Friday Five: Types of Assholes at the Park & Ride

Although the title might tell you differently, I do love that my train station is a park and ride. I've taken the train from other stations and finding a spot in a small lot or looking for street parking can be really stressful in the morning. That being said, the park and ride is not without its assholes...I mean, is any situation? Here are some types of assholes I encounter at the park and ride. 

1. The people who stop at the nonexistent stop sign. Sometimes the difference between making the train and not making the train is someone stopping at this nonexistent stop sign on the way into the station, yet they still do it every day. Rage spikes into the stratosphere on days when multiple people stop for no reason. I hate to start my day off laying on the horn but sometimes it must be done. 

2. Artful parkers in the morning. Again, we’re on a train time table. Chop chop. If you can’t park your car in one shot, you fail. No one has time to wait for you to finesse a perfect park job, backing in and out and in and out. It makes the people waiting to get past you feel like playing demolition derby with your vehicle. Are you in the lines? Good. Stop moving.

3. People who do not observe the exiting etiquette. Leaving the station is a complicated system but one you are introduced to quite quickly when you are a regular rider. There are three exits from the main parking lot and decorum calls for taking turns and letting people out. When you don’t do this, people let you know with horns, hand gestures, and yelling what an asshole you are yet some people speed their oblivious asses off acting like they see no one else waiting to leave. We recognize you as regular passengers, you dicks. We’re supposed to take turns letting each other out and you know it. 

4. People who block cars in. This seems like a no brainer, right? Do not sit in the lane with your car in park, making out like your life depends on it, then act butt hurt when people beep at you to move. Park your car in a spot and make out if you need to relive your teenage years. Or maybe make out not in public like other adults. 

5. Little bitches. When I wave you across the lane and inch up when you’re ¾ of the way through, still quite far from you, do not shake your head at me. Because I will roll down my window and say, “I’m sorry, did you have a problem with me waving you across?” and you will be left stuttering, "No."

*********************************************************

All of the sudden, it was May. Right? That came up like a rocket. I'm excited to have lunch with my friend Tara from high school today. Other than that, I have no commitments this weekend. This rarely happens and I really love that the weekend is stretched out before me, waiting to be meandered through. And it looks like it's going to be beautiful. Enjoy, friends!

When We Were in Chicago... a down & dirty recap

A few things you should know about how I vacation & how I recap vacations:

1. When I come to your town, I want to see all the tourist things. Because I am a tourist. 

2. Vacation is not a place where we cheap out. We save up so we can do all the things, eat where we want, and have the luxury of convenience. I cheap out on hotel rooms though and always choose a mid-range place because when we do a quick trip, we're barely in there. 

3. If we go to a city over a weekend, we pack as much in as possible and sacrifice sleep and lounging to do so. Beaches and cruises are for relaxing, these trips are for seeing and doing. I love creating ridiculous itineraries and we enjoy being on the go. My itineraries always have some sway and the ability to move shit around on the fly because you always have to do that when you travel. The trick is to get a flow going so you get a lot in without feeling like you're on a mission. 

4. Apologies on the food shots - they're always taken with an iPhone and lots of these places were dim. MFD already has a fit about me taking pics of all food so I'm not going to prolong the process by getting the lighting right. If you don't give a shit about food or restaurants, skip over the paragraphs before the food collages.
5. If we're friends on FB, you know a lot of this because MFD checks in everywhere as it gives him great joy.
6. I don't split trip recaps because I like to keep all the information in one spot, so it's long. 

Time/travel parameters: we flew Frontier Airlines from Trenton to Midway on Saturday night, arriving in Chicago at 6:30 p.m. We flew out of Midway at 7:59 p.m. Tuesday night and arrived home at midnight. We stayed at Hyatt Place River North and did breakfast at the hotel daily. We basically arrived, dumped our bags, and hit the streets. 

Saturday

Strolling the Chicago Riverwalk - the skyline is magnificent at night

Chicago Jazz Festival in Millennium Park - specifically Kevin Eubanks from The Tonight Show

The Skyline -and us - reflected in the Bean

We took an 11:30 reservation at The Girl and the Goat in the West Loop, owned by Stephanie Izard from Top Chef. That time is all they had more than a month and a half out. I liked it a lot - the atmosphere was great, I enjoyed seeing the open kitchen, the food was mostly a hit, and the service was energetic and friendly despite the hour. MFD and I shared everything: goat cheese & sweet corn dumplings (excellent, not pictured), hamachi crudo (crisp pork belly, not pictured - just meh, should've gotten the pig face), wood fired scallops (surprisingly awesome, recommended by the waiter, first pic on the bottom left), egg salad oysters (top middle photo, totally amazing). For dessert MFD has some regrettable bittersweet chocolate thing that sucked. I had peaches and blueberry buckle with goat cheese gelato. GIRL, you don't even know. You don't even know!! The coffee was excellent. Yes, we drank it at midnight because we are fools. 

Sunday

Rise and shine bitches! Up and out by 7:30 to walk down to Milton Olive Park via the Ohio Beach entry. What a glorious view of the city. So quiet and really awesome. 

Gangster Tour, because who doesn't like a little cheese with their vacation? It was pretty interesting, and we did drive through most Chicago neighborhoods which gave us an idea of the places we weren't going to be visiting. 

We originally planned to go to the Art Institute or Field Museum in the afternoon, but it was MFD's birthday weekend and he wanted to swim. So weird to have this big ocean-looking lake in the middle of a large city. I did not want to swim so I dipped my toes in, read and people watched. p.s. - post swimming is the only time you'll see MFD's hair not perfect. 

Dinner at Shaw's Crab House. We both loved the 1940s-ish atmosphere and the seafood was excellent. The service was top notch. This key lime pie is the best key lime pie I've ever had, including numerous pies in Key West itself. 

Jazz at Andy's Jazz

Monday - MFD's Birthday and Labor Day

Since it was Labor Day, we got to walk really slowly on the sidewalks looking up at the buildings in the central business district and take pics in the middle of the street without locals getting pissed off at us for slowing their roll. The city felt deserted and it was awesome.

Sears Tower Skydeck. What a trip! I did much better than I thought I'd do out on the ledges and MFD did worse. We went on an overcast day with some fog. It rained while we were up there and even with all that, the views and experience were really impressive. I bought fast pass tickets prior to arrival which took our wait time from an hour and a half to 20 minutes to get to the 103rd floor.

Lunch at Lou Malnati's. I thought I was not a fan of deep dish pizza. I was wrong. We got the Malnati Chicago Classic and it was delicious. I also loved the Green Line beer brewed by Goose Island in Chicago.

I had an UBER credit (sign up and use promo code ubersmd to get a $30 credit towards your first ride) so we jumped in one to get to Wrigley Field since we were already running late. We were initially supposed to take the Red Line, but we were short on time and it was a nice quick ride up the Gold Coast into Wrigleyville. What a cool experience - you walk in off the street and there you are! We also walked around the stadium when we left, which was pretty cool as well seeing all the stuff on the outside walls, checking out the places for roof top viewing, and getting a load of people tailgating outside and on the sidewalk.

MFD had a Chicago style hotdog at Wrigley. I had mine at the airport. This is my kind of hotdog.

People we saw at both the Skydeck and Wrigley...these three, dressed as Cameron, Sloane, and Ferris. How fucking amazing is this? MFD got their photo at the Skydeck and I spied Cameron & Ferris with the zoom at Wrigley. MFD actually went down to where they were sitting to say hello to them again because of course...Mayor.

MFD's birthday dinner at David Burke's Primehouse in The James Hotel. Prices were ridiculous but YOLO, birthday. The steaks were unbelievable. MFD had the 55 day aged and it melted in your mouth. I thought the atmosphere was just okay. My steak, wine, and coffee gelato were excellent though. I was unable to get reservations at Gibsons, which was our first choice.

MFD used LYFT to get a car to take us to The Second City. You guys, this was awesome. We saw The Best of The Second City on the mainstage. It was hilarious and for $30 each we saw over 2.5 hours of comedy. I loved every second of it. Also hilarious: when MFD had a mouth full of water and it shot out in an actual spit take because he could not hold back the laughter.

Tuesday
We packed up and had the hotel hold our bags while we took off for the Wendella Lake & River Boat Tour. Totally fucking awesome. We went out onto Lake Michigan (the photo you see below with the water coming through is the lock opening up from the Chicago River to let the boat out - the lake is about two feet higher than the river), learned about all the buildings, then back onto the river to do the same. We loved this. I could fill a blog post just with photos taken on this tour, and they don't fit well into collages which sucks.

In a Philly takes Chicago move, we met your friend and mine Marla from Luck Fupus and her husband Steve for lunch at The Purple Pig. We sat outside and had a nice long lunch.

We ordered a bunch of plates to share, and I would go back every day until I could try everything on the menu. Really a phenomenal experience. Some dishes we sampled include calamari with fregula, radishes, cucumbers & pistachios; the best Greek salad I've ever had; chorizo stuffed olives; some type of foie grass; chocolate goat cheese and a few other cheeses; milk braised pork shoulder with mashed potatoes; stuffed squid; soft serve ice cream with espresso poured over it. I can't remember the rest. The food was my favorite on the trip. Everything was excellent and it was a bonus to share the meal with friends from home!

We checked out the rocks in the face of the Tribune Tower, which was awesome. We glimpsed Bill Rancic and while Marla, Steve & I were sitting in the shade MFD got his photo taken with him. Of course we missed that. Why not. We strolled down to see The Bean in the sunlight and also to check out the Crowd Fountains.

MFD and I hopped into a cab and Marla & Steve went on to enjoy their first day in Chicago as we wrapped up our last. MFD got an Italian beef sandwich and we split a freaking donut ice cream sandwich from Firecakes Donuts. You guys, is this real life? How do my pants still fit? It was awesome.

We took the Orange Line to Midway during rush hour - not fun. MFD also tried to take an elevator up to the platform, which opened to reveal a big puddle of stinky hot pee. Silly MFD, always avoid elevators at public transportation stations.

What a phenomenal city - very clean, very friendly to tourists in that it's easy to get around and the people are pretty nice. It's also beautiful, walkable, has a wonderful food scene, and shows its face really well. We loved the feel of the city and if the winters weren't so ridiculous I think I'd be arguing with MFD to stay here instead of moving there. Thanks to Steph at Not Entirely Perfect for her Chicago smarts, especially this map/post, and help with hotel locations and which streets to avoid at night. We missed meeting up due to her move and both of our schedules but will do so next time!

Chicago, I think you're the favorite city of all the cities I've visited.

Linking up with  Meet @ the Barre

Friday Tips: Phone Interviews

Dear faithful blog followers, all five of you:

When conducting a phone interview for a new job opportunity, please make sure to do it somewhere other than a shared bathroom on the floor you currently work on. Aside from having your coworkers possibly walk in on you interviewing for a new job, the shared bathroom poses other dangers to people like you.

If you refrain from interviewing for a new job in the bathroom, you don't have to whisper yell to a person you don't know (me), asking them not to flush the toilet. You also don't have to frantically clear your throat when that person (me again) does not heed your plea and flushes the toilet anyway in order to observe shared bathroom etiquette and be the opposite of an unsanitary dirtball. Your manufactured throat noises will not cover the roar and echo of a flushing industrial toilet.
Helpfully yours,

SMD

p.s. What the hell is wrong with people? Really.
p.p.s. **Oh happy day, 2:30 p.m. edit: I just spoke to a coworker who stopped off to use the lav before leaving the building for a meeting. She was also in on the interview. We shared a WTF discussion.

The Fake Holy Will Roll You

This morning, I was heading towards the ticket area of Suburban Station when I heard "If my skin was pink like his you would not be accusing me of this!" The indignant shouter sounded very familiar. He went on to yell, "What are you, Egyptian? No one cares what you think!" Oh thank you tiny hypocrisy loving sweet baby Jesus, it WAS him! The 16th & Market preacher was being a  douche in the train station! And by a great stroke of luck, I was there to see it.

Holy roller tried to roll SEPTA out of cash.

When I got to the window, I had an enlightening conversation with the woman who helped me.

Me: That guy is crazy.

SEPTA lady: Oh I know it, we all know him, that's why two managers are over there. He goes from station to station telling us we shorted him change and owe him cash.

Me: GET OUT! You do know he preaches holiness and truth up on the street at 16th & Market, right?

SEPTA lady: Really? When?

Me: All day! You've got to get above ground.

SEPTA lady (over her shoulder): Rhonda, we got to get up to the street during break today. Crazy Man is a Street Preacher, telling everybody about their sins!

tra la la la la la la la la. I love witnessing hypocrisy. I can't wait until that mofo yells out about thiefs and sinners when I'm walking by, spittle flying out of his gross lying mouth. As the great Tennessee Williams once said, "The only thing worse than a liar is a liar who is a hypocrite."

Now, good day. I SAID GOOD DAY!

Hallelujiah and amen,

SMD

p.s. FRIDAY EVE. Thank you.