Ch-ch-ch-chilly in Chicago

Back on the road again for work. I had a quick turn-around weekend at home, just enough time to launder my work clothes and shove them back into a suitcase. I also squeezed in a wedding and an anxiety attack, so all-in-all, it was a pretty productive 60 hours at home!

This time, I am in the Chicago suburbs. The weather report called for highs in the mid-50's, which is cold, but not crazy cold. So I just brought a sweatshirt and long sleeved shirts. Then, once I landed a "cold front" moved in and the temperatures dropped into the 40's and started sliding downward. My hotel was across from a mall, so I ran over there (literally ran, it was cold and WINDY) to find a real jacket. Of course, this is the wrong time of year to buy warm clothes. I could buy a bikini in every color of the rainbow, but nothing warm.

After losing out on a jacket, I was met by Beefranck and Mr. Franck for dinner. Which was awesome. I mean, c'mon - they drove something like 40 miles just to have dinner WITH ME. I was thrilled! And even though I was feeling rather shy, I talked NON STOP for like 2 hours while we ate Lou Malnati's pizza (classic Chi-Town deep dish). Mr. Franck even commented that I didn't "seem shy." It's my defense mechanism. I'll either hide under the table or just yammer on and on and on until I scare people away. I apologize.

After dinner, I was pretty tired and crazy full so I had to "call it a night" earlier than I should have. Plus, they'd driven across the world to come see me! I felt like I should hang out late, but at the same time everyone had to get up early the next day for work, so I felt like I should let them go home already so they could unwind and enjoy the rest of their weekend. It was probably best that I let them go, since I was crazy bloated from eating half of a deep dish pizza. Enough said.

That night, the rain moved in and it got colder. Apparently, it snowed overnight and by noon, this was what was left on the ground:

I had to switch hotels to where our event was being held, which turned out to be adjacent to another mall. After set-up on Monday night, I went to the mall and lo and behold - I found a jacket! Two, in fact! Forever 21 had some awesome clearance deals and I ended up with two new coats and only spent $40! But don't worry, I still wasted a ton of money. Firstly, Forever 21 has cheap-cheap-cheap accessories and I bought a handful of necklaces. Then, I went to the Target that was RIGHT NEXT TO THE HOTEL and loaded up on snacks and stuff... it wasn't until I had schlepped it all to my room that I realized "duh, I am only here for 2 nights and one of those days is our event day, which is catered the whole time" so I have a gigantic bag of rice cakes and a 6 pack of Coke and a box of granola bars that I need to finish before I leave. EATING CONTEST!