The Official Inaugural Chicago Post

I have never lived this close to a movie theater! I have never lived this close to a lake! And to live so close to both a movie theater and a lake at the same time? It must be some kind of miracle. I believe the miracle's name is Chicago.

I have been so - um, busy - that I have not got around to posting. Maybe I was just letting the goodness of our move to Chicago sink in. But folks, it's true. Brian and I have set up shop in a tiny apartment in the Lakeview neighborhood, barely a mile from Wrigley Field and about half a block from everything one could ever want: cheap restaurants, great bars, multiple coffee shops (including DD!), a delicious Mexican restaurant, a fantastic pub with weekly all-you-can-eat fish & chips that is no-kidding-right-next-door, the gym, the aforementioned cinema, and so on. Not to mention that my run is now along a Great Lake and the city bus two seconds from our building's front door runs frequently, although we are also a mere few minutes' walk from the train.

I LOVE LIVING IN CHICAGO!

Oh, sorry for the outburst there. I just love it. Careful readers will recall that I have been kicking around the idea of moving to Chicago for some time. First of all, it's the next logical choice after having lived in Los Angeles and New York. (Wait, you mean there are people who don't think that way about where to live?) Secondly, now that I'm all Midwesterly connected via Brian, it was a logical choice for us, because he likes it too and has a gazillion friends here. Plus we were just sitting there with all our stuff in the garage in Grand Rapids and we really needed to get the eff out like tout de suite, and in considering the nearest largest cities Chicago had it all over Detroit-Ann Arbor, even though I have friends there too, because a.)Michigan is currently an economic wasteland and b.)Michigan is like the essence of let-me-please-have-a-car-and-drive-drive-drive while Chicago is public transit, baby! And the longer I put off buying another car, the longer I can convince myself that I am going to get to live abroad again before I, ahem, "settle down" somewhere here in these United States.

And in the two weeks we have lived here I have already seen: Ajami, The White Ribbon, Nine, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, The Messenger, and Crazy Heart. Not only is there a movie theater AROUND THE CORNER from us, but there is another excellent theatre just over a mile away, walking distance or a short bus ride. (Let me be clear that chez Mom in Phoenix I also had the nearby AMC Deer Valley that was walkable/bikeable, and although it was a mega-multi-eleventy-billion-screens-plex, it does run a fair amount of good stuff, but while Grand Rapids offered the not-so-far-away Celebration! Cinema Woodland, it failed to offer SIDEWALKS along 28th Street on which to walk there. So, you know. Kind of problematic.)

We are less than two weeks away from the Oscars, people!!! I will definitely get on the stick and offer up some Oscar bloggage here in the home stretch. Today I believe I am going to see the Live Action Short nominees, at my theater AROUND THE CORNER! Yeah.