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     As mentioned before, the weekend involved a trip to Chicago.  While the flight back reaffirmed my thoughts on the travel process, I can say that I had an amazing time.  Here are the details.

     On Friday I went to the White Sox/Twins game.  At the recommendation of the concierge at the Drake hotel, I didn’t drive to the game, and took mass transit.  It’s very much like taking the 4 to the Yankee game, except everyone is wearing White Sox jerseys.  Of course, I’m wearing a Yankee hat and my Jeter shirt.

     I have to digress here.  We all know that no self-respecing male Yankee fan would wear the Jeter shirt in public on a regular basis.  Why?  Because only women wear Jeter shirts (and A-Rod shirts, as well).  As a good friend of mine put it, when you wear the Jeter shirt, it’s “cuddle time”.  However, this was one of two Yankee shirts that I had with me, the other one being for Chien-Ming Wang.  I think that in light of the situation, the Jeter shirt was a good call.

     So, when I get to the stadium, I find out that the pitching matchup is going to be Johan Santana against Mark Buehrle.  Basically, that means a two-hour game, since no one hits off either of these guys.

     Then I take a look at my tickets.  When I purchased them, I noticed they were in row 4 on the field level, so I knew that I was going to be sitting pretty close to the first-base dugout.  As I walked down the aisle, I realized that the rows start at the third row!  So yes, I was sitting one row behind the first-base dugout where the Twins were, right behind where they enter and exit the dugout.

     To my surprize, I realized that Ruben Sierra was on the Twins.  As he was leaning over the screen to the dugout, I would should “RUUUBE!”.  Eventually, he saw me in the Yankee gear, to which he replied with a subdued smile and a wave.

     The game proceeded pretty quickly, up until the sixth inning, where the White Sox scored two runs, and then the eigth inning, where they tacked on five more.  I thought for a moment I was watching the Yankees with all of that offensive output.

     After that, a quick train ride to the hotel, and then to sleep.

     A word about the hotel.  While in Chicago, I stayed in the Drake.  The Drake is supposed to be one of, if not the premiere hotel in all of Chicago.  To a degree, it is, but I had some issues.

     I should start out by saying that the building itself is fabulous, and the service of the staff is impecable.  As I mentioned before, the concierge was extremely helpful in providing transportation options to the stadium.  On top of that, the bellmen, the people behind the front desk, and everyone else in the hotel was extremely polite and helpful in every way that they could possibly be.

     The room itself was massive, even having a foyer.  It was decorated in a style reminiscient of the early 20th century.

     There were a number of things that bothered me about the hotel.  The first is that there was no newspaper delivered to my door in the morning.  I found that to be odd.   The second was that there was a charge both for the internet and for the gym, of $10 per day.  If the hotel room itself was $20 a day, then I would understand, but when one pays a price which is MANY times over $10 per day, you expect certain things to be included in the price, internet and the gym being some of those things.  Overall, I think these things make a very strong statement about what the hotel thinks of its guests, and as a result, I will NOT be staying there again.  I also recommend to others that they not stay there either.

     Needless to say, when the bellman, Christopher, asked me how my stay was on my way out, he noticed I wasn’t completely enthusiastic, and asked what happened.  He took down my contact information and said an assistant manager would be contacting me.  Christopher was EXTREMELY polite (as was everyone else) and asked what it was about the hotel that didn’t meet my satisfaction, as well as my contact information, so that an assistant manager could speak to me about the experience.  I spoke with her this morning, and she was very polite and agreeable.  I do appreciate the fact that she took the time to listen, even though I don’t believe that anything will be done as a result.

     On to Saturday.  On Saturday, I took the time to browse the area around the hotel that I was staying in.  There were a number of very high-end stores there (LV, Chanel, Prada, etc, etc), as well as some little boutiques which I found to be interesting.  After that, I took a nap, and then headed out to dinner.

     Dinner is a whole other story which will be detailed in an upcoming post.  Just to give you an idea, it was 24 courses over three-and-a-half hours.  More to come soon.

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