A Not so Venetian Night

The day started out pretty cloudy and looked like it was going to rain. I met up with Lisa Lewis for breakfast at 8:30am at Eggclectic and had a tasty Mediterranean omlet. I haven't seen Lisa in a long time since she got married to Mr. Peter Lewis, one of my homies from the old small group. Actually, both Lisa and Peter were in my first HBC small group. It was nice to catch up with her and share stories and updates about what is going on in our lives. Her and Peter are doing well out in Elgin, but are thinking about moving into a single family home in the future. Following breakfast, I did a bunch of errands and made it over to Lake Arlington to go for a very hot and sweaty run. The sky was starting to turn and the clouds had disappeared. Jody and I hopped into the "squad car" aka the Lumina and voyaged to Alex Nuekomm's condo off of Sheridan to hangout and eat before Venetian Nights. I attempted to parallel park the squad car and Jody just laughed at me. I guess I need some training:) When we arrived at Alex's, there were several people there whom we didn't know...and actually I found out from Alex later on that he didn't really know 75% of the people there as well. One of his friends from YAM, Sara, brought a bunch of her out of town guests over. Nice people from Ohio and Georgia. As 8pm started approaching very quickly, Alex, Jody, and I jumped into a taxi and headed down to Buckingham fountain to meet up with the rest of the Yammers at Venetian Night. The taxi ride was probably the most expensive ride I've taken in a long time! But at least we got to our destination quickly and without delay. A few moments after we arrived, Josh Chen radioed in to Alex and told us where everyone was at...Balbo and LSD just a little north of Balbo on the lake side. Josh or someone he was with, picked an excellent spot. You could see everything pretty well. Jody and I are trying to figure out why thy called it Venetian Night. There was a really lame boat parade. Boats were lit up and decorated with an all things Chicago theme. You had a boat representing each sports team, a blues brothers boat, a Marshall Fields boat, and a boat with a bunch of cows? They were singing "who let the cows out...moo..moo..moo..moo." When you think Venetian I think Venice and Italy and lots of decorations and vendors and dancing and music...kinda like an upscale trendy carnival or festival. Not a lame boat parade. The Chicago Cubs boat almost tipped over and capsized at one point as the wind blew the scoreboard, which doubled as the boat's sail. Well at least the fireworks picked up the slack where the boats lacked. The fireworks were AMAZING and so unique. Unfortunately, the only thing to complain about there was the lame XRT music it was choreographed to. Other than that, we couldn't complain much. At the end of the evening, we wrapped Alex up in his blanket like a burrito and attempted to drag him down to the lake. He's pretty heavy for a small guy:) I guess you've got to have some weight to be able to run 18 miles in a couple hours. As soon as the fireworks were over, we hopped on another expensive taxi ride and headed home. A not so Venetian Night but a good one none the less.