Keanu looked at me!
PhysO's Birthday celebration, Part 2I got up at about 7:15 in the morning on Sunday and thanked Odin that I was not going to Bennet's for breakfast. At about 8:15 or so PhysO and defaultlisa picked me up. We stopped to pick up a couple of sodas and then hit the highway, Chicago-bound.
I feel it should be said that Selene is a good car. She is a pretty car. She is a new car. She is, however, not built for people of my shape and size. Defaultlisa was kind enough to allow me to sit in the front, which was really nice, because my head doesn't reach the ceiling in the front.
Selene and PhysO got us to downtown Chicago by about 10:15, we found a place to leave Selene (where she could play with other cute little cars while we were out all day), and went into the Four Seasons restaurant to meet up with the rest of the entourage. Once everyone had been collected (mostly PhysO's family, and a few associated personages) we headed into the Seasons restaurant for their apparently legendary brunch.
Having eaten there once, I now consider their brunch to be Brunch. It must be capitalized.
I had not been informed (or had failed to absorb) that Brunch is actually buffet style. There are different tables with certain specialties, including breakfast foods, meats, vegetarian foods, asian specialties, salads and cheeses, bloody marys, and of course, the nefarious dessert table. Each table is attended to by at least one server.
I ended up going back a disgusting number of times--a total of four, I think--which isn't as bad as it sounds, as PhysO was encouraging me to just try a little of everything instead of actually eating everything I got. Despite the fact that it went against every grain of my being I acquiesced. In no particular order, I remember having tried chicken sate, a shrimp roll, a croissant, a tomato-rice vegetarian thing, sausage, basil-encrusted lamb, beef with wild mushroom, a mini blintz with berries, a mini-quiche, organic tomatos with a mild (mozzarella-like, but I can't remember the name) cheese in a light herby-dressing, green beans, roquefort on grain crackers, caramelized bananas (which were technically for the waffles, but I got them for their own sake), a fruit tart, tirimisu, lemon tart, flourless chocolate cake, caramel creme brule, and lemon-glazed cheesecake. And that's just what I remember.
There was also a lemon poppyseed cake for PhysO's birthday. I managed to eat most of a slice. I'm not sure how.
Also, the orange juice was fantastic.
When we were most of the way done with our meal, someone in our group realized that Keanu Reeves was sitting across the room. (Apparently the family has seen him there before, so we suspect he really digs the brunch.) I had noticed him before, but all I had actually thought was, "Ah, guy in nice clothes, very well groomed, looks pretty rich," and never managed to register who it was. Dorky me. Anyway, I thought it was cool. And I stole a last glance at him on the way out of the restaurant and he LOOKED AT ME. OUR EYES LOCKED. WOOOOOOOO!
Later on, I told defaultlisa I really should have run up to his table and shouted "KIIIISSSSS!" at him and the woman he was with, but they *did* kiss while we were there, so it hardly would have been worth it.
Anyway.
At one o'clock we left the restaurant. Part of the group headed home, but most remained in Chicago. PhysO, defaultlisa, and I took a taxi to the Field Museum. I took a bunch of pictures of Sue, the T-Rex skeleton (teh awesome!). We went through part of the animal exhibit and rather quickly through the Egyptian exhibit as it was horribly crowded (but some of the signs there were goddamn hilarious--I think PhysO got pictures). We traversed the Underground World exhibit, and then I dragged PhysO and defaultlisa upstairs with me to walk through Plants of the World. I was a little annoyed with them--there were probably 30 different displays about vascular plants, and about one each for fungi, bryophytes, and algae--and I think *I* annoyed PhysO and defaultlisa with my ramblings about things and the pointing and the jumping, but they seemed impressed that I knew names for many things, so it all worked out alright. We managed to find a few minutes to look at the geology exhibits, too. (The enthusiasm of defaultlisa and PhysO for various minerals makes me think I should take them to the geology museum on campus sometime--it's small, and I know PhysO has been there before, but I really like it.)
I think, all in all, we took in about 20% of the museum, all of it at fairly high speed. We had less than two hours for it. I think I would like to return sometime when I have money and allot at least 8 hours for it, because it's really quite a cool and groovy place. We had an awful lot of fun looking at things there, and I'd love to see everything else they have.
At 4pm we met the rest of our party at the Shedd Aquarium. The Shedd is only open until 5:30, and we had to leave at 5:15 to get to dinner, so we had even less time there than we did at the Field Museum. Still, we saw a lot of stuff. There was a dolphin show at 4:30 that we went to (aquatic mammals are The Bomb), and then I demanded to go look at the lungfish. The Shedd has a few lungfish (
Neoceratodus forsteri I think?) on display; the oldest one, named Granddad, is almost 80 years old. I probably spent 10 minute watching Granddad and friends swimming around; they were much more active than I thought they'd be, which was cool. I spent a while terrifying children around me by explaining to defaultlisa and PhysO that lungfish can be dangerous to keep as pets and have been known to take off fingers. Teehee!!
LUNGFISH! COOOOOOL!!!
Once I managed to peel myself away from the lungfish (largely helped by PhysO saying, "Alice! Cephalopods!"), we went and looked at some other displays. The things that stick out in my mind were the various neat, creepy eels, the mantas (flatfish! sooooo coool!), the sharks (sharky fish! sooooo coooool!), the cnidarians, the wolffish, the crazy giant Japanese Spider Crabs, the big octopus, and the various weird and delightful things we saw at the Wild Reef exhibit we had to get through in 10 minutes. Oh, and sea cucumbers. I was entirely too amused by the sea cucumbers we saw; very cute. (Oh, and I looked them up; they're echinoderms, same as sea urchins, which I feel slightly ashamed at not being able to to remember--but I'm a botanist, so I have an excuse.)
As the Field museum was already closed and there is nowhere convient to get a taxi immediately adjacent to the Shedd, getting transport to Ron of Japan for dinner was a bit of a bitch, but eventually we did all get taxis and got there intact. Defaultlisa, PhysO, and I all started in on drinks in the bar while the last of our party arrived (Mariko Coladas are *tasty*, as I found out), but it was not long before we were all taken into the dining room.
Defaultlisa, PhysO, PhysO's younger sister and I all had one table to ourselves. Ron of Japan is Japanese, as one might guess. The center of the tables is a heating cooking surface and the chefs do all the cooking at your table. Everything that they cook there is fabulous. I suspect my dinner may have been just *slightly* tastier than Brunch at the Seasons, but don't tell the Brunch that. PhysO had the Sumo Beef, his sister had some sort of beef filet dish, defaultlisa had a tofu dish, and I had the Seafood combo, which had crab legs, scallops, and shrimp. I think I won, but we meat eaters all tried everyone else's dinners, and frankly, they were all tasty.
I did manage to get much more drunk than I had intended. They apparently use a reeeeally high quality rum that is fantastic. I had difficulty walking to the bathroom, but I managed to avoid causing any incidents, and I think I managed to not make an ass of myself. Go me.
Once we had finished our ice cream, PhysO and the other drivers set out to get cars and bring them to the restaurant (which was only a few blocks away). We all said our goodbyes and set out for home.
PhysO is really into audio books and he happened to have Jon Stewart's America on his iPod, so we listened to it on the way home. It was really, really funny. Despite the fact that I was drunk and tired, I stayed up in order to listen to it.
I got home at about 10:30, hugged Inle, checked my email, and crashed. And that was the end of Day Two.
If I haven't said it enough this weekend, Happy Birthday, PhysO. Your present will be forthcoming. I had a fabulous time both days. Thank you, and thanks to everyone who participated.
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