The 22nd floor of Chicago

I haven't posted in a while, so I thought an abbreviated catch-up is in order (notice the clever segue from past to present). I did a hurry up trip to Chicago, as everyone knows. The second week was mostly wasted in a class doing tech stuff with techies. Between typong misstakes, never having seen the program before (some of the class actually work for the company whose software we are learning), and looking at the back end material from a front end user perspective, I spent the whole week behind and bewildered.
The highlights were few and dim: the company CEO dropped in with a CEO rah rah, but left us four tickets to the Bulls (basketball) game. Only three (out of 19) in the class wanted to go, so I decided to go. That's when I saw the $135 price on the ticket. The seats were good, but not spectacular--none of the Bulls know I was there. $135, one game, one seat, $135. What does it cost to be a pro sports "fan" for the season? $135!
On Saturday I walked three blocks (Chicago, dead of winter, one of those blizzards you can't actually see that Dad always was talking about) to a pizza joint a friend recommended. I took most of it back to the room and ate it all weekend. For the person in America that doesn't talk to my mother regularly, you can heat a one inch thick Chicago pizza in your hotel room by placing a sheet of newspaper (veeerry important) on the hotel's iron (on medium heat) held downside up and a piece of pizza on top. Flip for the thicker slices. It crisps up the crust nicely.
When I got home we started using the fireplace. I don't know where the grate is. I took it out to chase the skunk out of the air inlet. Rocks don't work well, so Friday afternoon 4pm we decided to go to Benton to get one. I called and they were open till 6pm but right then I got a call from the ER--med on call diabetic coma. Sarah picked me up at the hospital a little after 5pm and (she) started to Benton at a gas saving rate. In fact, we were making gas. At 5:45 pm she realized a) the tank couldn't hold much more and 2) we weren't anywhere near Benton. I tried to call them to say we are on our way but my battery died the death at that very moment, maybe from the whiplash of Sarah adjusting to gas-be-damned speed.
Then we got lost (yes, on the interstate). Actually, we took the Congo Road exit to get to the Congo Road Stove Works, which ended up being only an approximate name--it wasn't on Congo Road and is really Congo Stove Works, only near Congo Road. Soon (5:55) the residential part of Benton appeared. Sarah speeded up. We came back to the access road of the interstate downstream from the CRSW, but we could see the store. 5:48, DOWNSTREAM. Sarah said "Such is Life!", approximately, and gunned it down the one way street into oncoming traffic. I think she had it figured that it was Friday afternoon after a long week and all the traffic that would be on the access road was coming off the interstate at 70 MPH, tired from the week, and wouldn't be paying attention. She swerved into a parking lot and stopped just before creating a new drive through in the strip mall.
I crawled out of the car and was about to kiss mother asphalt. When I looked up we were at CRSW approx. We bought a good grate and were back on the interstate before the police arrived, if in fact they were called (my phone had died the death or I might have tried for the reward money to help pay for the grate). We got back home with a new grate and a little more gas than we started with.
Better than Chicago. BB