Day 5

Saturday 5th May 2007 <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Refreshed from our night’s sleep and a rudimentary breakfast in the lobby of the motel, chatting with the Indian proprietor and his wife, both of whom have several relatives in the UK (a doctor in Scotland, another in Ilford, others in Wolverhampton and Northampton), we set out once more on the road.  We also signed up for the Triprewards programme, which means we will be able to have a couple of freebie nights in participating motels before this trip is out.

 

We immediately upset Connie by diverting to a gas station to use a pay-at-the-pump pump that nevertheless told me to collect my receipt from the cashier.  Mind you, we have now tamed Connie Garmin and taught her left from right.  It would appear that if she is not in the windscreen when you programme her (we had been doing it nearer to our laps and then putting her in the windscreen), she gets a tad confused. It is just a pity that she does not recognise that cars have passengers, so she goes into “Safe Mode” and refuses any new instructions because the car is being driven: hence we need to pull over and stop to issue new instructions.

 

Then we were on our way, able once more to see though the windscreen by dint of a scourer and warm soapy water and my elbow grease.

 

We followed I76 and then I77 and I80/90 all the way across <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Ohio and Indiana, stopping ata couple of bleak service areas and several poll plazas.  The terrain was almost uniformly flat but relieved by woods and farms and small towns.  Our musical accompaniment was provided by our iPods, relayed through the car radio by a Belkin gadget, which we had finally fathomed out how to work by virtue of ignoring the instructions that came with it.   Our previous attempts to use it had been foiled by excessive interference but in these more sparsely populated areas we got good reception and a good selection of music.  While Mary slept, I was able to enjoy my motley collection of blues, folk, reggae, jazz etc but then Roy’s high tones in the middle of McGoohan’s Blues woke Mary up, prompting her to disconnect my iPod and connect hers, which I had previously populated with much more “easier listening” for her (lots of Enya, Van Morrison, Daniel Donnell, Corrs and some classical stuff).  As we were pulling in to a service plaza, I allowed this sacrilegious action and calmly attached my own iPod to my ears as we went in for refreshment.  Once I’d had my fill of the sea roaring with laughter, we communicated together again.  Up until now we had been selecting CDs from the collection that remains after I managed to stop Mary taking it back to England on her last two trips along with the two case loads she has already taken back.

 

Eventually, the battery in Mary’s iPod died and proper order was restored, as my iPod was reconnected.  Suitably equipped we entered the desolate industrial wasteland of Gary, Indiana, and embarked on the grim reality of the Chicago Skyway.  It is undergoing severe roadworks at present, one of which spat us out on S State St, so I made the best of a bad job and headed for the distant skyscrapers representing Downtown Chicago and the hope of some civilization.  For the first couple of miles the scenery was classic industrial despoliation: parks and schools were all that were left from sites of factories, surrounded by wreckage and run-down, somehow surviving buildings, punctuated by churches and other religious buildings displaying their crude messages of hope for this and the next life: how graphically is illustrated that old Marxian doctrine that “Religion is the opiate of the masses”.  Here are people whose lives are desperate because no one wants the fruits of their labors any more, yet they seem to gladly bear their troubles in the “comfort of the Lord”. Many of the overpopulated housing areas showed extreme examples of deprivation with boarded windows, and tumble down housing – a lot of which appeared to be no bigger than the holiday caravan we own in the New Forest. Was it coincidental that the only faces we saw here were non white?

 

Gradually, the road took on a slightly better kempt and prosperous appearance: new housing and office blocks, more even road surface, more complex junctions and speed cameras, accompanied by flashing blue lights, presumably designed to warn us of the risks of speeding.  Then there were tall buildings and more prosperous looking people and commercial properties and shops and we were into downtown Chicago, which, at first glance, was remarkably like midtown New York.   We stayed on State St as it crossed the Chicago River and became N State St and came out the other side of the commercial district into a very genteel leafy area of prosperous “Georgian” or “Victorian” town houses (if those terms are appropriate in defiantly republican America).  At the end of State St we turned into a park and then drove South along the shore of Lake Michigan, with the wonderful skyline of skyscrapers to our right, before ducking again into E Ontario St, where, after a few more explorations, we ended up, booking into the Courtyard by Marriott for “$339”, which turned out to be $419, after taking into account $28 for parking, and City Tax and Room Tax, not to mention the tips we had to fork out to bell boys, without whose help we were not allowed to borrow a trolley to decamp our cases.  I think Mary would have said “No Thank You”, worried mostly by the cost, and headed for the outskirts to find a more reasonably priced motel, but I’d decided that, as we were in Chicago, we ought to do it properly.

 

In for a penny, in for a pound.  We went for a walk up “The Magnificent Mile”, the “honorary name” of N Michigan Ave, where we took lots of pictures of the Chicago Tribune office building and similar landmarks, crossed the Chicago River and visited the Millennium Park, then walked along Randolph St to State St and walked back across the river, where we dined in the Wollensky Grill at Smith and Wollensky.  We had the most exquisite Filet Mignons of recent memory, accompanied by delightful creamed spinach and steamed broccoli, washed down with Bylington Cabernet Sauvignon from Paso Robles, at $53 a bottle, one of the cheapest on the extensive and proudly compiled list.

 

We then strolled back to our room, via an off-licence, and drank a $13 bottle of Californian plonk.  This allowed the filets to settle and our minds to turn to adventure once more, taking advantage of the hour gained when crossing into Illinois.  So into a taxi we climbed and headed for Blue Chicago on N Clark St, to be regaled first by Calvin McKenzie and his band, then by singer Shirley Johnson, supported by the same band.  The second guitarist was a Japanese guy called Hirotaka Konishi, who played some sweet but unassertive solos.  The most impressive player on show was the saxophonist, Lawrence something.  His accompaniment to Shirley’s delivery of Etta James’s “Dreams” (or something similar) was note perfect: neither too much nor too little and beautifully tuneful.  Followers of John Martyn will recognize how difficult such a balance is, ashis saxophonist has been slated for overdoing things.  The bassist played a six-string instrument and got his chance to show his chops to, as did the drummer.  Both are, I hope, featured on Calvin McKenzie’s album that we bought, along with Shirley’s “Killer Diller” and Konishi’s “A Blues Project”.

 

The bar was packed but not unbearably so, and the music was just at the right level of decibels: loud enough to be heard clearly over the general hubbub without endangering our eardrums.  Calvin did a good line in buzzing guitar solos, Shirley did the big black mama thing and the Japanese guy sang Howling Wolf’s “Killing Floor” in rather a reedy, feeble voice – but somehow it still worked.

 

The usual CDs were on sale and we purchased all the ones that I did not already have, after Mary sent me off to fetch more cash, trusting me with her bank card and pin number.  I still haven’t been able to resolve my problems with the bank as to why I cannot get cash: I’ve tried emailing them via the secure internet connection and got no answer.  I’ve tried phoning them but failed to get through the automated answering system as “talk to someone about a problem” is not an option and I don’t have a telephone banking password, required by all other options.

 

There was a crazy lone dancer among the writhing and spectating couples, doing his own weird and oddly choreographed and self-conscious moves.   He later came and kissed Mary on the forehead, without warning, and told her how beautiful she was.  This took us by surprise but we laughed it off.  He’d probably seen Mary’s long tied-back blondish hair and mistaken her for his wife, with whom we soon fell into conversation.  They were English and were accompanied by her cousin-and-boyfriend, who were also English and visiting.  The wife had been in Chicago since 1997, apart from a brief absence in Switzerland, and always came to this bar because of the music and ambience.  She was surprised at finding other Brits there as it was seldom found by tourists.

 

When we left the bar, we bumped into this group again as hubby was trying to walk in front of the speeding traffic.  We made sure that they safely got into a taxi then walked back to our hotel, on the way admiring the Bloomingdale’s that seems to be a converted church.  We finally hit bed around 2:00am and slept soundly …