's some sort of religious meaning behind the number nine. Or maybe that's just how things looked the prettiest. Strange how such an enormous building gets lost in the trees in the Midwest. I bet it looks really cool in the snow.

This is a picture we ripped off the internet of the interior of the dome (no pictures allowed inside). I really like that they keep the interior so bright, unlike many international churches of similar grandeur. The detail in the ceiling is fascinating, and the symbol in the middle represents the Greatest Name. Islamic people believe there are 99 names for God, and some Islamic sects, including the Ba'hai, believe in a 100th name for God which is greater than all, and there it is. The interior of that building was so peaceful and bright, I didn't want to leave.

There are only two existing pictures of Baha'u'llah. Ba'hais believe it sacreligious to show pictures of him in public places, or display his image in their homes. I guess if you'd really like to see what he looks like, the shameless and wonderful people of Wikipedia have both pictures. He lived in the latter half of the 19th century in what we now call Iran and Iraq. He became prominent for spreading the word of the Bab, a guy who showed up around Persia in 1844 claiming to be the Islamic messiah. After that he pretty much walked all around Iraq, spent many years in prison and preached like crazy. He claims to be the Messiah of all religions, which is a pretty big deal, but at least he did it in a peaceful way. The Ba'hai's seem to be carrying on his tradition; they are so quiet and peaceful. They don't even accept contributions unless you're a member of the faith. So there's your religious lesson of the day. I'm so glad that the churches of the world have given us all so many amazing buildings!

The Ba'hai House of Worship - Illinois

The Ba'hai House of Worship is one of those amazing places in our own backyard that a lot of the locals don't even know about. This is the prettiest building in the entire state, and according to the state department of tourism, one of the Seven Wonders of Illinois (ranked only slightly below Coach Ditka). That's a fairly big claim for a state chuck full of the world's best sky scrapers.

If I were a better person I would take the time to read the entire wikipedia article about the Ba'hai faith, but I just don't have the patience right now. There are actually quite a few Ba'hais out there, over 6 million actually, and they aren't necessarily all in the Middle East. As a matter of fact, they've established a house of worship on each continent, and the North American temple happens to be in Willmette, Illinois, so of course we went to see it. Actually, does Panama City count as North America? I guess we'll call that Central America. Anyhow, so the people there were super neat, and I could really feel that great spirit that is present in religious buildings. You can always tell when a religious group is in it for the right reason by how the tourists act while visiting their houses of worship. People touched by the spirit just feel wrong running about and shouting like tourist ninnies regardless of weather they belong to the faith or not.

This temple is by far the coolest looking of all the Ba'hai houses of worship, although the one in New Delhi ain't so bad. Its a good 138 feet tall, being the tallest of all Ba'hai buildings, and is surrounded by the most beautiful gardens. The building took 32 years to build, mostly because of the lulls during World War II and the Great Depression, and the fact that it is massive and incredible. I'll have to move on to the next posting to further prove how awesome this building is. Anyone who has lived in the Chicago area and has never stood at the bottom of the stairs of the Ba'hai temple should repent and make a pilgrimage.

Zoo Hijinks with Randy III

So I don't know where it came from, but I've always had this strange fascination with birds. I'm guessing it's genesis was all those trips I made to Logan's Willow Park when I was a tiny little fledgling. I remember my dad and I going there with an entire loaf of bread, wadding up pieces into little balls and throwing them at, I mean to, the birds. There's just something cool about how birds move and get around, and they all look like puppets. I really like puppets. Also, there was a period of time where my mom raised love birds to sell into bird slavery. I really liked those fat little guys, and I sometimes wish they were still around, but I think my parents had to get rid of them because they ran out of newspapers.

When Randy and Diane were visiting, The Milwaukee County Zoo sponsored a "Birds of Australia" exhibit in which zoo goers could shove little Popsicle sticks with millet glued to them into the faces of aviary, hoping to forge a bond between the humans and the birds. It worked for all of us, except Zoe who was too busy trying to play with the stuffed creatures sold in the exhibition hall to notice the hundreds of birds flying about the room. I was a little bit disappointed that I wasn't able to feed any stereotypical Australian birds like Kookaburra and Emus. I don't know a whole lot about these birds from down under, but given that they are from Australia they could probably kill me, so I'm glad they were left out of the millet mall.

There's this awesome bird house at the Zoo that I really liked going to whenever we visited. My dear little wife, however, has some sort of strange bird phobia, so she sent my brave daughter and I into the wild blue yonder to commune with our fine feathered friends all alone. The grand finale of the bird house was my favouritest bird in the whole wide world, the Great Hornbill. Of all the birds ever created, this one is the puppetiest, with its fat long neck, and its Toucan Sam beak. It just sits there all day looking super regal, occasionally opening its mouth and squawking, as though it ran the whole Zoo. Sometimes I think the gigantic land mammals get all the attention.

Zoo Hijinks with Randy II

I learned something new about Randy; he always keeps a red bandana in his pocket. Well at least he does when he's being forced by his son-in-law to load boxes full of old math books into a hot truck on a sunny summer day. This bandana came to great use while at the zoo riding on the train, where he spontaneously metamorphosised from Normal Randy: to Bank Robber Randy: and then finally into Street Thug Randy:How could I not put these pictures on the blog? I just get a big kick out of this guy. I don't think I've ever met somebody who takes better advantage of the summer than Randy does. He'll wear shorts all year as if having a sit in against heat discrimination during the winter time. I just realized that on the other side of the calendar, my own dad is the best Christmas celebrator I've ever met. So my wife and I get the best of paternity all year long. I wonder if a similar polarity exists between my mother and mother-in-law? I know my mom enjoys a good Easter egg hunt, but does Diane go ga ga for pumpkin carving? We'll have to explore this at the next family reunion.

Zoo Hijinks with Randy I

The Milwaukee County Zoo is a whole load of fun, and for Zoe it becomes an amusement park when Randy is around. He and Diane came out to enjoy our last week of the Midwest with us. When I wasn't standing over them with a whip while they were standing over boxes with bubble wrap, we all went to our favorite Milwaukee sites to bid farewell and have some fun. Randy's a pretty hip grandpa who is very good at turning leisurely stroller rides into Six Flags on four wheels. In her two year-old mind Zoe has often likened me to a Grand Canyon mule as I slowly lumber along up and down the forested hills of the county Zoo. On the other hand, Grandpa Randy runs up and down the road zig-zagging like crazy, popping wheelies, making scary noises, and actually lifting up the entire stroller so Zoe can see the big fat bears loafing about in their hammocks...not unlike her father. This is no easy task since Randy has to lean down about ten feet in order to grasp onto the stroller handles. Here he is subjecting her to some sort of zoological water torture.

I've got a load of pictures of this Zoo trip, so maybe I shouldn't type so much. Whenever we go places with Randy and Diane we end up taking more pictures than the paparazzi at a celebrity purse dog convention. We've got our camera, Diane has hers, and Randy has the camera he won from work...the same camera that has snapped many a roadside picture of OREO cows and freeway sunsets. We all snap pictures, then after our photogenic shenanigans have come to an end I have three times the pictures to select from for blog fodder. How will I ever find enough text to give all the blog-worthy pictures from my shutter bug in-laws a comfy little house to live in? I'm sure I'll manage, I'm a pretty chatty fella. Here's Zoe with her grandpa on the resident Milwaukee County Zoo dromedary, Omar. Omar has frequented our film over and over again. Let's face it, he's a very photogenic camel.

So Long Waukesha

My last day of work in Milwaukee was July 23rd. It was a great part of the year to be gainfully unemployed, and we used our time off to its fullest. I already had another job lined up in Seattle, so it really ended up being a 3 month partially paid vacation. Wahoo! Sara and I spent most of our free time putting all of our stuff into boxes and taping them shut, hoping that the contents would get to their final destination in as many pieces as they began with. Of course, there was no way on Earth I could keep Sara inside packing during the 2 beautiful months of Wisconsin summer, so we grabbed the camera and set out looking for some final photos to remember the fond moments of our Midwest sojourn.

Many of our good times were in our county's seat: Waukesha. If you'll recall from a former posting, Les Paul is from this fine town, as are a bunch of people who live with a lot of strange lawn statuary on diagonally oriented streets. Zoe was born in Waukesha, and she can say the name of her birth town, which took a lot of practice. Is it just me, or is that a lot of signs on that sign? Also, here's a picture of me with a fox statue on a bridge over the Fox River in a city whose name means "fox" in Algonquin. Has anyone ever seen a fox in the wild? I think they live strictly in movies and statues. I'm so surprised that none of the locals have stolen this statue for their lawns. On this particular weekend Randy and Diane were on their way to spend our last few days in Wisconsin with us. This is code for "help us move all our boxes". By some strange coincidence the vacation they planned months in advance ended up being the same week we moved. Lucky them. I love those few days when they are on the road en route to visit us, its fun to call and see where they're at (usually Nebraska).

Wellants!

The Great Circus Parade included a whole herd of elephants which had been specially trained to withstand the weight of six to eight Americans. Three of those six to eight were Zoe, Sara and I. Zoe's been an elephant fan for all of her two years, and she just about exploded with excitement when she realized that the line we'd been standing in for many minutes was to actually sit on top of an elephant.

When it was my turn to get on the elephant with Zoe, the weird circus dude let me sit pretty much on top of his or her head (the elephant's head, not the weird circus dude's). It was pretty much the coolest thing ever because when the elephant flapped its ears to cool off, the ears scraped across my legs. I've never had gigantic ears flap across my legs before, and it was pretty neat. The elephant really liked it when I pet its head and ruffled its hair. It did not enjoy the Dutch rubs.

Sara wanted a chance to ride with Zoe too, so I passed the elephant jockey reigns to her. Ever since Zoe was a little glow worm we've been working as hard as we can to influence her favorite animal decision into the pachyderm arena. Imagine our relief when one of her first words was "wellant", which we have correctly interpreted to mean "elephant". Since then we've all become intense wellant fans, and hope to someday have a wellant ranch in our backyard. I'm sure we'll be able to succesfully wrangle the world's largest land mammal because the weird circus dude taught a secret wellant fact: Some are left-trunked and some are right-trunked. Let the records show that Sara, Zoe and Kason are, and forever will be, HUGE wellant fans.

The Great Circus Parade Part II

Here are some more pictures of Sara, Zoe and I in front of various circus wagons. There were about four really cool wagons containing old timey player organs that had little drums and bells and cymbals. I spent a lot of time staring at the organ wagons listening to the music, and I think some other members of my party got sort of bored. I'm sorry that I didn't take any pictures of those wagons, I was too busy filming several minutes of the music for Zoe to listen to at a later date when her attention span is longer than amount of time it takes for her brain to remind her legs that she now knows how to walk.
So the Great Circus Parade is sort of a big deal. The folks from Baraboo have been stomping their way through Milwaukee for 30 years now, from 1963 to 2009. I know the year's don't add up, but that's because it's not necessarily an annual occasion. As a matter of fact, the parade took a recess from 2005 through 2008, which means that this year was the first chance we really ever had to see the show. I'm pretty sure the wagon pictured below features lion-headed shrimp - limps. Golden limps. In a few milleniums archaeologists will dig up these bas reliefs and immediately assume we worshipped mythological shrimp lions. I wonder it that truly is the case in Baraboo. Yes, the giant 'S' on the wagon stands for shrimp. Or maybe Sara.
I wish I could post the rest of the pictures we took, but lets face it, this is teetering on the fulcrum of boredom as it is. But wait, here's a fascinating tidbit; the Grand Clown of this particular Great Circus Parade was none other than Ernest Borgnine. I wonder if I'd have recognized him if he hadn't been wearing the make-up? Probably not since I never watched any McHale's Navy, or SpongeBob SquarePants.

The Great Circus Parade Part I

Baraboo, Wisconsin is the birthplace of the Ringling Brothers of Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus fame. We always planned on heading out towards Madison to see the Circus Museum in Baraboo, but never really got around to it. I heard there's a big statue of Romeo the Killer Circus Elephant out there, and we definitely could have used a picture in front of that. Instead, the circus museum came to us, minus the killer elephant statue. Early in July the circus people loaded all their cool wagons and animals into trains and came on out to Milwaukee to parade around the streets and put on little shows. It was just like the first scene of Dumbo, but with snow instead of rain (in July?). Like I've said before, Milwaukee knows how to throw a party, they have cool stuff like this pretty much every weekend in the summer.
The parade itself was during church, so we weren't able to go, but we did spend a lot of time at the lakefront the day before where they had parked all the wagons, livestock and weird circus people for public exhibition. Check out how cool these here antique wagons are! There were about 50 of them parked all along the gigantic park by the lake, and each one of them was unique and beautiful. A lot of them are over a hundred years old. I never would have thought I could be so amazed by circus wagons. I've got loads of pictures of us posing in front of circus wagons (I bet you don't find that sort of action photography on many blogs out there), so I'll probably have to end this post with a To Be Continued...

Tonight We Gonna Party Like it's the Year 2009!

This is how we celebrate the New Year in Seattle! Oh yeah, what a cool city. I just had to share with the cyber world what must have been the most hilarious news caster banter I've ever heard. Here's pretty close to a direct quote - "History shows that the people of ancient China used fireworks to scare away evil demons, so if any of you are evil demons you best be changing the channel". That is awesome stuff. I'm pretty sure I would be a lousy newscaster because I could never come up with such informative and precautionary statements. Or possibly because I would make frequent usage of the term "pretty close to a direct quote".

Even though we had been dutifully warned by Guy Smiley, Sara and I were persistent in our New Year's Eve firework viewing. I kinda feel bad because we had long-time plans to actually see the fireworks in person at the Seattle Center, but we sorta wussed out. Do we get any points for actually taking the ride downtown to scope out the festivities? We got down there only to discover that the fog was thick enough, and the rain downpoury enough to potentially cancel the fireworks. I ain't waitin' no three hours for nothin', so back up to our safe little suburb we drove and watched Dick Clark, Ryan Seacrest AND Anderson Cooper welcome the New Year 3 times. That's right, we west coasters get to watch the ball fall starting at nine o'clock. We learned that Anderson Cooper's middle name is Hayes, thus making him the only person in the world with three last names as a full name. The powers that be in Seattle have finally proven to me that wind, fog and rain aren't actually legitimate reasons to cancel fireworks. All those "postponed" fireworks shows at Disneyland must be some sort of conspiracy to get people to come back. I blame the rat.

So unlike some people, I'm way into the whole New Year's thing. Yes, I looked it up, that's supposed to be an apostrophe, it's short for New Year's Eve or New Year's Day...some people think it's plural, but that's wrong. Just an hour and a half ago we started a new decade, and that only happens like every ten years or so. Everyone remembers when 2000 rolled around, I was at the Larsen's house hangin' out with all my High School Senior friends, and it was my first time to ever stay up all night. I was such a rebellious young punk! I also remember when 1990 rolled around, which is a lot to say since I have the memory of an inquired politician ("I do not recall that event, Senator"). Specifically, I remember watching one of those "Best and Worst of the Decade" shows as my dad set up chairs in our basement for some sort of party. Man, that was 20 years ago. I know it's a bit cliche, but I really do feel like there's something magical that happens when that second rolls over from 11:59 59 to 12:00 00. 2009 was a huge year for Sara and I, we moved from one side of the country to the other, changed jobs, and are still coping with the tragic loss of Kopps Frozen Custard and Chicago-style pizza. May 2010 be as rockin' as Dick Clark can make it, and may God help us all to agree on the best way to abbreviate it...I recommend Oh-ten. Happy 2010!!