Chicago Go!

I have arrived in Chicago. The view from my apartment:


But how did I get here? Well, when I flew into Midway with my approximately 130 lbs. of luggage, I decided that taking a taxicab to my apartment would be unnecessarily decadent. Shunning the advice of my mother, my siblings, and other sane people, I ventured to jump on the affordable metro to my Chicago home.

If my liberal arts education at the University of Kansas has taught me anything, it was that people all over the world suffer from genocide, famine, oppression, and non-reality based television. The rich and privileged need to be exposed to such issues, in the hippie monetary unit known as "awareness." I was overcome with this emotion at the airport, and without an organic cotton t-shirt to buy or an ironic button to attach to my backpack, I resorted to taking public transit.

Lugging my luggage through the metro stations, up and down stairs, was probably as hilarious as it was exhausting. My feeble attempts to "blend in" with the locals on the train were stopped when I almost punched a lady when the train lurched to a stop.

Dehydrated and demoralized, I attempted to buy some water from a vending machine as I transfered between metro lines. I placed quarter after quarter into the contraption until I ran out of change, only to realize that water was $2.00. I had just placed $1.75 into the machine. Other than that, I only had $20 bills, which the device did not take. I did not have enough quarters to buy water. Waiting and understanding that my death now would probably be justified and serve as an effective warning to others, I got onto my train.

However, this was the correct decision. A cab ride surely would have been $50 or greater. And by my calculations and conversions, I still managed to choose the better deal:

Cab

Cab ride: $50

Metro

Metro fare: $2.25
Estimated value of pain/suffering: $32.51
Failed water bottle: $1.75
Total: $36.01
-> less than $50!

On the bright side, my apartment has a bright side. Two large windows open my humble home to the scraped sky of Chicago.


The living room (a.k.a. only room) is surprisingly large, and the hardwood floors give the illusion that someone much cooler lives here. The mattress was salvaged from an exited resident with "standards" for furniture.


The bathroom is lovely and also has hints of a vintage design.


The "kitchen" is small, but functional. My tea set occupies nearly 50% of my counterspace. Unacceptable.


My laptop sits atop a set of drawers also aquired free of charge (one step before dumpster).

Perhaps soon I shall photograph the beautiful city. But first I need to put away the rest of my stuff. What?! Really?! Come on! [Sai has just discovered a large number of quarters in his messenger bag, any of which could have saved him at least $17.47 worth of pain/suffering from the trip]