Half Day Fridays

Columbia has a lovely habit of giving staff half-day fridays every other week in the summer. I've never taken much advantage of them because I run a big summer program for high schoolers that keeps me glued to my desk. . . happily glued. But I have, nevertheless, been wistfully jealous of my colleagues for years as they run off mid-day, starting their weekends early, hying off to do fun summer things on a stolen friday afternoon.

So, this year, I took one! And it was just as wonderful as I imagined--sneaking away with my buddy Tim to walk the whole length of Michigan Avenue, to see a movie (or two!), to walk through the fountain in Millennium Park and then eventually meet up with Dan for dinner at the Honky Tonk BBQ in Pilsen. It was a perfect day. A swirl of 5 hours of work to start the day and then come noon a lazy protracted afternoon.

By the end of the day, the afternoon felt like it had been 20 hours long and work was a distant memory.

And that's apparently how half-day Fridays feel. So lovely!

And here's what they look like:


Outside of the Chrysler Building in NYC, I think there no lovelier skyscraper than the Carbide and Carbon building on Michigan Ave. It would be the black sheep of the Chrysler Building Family. The wild card. The unpredictable one with its dark good looks and handsome bone structure. But come sunset when the copper at the top of the building lights up fiery orange? Watch out.

I heart Jeanne Gang. Her new Condo building is on the left. Maybe best structurally designed skyscraper ever. Not the most elegant facade, but smart smart smart (and green!) to its very core.

I can't get enough of this shot coming out of the AMC movie theater on the Chicago River. The Trump Tower is just so insanely overwhelming. It's Monolithic. It's sort of beautiful (though decidedly more so from a distance. . . from a vantage point where you don't feel like it might just reach out and smoosh you for being so puny), but it's mass looks so colossally out of scale with the Wrigley right next to it.

Gosh, I can't say enough good things about this place. Ask anyone. . . it's all I can talk about. Pulled pork sandwiches that will either make you cry or marry it.


Oh boy. Maple syrup candied bacon? And how!


Splendid bathroom art at the Honky Tonk BBQ. 3-D.