[img]1325|left|Alex Campbell ||no_popup[/img]Dateline Boston — H and I just returned from our honeymoon in Chicago. It was a blast, and we had many adventures. One of the most interesting days we had involved Swedish food and cops, a yuppie panhandler and a free zoo.
I wanted to go to a Swedish restaurant we had read about in our guidebook, a place reputed to have amazing cinnamon rolls. We took a long bus ride to a different part of town. The ride was quite beautiful; we followed Lake Michigan, which looked more like an ocean than a lake; rolling waves and everything. On the way, I noticed that we passed the Lincoln Zoo—was that the free zoo we had read about in the guidebook? We made a plan to hit the zoo on the way back.
We got to the restaurant and had a nice meal. The online review was right—the cinnamon rolls were delicious! We were seated right next to a huge picture window where we could see the locals passing by. And pass by they did. Five minutes into our meal, we observed a hipster dude and a scruffy dude walking past. As they passed us, the scruffy dude smacked the hipster dude in his head! We couldn’t tell if they were friends or not, but we found out a few minutes later.
Suddenly, five police cars showed up and put Scruffy in the back of one of them. I turned to H and said, “We’re witnesses.” He assured me that if the police came in and asked, we could tell them what we saw. They cleared out without asking us anything. Now that was an exciting breakfast!
We walked back to the bus stop. On our way, I noticed a billboard advertising a place where you could free yourself of your drug habit. I started to think that perhaps we were in a sketchy area. When we got to the bus stop and sat down to wait for the bus, a nice-looking man wearing a button-down shirt and chinos came over to us. I thought he was going to ask about the bus schedule. Instead he asked us for money. He said he was fifty cents short of bus fare, and asked if we had 2 quarters. H said no, and I ignored him. Soon afterwards, a couple came staggering over, and the man ordered his companion to sit down, using words I can’t type in this essay. I got up and stood away from them, my eyes glazing over. I found myself going into city-mode, where I appear to be shut down, In actuality, I’m on high alert. H was amazed at the transformation. He asked if I wanted to start walking. No, I said, gazing off into the distance, standing stock still. Luckily, the loud man and lady friend walked off, and the bus came.
I relaxed a bit once we were on the bus, and looked forward to seeing some animals to make me feel better. We strolled into the Lincoln Park Zoo for free, and headed towards the big cat enclosure. When we got inside, I didn’t feel better at all.
(To be continued)
Ms. Vaillancourt may be contacted at snobbyblog@gmail.com
