Today we headed up to Chicago for a mini-vacation. Mom’s been bummed out that due to business constraints we didn’t manage to get away on any vacations this summer.She had wanted to do two mini-vacations, this weekend and the next, but Corwin put a stop to that with a Boy Scout activity next weekend, but for now we’re on the road again.
We spent the morning driving and then dropped by the Museum of Science and Industry. I had to leave Mom and the kids there to make a business meeting but I think they had fun while I was gone. Mom had several activities lined up, including a virtual tour of the Colorado River and glass making. Best of all, she let the kids get some stuff at the Museum store. Corwin got a trick paper airplane, and Charles and Alice got stuffed microbes, salmonella for Alice and mad cow disease for Charles. I wanted to buy some of those from one of my geek catalogs a while back, but Mom said noooooooo. I thought she considered them too geeky, but now I see that she just wanted to credit!
I didn’t make it back to the Museum so I met the gang at Navy Pier. We hung out there for a while. Mom persuaded the kids to try the ferris wheel, which Alice in particular was reluctant to do. We watched parts of an air show just to the north, and experienced some very close fly-bys from an F-22, F-15, and a P-51. At first I couldn’t figure out what the jet going by was, but eventually Mom realized that it was two different planes. Later, we saw all three flying together, representing the best of piston, jet, and stealth technology. Some of the passes were very close. I thought Alice would be frightened by the noise but she would dart out to try to catch a glimpse of the aircraft. Charles was kind of interested, but I guess real life planes are not his thing.
We also played a round of mini-golf at Corwin’s insistance. I crushed him like the insect he is, getting two holes in one and two others where the ball glanced off the edge. Alice helped by dancing around and singing “Daddy won! Daddy won!”. Charles even won one hole, beating both Corwin and me.
After that we trudged back to the hotel to watch Olympics.
P.S. Gosh there’s a lot of construction going on downtown. According to some flyer at Navy Pier, there’s a plan to put a 2000 foot tower on the south corner of the pier. That should be something.