Cloud Gate

While in Chicago, we headed over to Millennium Park...


...where they had amazing fountains with various moving faces on them and since it was 89F, the cool water was appreciated by many overheated children.


Also in the park is Cloud Gate by Anish Kapoor.


Because of its shape, it's most often referred to as the Bean.


Richard took some great photos too. Click here to check 'em out!


Underneath the Bean, the reflections get really distorted.


The reflections are amazing.


Here's Richard's self-portrait...


...and here are the two of us as seen in Cloud Gate.

Sacred Grounds

While in Chicago, we stopped at Macy's Watertower on the Magnificent Mile. Upstairs in their food court, we came across Sacred Grounds and stopped for a while. The cakes looked delicious.


I liked how they were simply displayed.


I'd never heard of fruit paté before.


Loved the variety of stuff this place had.


This just looks plain delicious.


These are the most elegant of strawberries, n'est-pas?


You can't go wrong with key lime tarts...


...or crispy squares with peanut butter and chocolate.


But these little darlings just blew me away. I didn't have the nerve to order one. Now I wish I had. Jello art. Who knew?

Contemporary Art in Chicago

The Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago had some funky stuff on display.


I loved the ottoman art.


Richard danced around the lava rock installation.


I kinda liked this. Perhaps Richard thought the wheel barrows would be better off schlepping wood instead of popcorn and Christmas balls.


Mike Kelley's Craft Morphology Flow Chart was a fave.


He had a room full of stuffed animals and sock monkeys found at flea markets...


... and treated them as scientific subjects.


Measuring them...


...and sketching them and measuring them some more. Kinda cool.


Looking at all that art made us thirsty so we headed to the gallery's Puck restaurant and drank some trendy soda outdoors.

Blackhawks Aftermath

Richard and I landed in Chicago an hour after the Stanley Cup championship rally had ended.


Wowza. The streets were covered in Blackhawk-coloured confetti.


It all had to be cleaned up with bulldozers.


Way to go Hawks!

Happy Birthday to Me

Richard made me a chocolate cake for my birthday. Yum-o!


Happy birthday to me!

Art Fayre and Birthdays

Yesterday we hung the Art Fayre show which will run this weekend at the Glengarry Pioneer Museum.


Evlyn Fortier's paintings included several amazing portraits including Barb and me.

After lunch, the hanging committee had a cake for me and sang me happy birthday. It turned out that I shared my special day with Ross, one of the summer students working at the museum this summer.


So we shared the cake. What fun!

Cheese Fries at Neil's

While in NYC a few weeks back, my sister Marci asked a few cops where we could grab a good cup of coffee -- that wouldn't cost us $5 a cup -- and they directed us to Neil's Coffee Shop.


Great call! The place is one of those real joints I love to go to.


Even at three o'clock in the afternoon, the food orders were coming fast and furious.


The menu had all the typical diner fare you'd expect...


...which included a great cup of coffee.


We couldn't find poutine on the menu so we ordered a plate of cheese fries...


...which my niece Sylvie and I split. She also had a chocolate shake. Ah, to be 19 again...

Art of Odile Tetu

An old friend of mine had an art show recently. I hadn't see her in years.


Odile Tetu is a talented painter and printmaker and is now living in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. Her vernissage and art show was held at the Skelly Gallery in St. Eugene, Ontario.


Some of her etchings depicted scenes in Battle Harbour, Labrador, a place I visited some ten or more years ago.


I pointed out the bake apples also known as cloudberries -- wild, golden berries that grow there in August. While I was in Labrador, I participated in a bake apple picking -- and later eating -- contest.


My cousin Len from New York State was visiting me during the show...


...and he very much enjoyed Odile's work.


And Richard was busy at work!