Me?

I've almost never taken a "vacation" vacation that didn't involve my family or work. But one year, an American band I was into was playing Toronto and my favorite Canadian band was playing Chicago 2 days later. This totally interested me because I am not a lounge about vacationer, I need to be doing something and I don't mean hiking.

The show in Toronto was okay. It was a small and weird shaped menu and since the band was young, there were no seats. So I pretty much crawled up some stairs to hide out on a balcony.

Then I got on a Greyhound bus. Yes, that's right. I took a Greyhound from Toronto to Chicago. The best thing about it was how skilled the driver was at winding his way through the streets of small towns in which he was required to stop. The second thing I enjoyed about that part of the trip was realizing the loveliest town was Battle Creek, MI, the home of Kellogg's.

The band I was travelling to see was called Great Big Sea. They chose to pursue solo interests after their 20th anniversary but they've left a marvelous legacy. Their fan base has always been quite strong. Those who wanted to be the chatty types would meet on the band's website chat forum called the Online Kitchen Party. Why kitchen party? Because if you attend a house party, the best part usually happens in the kitchen or it will end up there anyway. I joined the forum mostly for the purpose of planning the trip. I even ended up changing hotels because of a recommendation there and got an amazing deal on a much better hotel that was, get this, NEXT DOOR to the venue. They shared a parking lot, I didn't even have to cross the street.

This happened a while ago, so I am a little foggy but I believe Great Big Sea was playing the House of Blues. At first, all I could remember was that it was a franchise near the Magnificent Mile and the Chicago Hard Rock doesn't fit that bill. So I must have stayed at Hotel Chicago downtown, which looks hella ritzy on their current website.

Check in was easy enough but my room number had 4 digits and I was tired so when I got in the elevator, I really wasn't sure which floor I wanted. There was a couple in the elevator car with me and the lady asked me my room number and told me I was on the 10th floor. I very gratefully thanked her and, as I did, she looked me in the eye and told me I looked familiar. Geographically, we couldn't have been further apart. "I'm here to see Great Big Sea," I told them. Both of them smiled broadly and confirmed they were as well. I don't think we ever did confirm it as I think that elevator was fast, I'm pretty sure she recognized me from my pretty tiny headshot on the Online Kitchen Party.

The above picture is the bed in the room and I'm glad I took the picture upon entry because that night, after a damn good, roof raising show (Great Big Sea's Celtic sound and influences usually went over like gangbusters in towns and cities with prevalent Irish influence), I coughed so hard I bloodied at least one of those pearly white pillow cases.

To be clear, I felt super bad for the housekeeper assigned to my room but no matter how much I coughed my way back over the border, it was worth it.