Vaccination Vacation, Part 1: Chicago!

Bad news, for at least the next three posts, I won’t have any pictures of walks through Inwood Hill Park. That’s because I took a big Vaccination Vacation visiting people all over the country. As I keep telling you, I stayed totally put for the pandemic, but, with my vaccine fully kicked in and my most recent gig wrapped up, it seemed like it was finally time to go see some people.

So on APRIL 23 I caught an early flight from the shiny new LaGuardia home to Chicago where Dad picked me up at Midway and I met the neighbor’s new dog, enjoyed a few Welcome Home Cheez-Its, and when Mom got home from the Dentist “helped” my folks go buy our first new TV in 15 years. What an exciting start to the trip!

Then I went to the grocery store with Mom and that evening we all went downtown and had some nice Mexican food and then took a walk on the thing in Chicago that’s like the Highline, but has rude bicyclists on it.

APRIL 24: Sundays certainly are Sundays, aren’t they? After dinner we took a walk to one of the Oak Park parks.

APRIL 26: Big day! Went downtown to have a look at the big Monet exhibit at the Art Institute (along with other arts), walked up Michigan Avenue, had ramen for lunch, dipped into the Field Museum to check on the t-rex named Sue, and took Mom and Dad to H Mart.

APRIL 27: I know you’ve been waiting and wondering when you’d see this, but that Tuesday I got Johnnie’s with Mom! And she told me an Elmwood Park park with permanent cornhole holes and bacci ball courts. I’m not going to share a picture of a combo juicy hot w/ ice, no cap and a hotdog w/ fries. But probably you know what they look like? I am including a picture of the Minion birdhouse I painted on our Michigan trip in 2019, though, since it’s on display in the kitchen. At night we took a walk and Mom and I got our picture together.

APRIL 28: For lunch I tried the Hot Chicken sandwich from a new place nearby called Chubby’s, it was great! And Mom tried the Popeye’s chicken sandwich for the first time. I’m a little mixed up on dates, today might be the day I went to the dentist. Or it was the day before.

APRIL 29: I took Mom and Dad to the airport in the morning so they could go check on everyone in Utah. I had seen on the internet that extremely formative restaurant of my teenage years (and thereafter) El Gallo de Oro had closed, so I drove over to pay my respects. Then I came home, went to the mall, asked myself why I went to the mall, drove back home, got an Alpine sandwich for my flight that afternoon, wound up having Johnnie’s again, and then caught my flight to the next destination of my Vaccination Vacation.