Chicago!

So, I told y'all about how I was planning on going to Chicago this month. I went and it was awesome! I had such a great time with all of my school friends.  I went with the Honors College at the University I attend.  It is called the Sophomore Service Trip and it is basically an opportunity for us to get away and do some good in the world.  It was fabulous.  We left from the Honors College at 7:00 pm on Thursday night and took a fleet of Charter buses to the Amtrak Station.  Yes, we took an Amtrak to Chicago.  117 twenty year olds in two train cars.  It was a 12 hour trip and it felt like it was every bit of those 12 hours.  Luckily we traveled at night both there and back so we were at least able to sleep for most of the trip.  I brought my sleep mask so that was very nice to have.  

Once in Chicago, we checked into our hotel and changed into our warm clothes (the highest temperature in Chicago the whole weekend was 7* F) and headed out to our volunteer sites.  We had five different sites: the YMCA, the Salvation Army, a greenhouse, bicycle building, and my group, the Treehouse Animal Haven.  We spent the day clearing out a basement in their downtown location so that they could use the extra space for a free clinic to spay and neuter feral cats.  Isn't that great?  For dinner that night, we went to a Brazilian Steak House where they bring the meat out on skewers.  It was super yummy.

On Saturday, we were supposed to go back to Treehouse to help at their Argyle Street location, but the people who work there were super nice and let us wander the city handing out fliers to promote their "Sex and the Kitty" program.  It's a great program that allows families in the area to trap feral cats, bring them in to be neutered and then return them to the wild.  We had a fabulous day wandering the city and seeing a lot of cool sites.  

That night we had a fabulous night of partying.  We played circle of death with the cool kids.  I played with Diet Pepsi, don't worry.   That is a fabulous game that is super fun to play before going out.  Then we went to eat some authentic Chicago deep dish pizza and my goodness, it was delicious.  We had planned to go to the Hancock building for dessert afterwards, but they wouldn't let us in because we were under 21.  Oh well, we still got a great view of the skyline.  Later SLG, DMB, and I went down to Navy Pier for some pictures.  We took some pretty fantastic ones (NOT) but here's the best.

On Sunday morning, CMC and I headed up to the Magnificent Mile for some hardcore shopping.  It was so fun.  We also went ice skating with some friends.  Poor C could barely stand.  As for me, my skating skills came back and I was able to not look like a fool! Ha.  We had so much fun that whole day and then finally headed back to the hotel so that we could head back to Union Station as a group.  Another 12 hours, and we were back to Memphrica so we could head back to the Honors College (we arrived in Memphrica at 5:45 am...it was VERY early).  

But by far, the highlight of the weekend, was when I stumbled into a fabulous store that sold Snuggies.  You better believe that this girl SNATCHED that up.  It is amazing and lovely.  And it is endlessly entertaining, ask anyone who was on the trip who I even talked to on the way home!  Later kids.