Saturday, August 06, 2005

Happiness #3

Living in the city makes me happy.

There's a good energy here in Chicago. The entire lake front belongs to the public. We have Lincoln Park, Grant Park and Millennium Park. I love the theaters and museums (although I don't get to the museums as much as I'd like). I can walk to work. If I take a cab, I can be at work in five minutes, which is handy when I oversleep. And, I don't have to get up at the crack of dawn to catch a train to get to work by 9:00am. If there's something going on at the kids' school, I can go there during the day without having to take a whole day off like my suburban colleagues. We don't have a lawn to mow! We have two big movie theaters within waling distance and all the shopping you can stand. There are tons of great restaurants. Most of the time, the massive amounts of tourists walking around our neighborhood don't bother me.

There is one thing about the tourists that I can't understand - why in the world would anyone wait over an hour for a table at Giordano's? I mean, it's good pizza and all (it's the only kind we order in) but seriously - waiting over sixty minutes to eat pizza? Eating at Hard Rock Cafe or Rain Forest Cafe makes more sense than that. And I really can't understand why anyone would eat at either place with all the other fabulous and interesting places to eat. But I digress.

Other things in the city that make me happy: Good street performers, the great landscaping along Michigan Avenue, Buckingham Fountain. Did I mention that we don't have a lawn to mow? I like that.

4 comments:

Choco Pie said...

I love living in Chicago too. Practically all my friends have moved to the suburbs, but I say never!

SlackerMom said...

Dave and I used to think that we would for sure move to the 'burbs once our kids were old enough to go to school. But as that time approached, we realized that we really wanted to stay in the city. We're really happy with our choice. In Chicago, you can still live in the city and get a more suburban-like house with a yard, too. We happen to like the part about not having to mow the lawn, did I mention that already?

Anonymous said...

I miss Chicago!
We don't have a lawn to mow either, but we have a nice landscaped area outside our apartment and a front stoop/stairs. All the tourists here are on the other side of the Hudson :)

Hayduke said...

We must visit Chicago; you make it sound quite appealing. Growing up on a farm I always dreamt of having a nice house on 20 acres of land; however, after living in a townhouse in Ann Arbor for the last 6 years my dreams have changed. I also love not mowing a lawn, love spending the weekends reading as opposed to landscaping, love riding my bike to work/school. And the big thing is, my kids don’t know the difference this is the only life they’ve known and they love it.