A Perfect Purple Birthday Weekend

Kelly turned 28 today. I've only known her for about 8 months, but damn, she gets better looking every year! Anyway, after our ritual hug and kiss upon my arrival to her apartment, I presented her with a single rose, a card, and a Chai latte from Caribou. We spent the remainder of the rainy morning looking at apartments, since her lease at International Village is up on October 31 and they raised the rent by $125. HELLL NO!

The first appointment was at the Berkshires of Glen Ellyn. These apartments weren't bad, we agreed, but they just didn't have that special something which says "You're home." Next up was Avalon Lakeside in Wheaton. Although these apartments are just a couple of blocks from the Berkshires, we, for some reason, and unknowingly, drove in a long-distance circle to get there. It was quite funny actually!

The Avalon Apartments were very nice, and stocked with trees. Danielle, the woman showing us the property, seemed like a straight shooter. Across the street from these apartments is a soil conservation area. A sign? Hmm, it must have been, because after seeing the crappy motelesque Glen Ellyn Apartments with the scary loiterer (HELLL NO!), Kelly decided on Avalon Lakeside as her new place of residence. "First Time" by Lifehouse and "Fast As You Can" by Fiona Apple both played in the leasing office when she signed.

On our lunch break at Jimmy Johns—where Kelly had made her decision about Avalon—a guy dropped a $20 bill, and I, being the honest dude that I am, gave it back to him. Another cool thing was our visit to my former employer, Willowbrook Wildlife Center, to take a look around. We made our way through the inside then went outside where even more caged animals are; the ones no longer suited for life in the wild.

Later that evening we went downtown and saw "The Color Purple" at the Cadillac Palace Theatre. Although we spent a ridiculous $13 to park in a lot, we almost paid $28 at the parking garage right next to it. HELLL NO. Before the show we had a lovely dinner at 312 Chicago, where we split Gnocchi and where my Caesar salad had a smelly fish corpse in it. The waiter said that the salads come that way. I must have scowled. Fish in a Caesar salad? HELLL NO x 2!

The show was extremely good though, with wonderful performances from the entire cast.

The next morning I went with Kelly to Christ the King church. We went out for breakfast afterwards at Simon's Restaurant (1 star for Kelly's banana pancakes, being that they were merely pancakes with cut bananas dropped on top). Then we went our separate ways for a few hours.

Later that night Kelly came over to my place and we made the Northwest Chicken Salad from our Cooking For Two cookbook. We also watched Before Sunrise and Mystic Pizza. After that, sleepy time.

The next day we watched the sequel to Before Sunrise, aptly titled Before Sunset. We ate muffins for breakfast, Tropical Turkey salad sandwiches for lunch, and stuffed pizza from Papa Savario's for dinner. During the pizza we watched The Notebook. After that we read poetry, talked politics, then went to bed.

It was a wonderful three-day weekend!