Can't wait to see the city skyline lit up for the Blackhawks :)

Free entry to national parks for one week!

Starting Saturday, April 17th, the National Park System will be waiving ENTRY fees for one week. Perfect excuse to go out and enjoy the spring weather and support the NPS!

More cupcakes!

Yeah, I know, it's a rough job but somebody has to do it. Swirlz Cupcakes rolled out their new spring flavors, and I had to, you know, stop by and try them out. And photograph them, while I'm at it. Nom, nom.

Tiramisu

Maple Pecan Pancake

Passionfruit

A dying American city

If you like The World Without Us book or the Life After People TV show, you will find this look at Detroit interesting.

Detroit struggles to live on; but its downtown is becoming a real-time look at how the earth recovers its own, and how nature reclaims what man has built. The city has suffered a number of financial setbacks and has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country; and as a result, as businesses and people have left downtown, the city is slowly being taken over by disuse, decay, and Mother Nature.

It's the Sports City

Antti Niemi, Blackhawks goalie (#31)

Chicago Blackhawks vs. Calgary Flames

April 4, 2010

With the Blackhawks regular hockey season wrapping up and the playoffs about to begin, I've been spending a lot more time on my hockey blog than my travel blog.

Chicago is a SPORTS city. I wouldn't call it a "baseball city" or a "football city" or any other specific sport; the city and its citizens simply love sports. For professional sports, there's two baseball teams (Cubs, White Sox), a football team (Bears), a basketball team (Bulls), two hockey teams (Blackhawks - NHL, and Wolves - AHL), and if that's not enough, a soccer team (Fire). The city hosts marathons, half marathons, fun runs, biathalons, triathalons - the list goes on.

Some of the sports events are free, and the rest vary in price, but you will never be bored by the variety of sports available to you in the Windy City.


Congratulations to the Chicago Blackhawks for clinching the Central Division title for the NHL this year!

The new spirit in the air

It was almost inevitable that some airline was going to do it sooner or later: Spirit Airlines is going to start charging passengers for carry-on baggage - up to $45 each way. (Purses, computer bags, diaper bags and other items that fit under the seat in front of you will still be free.)

Spirit already charges between $15-45 for checking bags domestically and $20-45 for international flights.

That really is the last straw for nickel-and-diming airline customers to death. "Sure, come fly us, but don't bring any clothes with you, or we'll nail you for it." I can understand the idea of charging for overweight bags or second bags, to discourage people from overpacking - and thus save on fuel charges.

But really, if you want to get $40-80 more out of each customer per flight... just charge more for the tickets to begin with. These new charges are bad for two reasons: first, Spirit is going to alienate customers. (And they're not that big of an airline to begin with.)

If it's an issue about things like people continuing to attempt to bring too many/too large bags into the main cabin: charge them $25 to carry on, but $10 to check the bag - most people will opt for the cheaper option. (But then make sure you improve your successful baggage arrival percentage, or people will complain they had to pay to ship their bag, but it got lost.)

Two: other airlines are keeping an eye on Spirit to see how successful they are with this new fee. If Spirit doesn't suffer from customer backlash on this, expect the big boys to start rolling out similar fees. And you can bet that those with frequent flyer status won't have to pay these fees, which means, once again, that the less-frequently-traveling customers are the ones being hit up to prop up the companies' bottom lines, instead of the travelers who make up 70% of airlines' business.

Spring is sprung

Ooops... haven't written in a week. See, it's the end of the hockey season and I'm just a wee bit caught up in playoff-season-fever. My team of choice is the Chicago Blackhawks<, and they've been like a roller coaster since the Olympics, but whew, what a game last night...

Anyway, spring is officially here, and temperatures today were downright summer-like. Suddenly the streets are filled with pedestrians and rollerbladers and cyclists, restaurants have set out their sidewalk café sections... ahhhh. The winter has been far, far, FAR too long and Chicagoans have practically been busting at the seems for these days!

To get you in the mood for spring... a few bright blooms!