is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.

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Chicago=Stuffed. As am I.

Chicago=Stuffed. As am I.

Today we found the place with the really good fudgy cake. A few years ago when Gayle and I were in Chicago together for a meeting of SPEP (Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy, and no I am not kidding about this), we had eaten at this restaurant where the chocolate cake was so good we could hardly believe it. When Evany kept having cake-based disappointments across the country, I wrote to Gayle to see whether she remembered the name of the restaurant. She did not, though she �remembered the cake, and the ceiling.� Sounds racy or dirty, but all she was referring to is the elaborate decorative theme of the restaurant (ha. and even though when Gayle and I ate the cake back when, I had initiated a discussion about chocolate and sex). �The cake, and the ceiling�: the restaurant in question is art-deco-ish and there is a profusion of hand-blown-seeming titty-shaped lamps suspended from the very high ceiling. I knew I would recognize the place from the outside and that it was semi-touristy and crazy art-deco designy, but I wasn�t sure that I would figure out what street it was on.

You know, almost every time Gayle and I go to SPEP (it�s a tradition) we have at least one utterly fantastic meal. Last year in Boston we ate at the same place for dinner and for lunch the next day because it was so yum-yummy. In just a month or so she and I will be in Memphis for this year�s meeting. I�ll keep you posted on our culinary adventures. (In fact, Dave Eggers was suggesting recently that I should keep a McSweeney�s webdiary for the conference, mostly because he couldn�t believe that there is actually something called �Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy AKA SPEP.� So maybe. I�m not sure that there are enough entertaining things to say about SPEP, however, even though I always find it rewarding to be there. So maybe.)

Anyway, Evany and I got into Chicago latish last night and were driving around semi-aimlessly comparing hotel prices (I would drive up, she would hop out and ask, I would circle the block and pick her back up, then off we were to the next place while she entered the stats into her sidekick). We were having a very hard time choosing a place, especially because we had been driving for so long and were tired, when we found the fairly reasonable Red Roof Inn on Ontario and Michigan. And lo! and behold, diagonal across the street was the very place of chocolate cake fame. It was our fate. So we got a room and moved our shit on in. The room is on the 11th floor, and is a corner room with extra windows and a fairly good city-scape view. And air-conditioning.

Also: it is not very hot here. In Chicago. In early September! And it has not been at all as hot as it is capable of being in the Midwest in general. So my lack of car air-conditioning, while less than desirable, has not been absolute torture. When I commented on our good fortune with the weather, Evany asked what I had been expecting and I said: �I assumed by now we would be barely masking our grumpiness during the daytime hours.� Instead, we are semi-joyously blasting across mid-US states and having a fairly good time� despite the overabundance of grilled-cheese-and-fries meal options (or lack of options). I mean, you who know me all know this. Jill is bad Bad BAD at spending 24-7 with anyone for too many days in a row. But Evany and I have had no problems to speak of, even though on occasion one or both of us wakes up grumpy. It passes. Oh how I love her! And, you know, when I spent the three days in LA with Mr. Perrone, I never minded a moment of it. In fact I could have kept going. Nor did I get grumpy when I had my six days in Yosemite with Evany, Marilyn, Jeff and Caroleen. And it�s not because I�ve suddenly become ready-for-crowding. It�s just that I�m lucky, friend-wise. It�s something I�ve been thinking about lately. Lots of thinking time presents itself when one is driving across farming states.

So today we had lunch at cake-o-rama. I was worried that perhaps my memory would prove to have glorified the cake in retrospect (a photogenic memory, as it were), but it had not. THE CAKE IS VERY VERY GOOD. It was so fudgtastically chocolatey good that it made me feel a bit light-headed all afternoon. I had to take a seat and get an ice tea at the Art Institute before I could start with the viewing. Food portions in Chicago are crazy-huge, as far as I can tell. Evany and I split the cake and, together, could not finish everything on the plate. That�s right, Jill and Evany together could not finish a cake full of chocolate cake. That is how huge the serving was.

We attempted to walk off the lunch by making our way to the Art Institute, about a mile down Michigan Ave. We walked through the newish Millennium Park and gazed at some pretty darn good public art, including some sculptures that lit up with faces and then sprayed water out all over a bunch of very excited children, and some adults too. Here I am taking my own photo in the reflective surface of a massive mirrored misshapen orb on the Chicago streets. Then we spent the afternoon looking at museum art. I saw three Van Goghs. And lots of Joseph Cornells. And some really good photographic collage work. And other good stuff. Then we walked back the long way up the lakeside walkway. Then we collapsed and napped a bit, so we could become coherently conversational again in time to meet Kevin G. for drinks.

Kevin took us to, like, the 3004th floor of a building where there is a bar. In the elevator our ears popped. I had two pina coladas. The view was fantastic. There were a lot of huge spiders living in webs outside the windows of the 3004th floor, which was odd but entertaining. They were Charlotte�s-Web-type spiders, but none of them found us to be ebullient. (And I suppose I am glad that they did not spell out �some pig� either.)

Evany and Kevin and I had a good time talking about writing and Chicago history and architecture and stuff. I always manage to meet interesting people through h2so4. Then Kevin took us to Giordano�s, home of Chicago stuffed pizza. Stuffed full of cheese. And now I, too, am stuffed full of cheese. So much so that I cannot eat the huge home-baked cookie that Kevin bought me on the way to the bar. I am sure that I will be excited to eat it tomorrow. And I will report back at that moment. (I got cinnamon, Evany got chocolate chip walnut, as did Kevin.)

Have I told you how much I love cinnamon in general? I love it as much as I love cherry pie! In fact, you know what would be really really good? Cherry pie with cinnamon ice cream. It is alarming to me that I am already talking about food again.

Despite all the pie and cake talk, I have been trying to reform my sugar habit a bit. Cutting down on Pepsi and going for unsweetened iced tea or plain old water. It�s hard, given how Pepsi-proud the Midwest is in general. There are signs everywhere saying �we proudly serve Pepsi.� Man. I proudly drink it. Even though it�s an irrational nonsensical kind of pride.

Tomorrow: through Indiana, into Ohio. Soon: the ducks will walk on the fish.

Stats:

Still in Chicago!

12:18 a.m. - September 03, 2004

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