Number 47: Wear a feather boa and movie star glasses to the grocery store -- Or a Mustache Around A Street Festival

Ah... the street fest. The quintessential must-do for every Chicagoan. Starting in early April, we begin buying oversized mugs guarenteed to get us one dollar off our next refill, making excuses for why we're not paying the "suggested donation" at the gate, and taking pictures of us acceptably drinking in public.

Good times, guys.

But not all street fests are created equal. And so, ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce... Taco Fest. I'll start off by saying that one of the particular perks of this fest is that we had to do zero traveling as it was right at the end of our street. In fact, it screwed up my run and my errands on Saturday afternoon. But Sunday, Taco Fest redeemed itself. (And it had nothing to do with the tacos.)

Before acquired any food or beverage, we acquired some mustaches for participating on THIS:

Yep, that is literally a mustache ride. Gross name? Sure. Fun? You betcha.

Then came the funner part. (Yep, I went there.) Wearing the staches. I'm not sure when the stache became a fashion statement, but we rocked the hell out of them on Sunday afternoon. From group shot...

to acting natural...

to taking care of business...

we sported staches everywhere. And apparently people noticed.

My favorite conversation?
Guy sitting on patio at Mystic Celt: Oh man - did you lose a bet or something?
Me: Nope. Why?
Guy: You know... (Gestures to the stache.)
Me: I really don't. (Walks away. End scene.)

So, the mustaches had nothing to do with Taco Fest but they did help promote what is my new favorite pumpkin beer - the Jack-O-Traveler. I'm actually surprised I've never heard of this company before since they are Vermont based, but I'm really glad I discovered them. It was like drinking a piece of pumpkin bread. AKA Heaven. Anyway, I understood the staches... what I really didn't get was the appearance of A CAMEL at Taco Fest. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but when I see a camel, I think Mediterranean food... not Mexican. But there it was in all its camel glory.

And while I avoided climbing up there, I thought it would still be a good time to have my picture taken with said camel. You know, until it was hungry since no one probably fed it any tacos and it decided to eat my hair. But hey, no harm, no fowl... er... dromedary.

Here are the things I learned about sporting a stache.

- I have no shame when it comes to wearing ridiculous things in public. And I love it.
- Drinking is pretty easy while wearing a stache. Eating, however is HARD! How do you do it, men?! I had to take mine off to eat my tacos. My delicious duck tacos.
- After awhile, you get used to the stares. (This is me assuming all staches get stares, not just mine.)
- And... this. While photos of staches are hilarious, photobombing will always be funnier.

 

You stay classy, Chicago. Lord knows we're not.

Number 65b: Remember the "a la mode" - A Summer Reflection

 Hey BlogLand... it's me. Erika. You may not remember me, but I'm the the girl whose life you read about when you visit this site. And sometimes that girl takes stupidly long hiatuses from posting. I'm sorry that I've left you hanging. Today marks a solid four months without a post. You're probably wondering what I've been up to. Well, friends, it's been a heck of a summer. (Hence the hiatus.) If we're Facebook friends you've probably noticed that I spent a lot of my summer holding red solo cups (cough, Mom, cough cough). That's because summer in Chicago is hot and I understand the importance of routine hydration. Glad we got that out of the way.

Well, since I posted last, I completed my first ever half-marathon (in 2 hours and 6 minutes), hydrated, spent two weeks traveling the East Coast, had some visitors, hydrated some more , saw some plays, and generally lived up that infamous "Chicago summer." You know, hydrating. And I made some important self-discoveries. (I know, I sound insanely productive.)

Here's a fun fact about me: I love watching tv sitcoms about solid groups of friends. Whether it's kicking back at Monica and Rachel's or sitting at the regular booth at MacLaren's or (as of late) playing poker at PJ's with the boys -  we take on these friends as if they are our own. I find myself saying things like, "I wish I could be friends with Schmidt." "Wouldn't it be fun if we could do that every night?"

But last month, as I walked away from a going away party for one my best friends, I realized that I actually do have THAT. We have our routines and our "spots" and our inside jokes. In every group, we each play our roles. We understand the dynamics of putting together certain groups of people. Recently, someone said to me, "I love meeting your friends - everyone is so nice and is always having fun." I'm pretty proud of that. I'd like to think that at 26, I'm choosing to surround myself with good people. People that I love and want to be around. People who bring out the best in me, understand the worst parts about me, and are still there for me when I have a colossal break down.

I don't have a large extended family and as a result I've made my friends a part of my family. Now that I'm far away from my family, this has become even more important to me. Whether it's coordinating a Skype date between four different time zones with my college friends or heading to a show to support new friends or answering that late night phone call because you know something isn't quite right, being a good friend is important to me.

An old boyfriend once commented how he was amazed that I have so many friends that I keep in close contact with. He wondered how I made time for them all. And how I was able to keep that many people close to me. "I make time," was my response. I've lived here for almost a year and half now, and I've gone from loving it, to wondering if I was doing the right thing, to being an absolute mess, to standing on solid ground. And it is the people I've surrounded myself with that even out the footing.

I know a lot of you (especially those in my age set) probably read this article yesterday. It made some interesting points, and gave me some stuff to think about, sure. But after I finished it, I got to thinking. I'm not unhappy. Things aren't perfect. I've cried more than once about the imperfections in the last month. But things will never be perfect. And, I mean, did you read the start of this blog? I just told you that I haven't blogged in four months because I've been having too much fun. I've been going on auditions and planning parties and discovering that I have friends that I can do nothing with. Because those are the best kind, the kind you can just sit next to on a couch with no movie on and no agenda, and just be with for hours on end. So what is there to be unhappy about? I've described myself as always striving to be the person in the room having the best time.

And sure, I probably could have a few more bucks in my savings account, and could spend some extra time per week at the gym, but life is out there to be lived. And so far, things are exactly at expectation level. So here we are, first post back, waxing on about happiness levels. I've got to go -- I've got to plan the side dish I'm bringing to supper club tonight and then figure out what I'm serving at this weekend's party. With my friends. Where I'll be having the best time.

Thanks for reading, BlogLand. I'm excited to be back in the game. See ya soon.
xoxo,
E