The Nootsmaak: Home Sweet Home

Good golly am I glad to be home. Chicago was great and all, but there is no place at all like home. In the Bay Area. With hills and tall trees and clear skies and the big beautiful bay.

I actually didn't get to see Chicago itself - I was in Rosemont/Des Plains, but there seemed to be no change in the topography no matter which direction I looked. That was weird.

Everyone there is SO nice. Very friendly, down-to-earth people. And I got to eat at the Steak & Shake! I didn't have the shake, but the steak (burger) was good.

There was a greasy-spoon type diner next door to the hotel that delivered, which was nice. The telephone in the room had three buttons for food service: "Pine Grove" (the greasy spoon) and two others that simply said "Mexican" and "Pizza."

I pressed the button for Pine Grove and a hotel employee answered and told me to just call the number on the menu. He must love having that job.

The folks at the restaurant were super nice and my food was good, especially considering how inexpensive it was. A roasted half chicken with vegetables, salad and baked potato, delivered for $15.00. Cheapest room service I've ever had.

When it was time to head home, my new colleagues dropped me off at the O'Hare people mover, which has a large parking area with a waiting area for those being picked up, where you can also be dropped off, aptly named the "Kiss & Fly" area.

We didn't kiss - maybe we'll be ready for that on the next visit - but said goodbye and I went up into the train station. There were two sets of tracks - one on either side of the station - and absolutely no signage on either side as to which track goes to the terminals.

There were electric signs above the doors and when the tram came on one side, the sign said it was going somewhere - not sure what it said - something about concourses - nothing about "terminals" or "airport" or "where the planes are."

I got on & figured I could always jump off & go back the other way if I was wrong. Turned out I was right, but again, no adequate signage or terminology about where it was going and where you might want to get off.

They don't seem to like the word terminal and instead, it's all about concourses - A thru M or whatever - and you sort-of have to know which concourse you need, rather than which terminal - the concourses are in the terminals...

But it looked like AA was in the third group of concourses, so I hoped for the best and got off the tram when I could see similar letters on the signs outside the tram - the announcer/robot never mentioned which airlines one might find at any one stop.

I guessed right and found American Asslines where I was checked in by a very nice woman. I then got to wheel my checked luggage down to an X-Ray area and leave it with some very large Union workers and piles of other bags that all go through the scanner before they go onto the magic conveyor belt.

The X-Ray area looked like an impromptu set-up, right next to the ticket counters with simple fabric dividers between it and all the passers by. No real security to it. I hoped my bag would make it onto the plane, and was very glad I opted to have all my photo equipment shipped.

After all that, I almost didn't make my flight because I got lost amid the dozens of AA gates, but when I found the gate I thought I needed, they'd made a gate change and I had to run from one rambling arm over to another and just made it into the last boarding group.

Once on the plane, it was hard to relax for four long hours - I just wanted to be home already. Flying is sooooo boooooooooring. Thankfully I was next to someone quiet and there was no annoying chit chat. I read my magazines and tried to sleep and took pictures - it helped pass the time.