Hopper and Winslow at the Art Institute - Place 37

We recently went to the Art Institute to view the Edward Hopper and Winslow Homer exhibits and they did not disappoint! Perhaps the most interesting thing we discovered was that Hopper's work, for all its realism, has many interesting surreal aspects. For example, in his famous "Nighthawks" painting, shown at left, there are no entrances or exits to the diner -- it's basically a self-contained, hermetically sealed space. We both liked his oils much better than his watercolors -- even though the watercolors focussed largely on venues in Kate's native New England. Great show -- but it was huge and we were so wiped out by the end of it that we didn't even make it to the gift shop afterwards to look at the books!

First Cubs Game of the Season - Performance 16

Prior to heading out to Las Vegas (see posting below), Susan took in her first Cubs game of the season with several of the girls. Here's a picture of us enjoying the friendly confines of Wrigley Field on a day when the Cubs beat the Pirates, who they have now swept twice already this year! Although they lost a close one yesterday, they are still in first place and have been hitting a ton. It's too soon to say anything out loud yet, but you know everyone in the city is already dreaming about October!

Hold em in Vegas - Experience 35

There's been so much going on that we've hardly had a moment to talk about it here in the blog. We'll be remedying that in the next several days. Most recently, Susan took a trip to Las Vegas with several of the girls to test out her Texas Hold Em skills in a bigger venue. She played in three tournaments and was able to break into the money in one of them, placing third! In the tournaments she did not cash in she was competitive, but largely card dead. So, she came away feeling that she definitely could compete at this level. Anyone want to join her at the World Series of Poker's Women's Touranment in June?

Fixx Coffee house - Place 36; The Year My Parents Went on Vacation - Movie 27

Weekend before last ushered in some beautiful weather and we decided to spend all day Saturday outside our apartment. We started off by walking over the the Fixx Coffee House, a locally owned coffee shop in our neighborhood. There were few people there that early on Saturday morning, so it turned out to be a great space for some peaceful reading. At about 11:30 a lot more people started showing up so we headed off to Penny's Noodle Shop for lunch, probably our favorite Thai restaurant here in Chicago, just a few blocks further down on Diversey and Sheffield. From there we went shopping down on Clark Street, hanging out in various bookstores and picking up a new pair of gym shoes for the triathlon training. In the late afternoon we stopped in at the Landmark Theatres to see a very quiet but compelling movie, The Year My Parents Went on Vacation. This is a Brazilian film set in the dictatorship period in 1970, the year that Brazil also won the World Cup (in soccer) led by the great Pele. This film chronicles a boy's coming of age during that time when his secular leftist parents are forced underground ("on vacation") and he must find his place the jewish community of his grandfather, who passes away upon his arrival. After the movie, we walked up to Mama Desta's Red Sea Ethiopian Restaurant (blogged here earlier) for an excellent dinner, and then finally made our way home, exhausted but happy with our day trip around the neighborhood.

Queer Exclusions at CHM - Performance 15; The Closet - Place 35

Last week we met up with our friend Karen to hear a lecture on Queer Exclusions: Sexuality and U.S. Citizenship at the Chicago History Museum, given by Siobhan Sommerville of English Department at the University of Illinois. Sommerville wrote a great book called Queering the Color Line a few years back, and is now at work on queering citizenship. We were expected a small crowd of maybe 50 or so people, so you can imagine how surprised we were to walk into a sold out room of 450! Her talk was part of the "Out at CHM" series. Famed transgender activist Susan Stryker is the next speaker in the series so stay tuned. She has a new film out that will be shown the Sunday before her talk.

After the talk we went out to eat at Adesso, an Italian place on Broadway in Boystown, and then to The Closet, a gay bar across the street for nightcap. A DJ in there was trying to get people to do Karioke, but we escaped unscathed!

yo yo ma / Chicago Symphony - Performances 13 and 14

The week before I went to San Diego I saw two great perfomances at Symphony Hall here in Chicago. First, I went with my friend Karen to listen to Yo Yo Ma play Bach and he was truly amazing. The house was packed and we were way up in the "cheap" seats, but the sound was so great - it was like we were right there next to him. I'm glad we had the opportunity to see him play solo rather than with the whole symphony - it was quite dramatic. Later in the week I went with Kate's step-father Ted to hear the CSO and they were also marvelous, playing Verdi, St. Soens, and Strauss, again to a packed house. We had much better seats for this show and were treated to a lecture about Strauss before the event in which I learned just how gendered classical music can be!

Surfing in San Diego - Experience 34

I was in San Diego last week for a political science convention in which I was particpating in an all day feminist theory workshop, presenting a paper on YouTube versions of the Founding Fathers, and serving as a discussant for a panel of law as a vehicle of redress and reform. Amidst all of that, I was able to get away for a few hours to try out surfing with my feminist theory friends Hawley and Cricket. They had both surfed before and very graciously explained to me what was required while we were still on dry land. It turned out to be enormously fun (as you can tell from the pictures -- how happy do we look?), but also very difficult! I was not able to get up on my feet, but did enjoy riding the huge waves in while on my belly and knees on the board. (Once I had a bit of a bad spill I lost a little bit of my nerve for standing up). It was so much fun that we are already plotting what our next time-out activity will be at the conference next year! Don't you think that wetsuits should be required attire at the conference next year?