Driven - PA to WI

The Willis Tower in Chicago

After a multi-day delay from my originally planned departure date of Tuesday morning after I returned from New York, I finally headed out from Philly on Friday morning at around 11AM. Nothing really eventful happened on Friday and I made it out to Ohio before calling it a night. It did rain off and on during the day, quite heavily at some times and surprisingly that was the only rain that I drove through on my entire trip. I was a little worried about driving a manual as the only practice I had was half an hour or so of practice weeks ago when Goran first let me know about his request for someone to drive his car to Seattle.  I actually didn't stall at all during the first day until I was driving around that night in some town looking for an open wifi signal.

Sunset somewhere in Ohio

I happened to run across a Tim Horton's at my stopping place for the night so I compared one to a dozen Krispy Kreme donuts sold at a gas station (no, I did not eat them all in one sitting like I would normally).  The prepackaged Krispy Kremes won hands down.  So far they have knocked down Ambler Donuts, Tim Horton's, Little Debbies, supermarket bakeries, and Dunkin' Donuts with ease.  Can Krispy Kreme be overthrown?  I doubt it...  I also was finally able to find and eat at an elusive White Castle.  Quite greasy but not bad.

Impressive lobby downtown

Saturday morning I continued my trip and was hoping to make it out to Minneapolis/St. Paul to take part in a Man vs. Food challenge at a restaurant out there (eating two one-pound Jucy Lucy burgers and two pounds of fries).  My brother had suggested stopping in featured restaurants along the way and I figured that would be a good way to provide some entertainment for the long, multi-day drive.

Lou Malnoti's deep dish!

A late start and some horrendous Chicago traffic quickly put that plan to rest.  Philly traffic, even I-76, doesn't even compare to what I witnessed on a weekend in Chicago. I-90/I-94 leading into the city was backed up bumper to bumper for around 4 miles leading into downtown.  I decided that I was going to eat a late lunch in Chicago instead of pushing for Minnesota. There was a 3 sandwich challenge at Lucky's Sandwich Co. that Adam Richmond from Man vs. Food took on but I figured that even though that would be a fun challenge to attempt, I should try some authentic Chicago cuisine while I was in town.  At at the suggestion of my friend Charlie who grew up in the area, I stopped at Lou Malnotis and ordered one of their original deep dish pizzas. I had to fight back the urge to order a larger pizza as even the 9" pizza recommend for 2 people was still something like $15. Quite simple in it's toppings with just pizza sauce, cheese, and sausage layered over the thick, crispy crust, it was actually incredibly delicious. I think I have to say that a deep dish pizza is better than the more traditional thin crust pizza that most of the rest of America considers 'standard.' Blasphemous? I don't know, but I'm sticking by my opinion.

Location of the Kohler store

Interesting building entrance

Bridge Over the River Chicago

While waiting for my pizza to be made, I walked around the city for about an hour. As I didn't know the city, I just wandered in the direction of the only visible landmark that I recognized, the Willis Tower (The Skyscraper Formerly Known as Sears Tower). Along the way I crossed over the Chicago River, witnessed the network of raised streetcars, and generally took in the sights and sounds of the city. For being a big city, it seemed pretty dead on a late Saturday afternoon. A bunch of restaurants that I passed by were actually closed for the weekend which I thought was strange. Being an architect, I had to stop in and visit the Kohler showcase store where I got to witness a fully automated, touchscreen controlled toilet among other things. By the way, Chicago definitely lives up to it's nickname of the windy city – it was quite gusty while I was there. Leaving Chicago wasn't as bad as entering it and I drove another couple hundred miles before stopping in Wisconsin for the night.

Before I left for my trip I loaded up my mp3 player with a bunch of music and audiobooks.  I figured with close to 50 hours of driving, it would be a good opportunity to listen to some books and possibly learn a new language.  However, the Philly library's system for browsing electronic media is absolutely atrocious so I couldn't find any good science fiction novels to read so I had to settle with filling my mp3 player with a few Spanish learning books (figured that would be the most useful living here in the US) and a chunk of my music collection.  I attempted listening to the Spanish learning books but found it hard to soak in without a visual component as well as having to prioritize my concentrate on driving.  With audio books out of the equation, I settled for listening to my complete Rush discography back to back for close to two days straight.  With that I leave you with a fitting Rush song...