This is Chicago. This is Grand!

(You El-riders know what the post title refers to.)

Had a lovely day downtown today with my mother and my friend Kate. We began at the Museum of Contemporary Art--currently the home of a fascinating, moldy-looking Matthew Barney table, and much, much more--and Kate and I concluded in the evening at the Michigan Avenue GAP, where I purchased a neon green corduroy miniskirt in the Kids' section. At $12.99, you can't go wrong, or you can't go that wrong...

Fox and Obel, which is in three of the pictures below, is the most wonderful place in Chicago (not the used bookstores of Hyde Park? not the U of C itself? not the Harper USITE computer lab?)--or at least one of my favorites. It is home to NYC-style bagels, a great cheese selection--no canned cheese, as at the Hyde Park Co-op--boy, was that a mistake--and a pleasant cafe serving Chicago-scale (i.e. massive) salads and various other dishes. My mother said (and I hope she doesn't mind my quoting her on this) that if she had a huge amount of money, she would make a donation to the U of C that would replace Aramark with Fox and Obel. Someone, quick, register my mother at the GSB!