Windy City (Saturday)

I was in Chicago this past weekend. Flew in Saturday morning and left Monday morning. My buddies Will (Gomaa) and Tim (Hudson) picked me up from the airport and we rolled back to the Lincoln Park part of Chicago where Will has been living this summer.

After dropping off my stuff at his place, we started the walk towards Wrigleyville, the neighborhood in Chicago that is naturally the home of Wrigley Field. We were hoping to scam some reasonable seats from the scalpers, but our hopes were dashed. $100 a ticket for standing room only? In the 3rd inning?!? No thanks, I’ll let the die-hard faithful pay those prices. So, we hopped from bar to bar, drinking plenty of beer and eating plenty of polish sausage (that didn’t come out right).

After the game, we rolled back to Gomaa’s, relaxed a bit, and then headed out for some of the best Chicago-style pizza in the city, at Gino’s East. If you haven’t been to Chicago, you haven’t had pizza like this. The crust was made from corn bread, and the sauce was on top of the cheese and pepperoni. Some of the best pizza I’ve ever had.

After eating, we raced to make a 9pm-10pm open bar that Gomaa hooked us up on. Apparently, his friend Leslie had entered one of those leave-your-business-card-in-the-fishbowl contests and actually won. So, we cabbed in to this bar which happened to be right next to Wrigley field, donned our “free booze” braclets, and started drinking. Before long, Gomaa discovered a cool bartender at the back of the bar who would score us armfuls of beer at a time, so we wasted no time getting banged up (this would come back to haunt me). Once the freebies stopped flowing, we picked up and went to another bar down the street. At this point, I’m fairly drunk, but I’m also exhausted. Looking back, I wish I had loaded up some Red Bulls. Before I know it, I’m literally nodding off. I’m in Chicago, it’s Saturday night, it’s not even midnight, and I’m about to pass out. Pathetic. So, with great shame, I start stumbling home. I literally nod off while walking down the street a few times. The minute my head hits the pillow, I’m gone…