Full days, good times.

Check it out. Ben was on TV. http://wgntv.trb.com/news/ You have to find the video titled "North Side Industrial Fire Blankets Neighborhood in Smoke." You should be able to find it in the list at the bottom at least for a couple of days.

We were biking home down Milwaukee on Saturday afternoon and were almost home when a guy on the sidewalk asked if we knew what was burning. We turned around and straight up Milwaukee we could see huge, black, black clouds of smoke billowing up into the sky. Since we had nothing going on we turned around and biked to see the fire. We had thought it was at Western Ave or so, about a mile away, but we kept on biking and biking and after more than five miles we finally reached the hugest fire I've ever seen at Irving Park and Pulaski. It was some old warehouse, and the smoke was huge and black and blocking the sun and dropping ashy bits on us. We could hear lots of loud popping, and the fire hoses, and there were people everywhere who had come to scope it out. It was exciting. We stayed for a while and watched, until we needed some fresh air and headed back to our hood to get dinner with Mike and George at an Argentinian restaurant.

So that was Saturday afternoon. Saturday morning Isabel was in town and we went out for brunch at Meli and made chocolate chip cookies. Isabel's the best. Friday night Ben and I went to Looptopia, to see Poppy sing with the Blue Ribbon Glee Club before eating at Eleven with Taavo and Ben and later seeing one of my favorite bands ever, Mucca Pazza.

Sunday: long workday, Duke's guest night gig with a new clarinetist and fiddle player!

Monday Mom came to visit! She sat in on my WW classes:



They went great and we had a ton of fun! Then we went to Lula my favorite restaurant and I took her out for lunch for her birthday! Then I took her to OTS and showed her off and she got to meet Emily and Jenna and other friends! Then we went to Borders so she could use up her gift cards and we ran into Kevin! Then we went to Cafe Gelato and did the Reader crossword puzzle, my favorite crossword puzzle! The we went home and hung out with Ben! Then we all went to Feed for dinner! Then we took her back to the train station.

I had super great fun with my mom. It was less like hanging out with my mother and more like hanging out with a really good friend who understands you the best and the conversation never ends.

And then Ben and I watched Heroes on TV instead of the internet and then biked to the Hideout to see my guitar teacher head up the Wilco ensemble as they played a concert of the new Wilco CD that would be released at midnight that night.

Rockin.