The Great American Summer Road Trip: Long First Day (NYC to Chi Town)

You may be wondering why there is a second post for the first day. Well, we were sitting in Starbucks (where I posted my first Day 1 post - about 7 hours ago), and we said, "We've already seen the HoF, we've seen the arenas, and we've stumbled upon a music festival, so if we go have a good meal, we'll feel pretty good about having 'done' Cleveland justice, right?"

Right.

So we decided that in order to fit in a full agenda tomorrow (consisting of Chicago deep dish at Lou Malnati's, a 2pm Lakefront Brewery tour in Milwaukee, early dinner at Kopp's Frozen Custard in the 'Wauk, and a night out in Madison, Wisconsin), we would just start driving to Chicago tonight and see how far we could go.

Oh by the way, everyone says St. Paul and Minneapolis are just not that awesome at all, so we're skipping the twin cities (especially because the Twins are away this week), and seeing the University of Wisconsin campus instead

So, we checked out a couple of restaurants, and everyone had bumped their prices up due to the street festival, save for one little spot tucked away on a corner street. We went in, and met some very friendly people. There was Gerad, the army veteran who had just returned from his latest tour in Iraq via Portland and told me that when I go to Oregon, I must visit the Red Hook Brewery (consider it done). There was our waitress Danice Diane (a.k.a "DiDi" a.k.a "Double D" a.k.a. the only person in the bar who knew how to work the grill in the kitchen and let me come hang out with her while she grilled up the half pound patty I ordered). And last but not least, there was Jeff, the bartender, who offered us a complimentary Great Lakes IPA (which Jim and I split, due to the impending post-dinner drive), and more importantly, gave me the following recipe for the cookbook:

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Jeff's "Go To"

Ingredients:

1 1/2 oz Absolut Citron

1 1/2 oz Three Olives Grape Vodka

1 1/2 oz Sour Mix

1 1/2 oz 7 Up

Directions:

1. Combine ingredients over ice in a metal mixing cup and shake vigorously

2. Strain into shot glasses

Serves four 1 1/2 oz shots

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Here are some pics from Cleveland (since my earlier post):

(Quicken Loans Arena, home of Lebron and the Cleveland Cavs. We are all witnesses. Literally. "We" being Jim and Will. I'm so clever.)

(Great Lakes IPA. Really good, especially six ounces at a time.)

(Danice with my half-pound swiss burger. Not your average-looking burger. Not your average-looking burger flipper either.)

So yeah, then we hit the road for Chicago, figuring we'd make it about 150 of the 350 mile journey, post up at a motel, and call it a night. Nope. I called my fraternity brother Joe Schwartz, who lives in Arlington Heights (a suburb just North of Chicago), and he was gracious enough to let us stay at his place. (A big shout out to his mother Sharon as well, who I've just found out is a total sweetheart). So, we decided that 860 miles wasn't too much driving for the first day, and off we went, stopping only for gas and beef jerky.

I am now sitting on Joe's brother's bunk bed (he's away at college or something), which is covered in Chicago Bulls-themed sheets and pillowcases. Joe is waking me up at 8am CST tomorrow (it is now 1:47 EST and 12:47 CST) to go for a run around his neighborhood, and get this: THERE IS A LOU MALNATI'S SIX MINUTES FROM HIS HOUSE. Fate, people. Fate.

Here are a few more pics. Hope this holds you over until next time. To all my still-employed blog followers, Happy Monday.