The Weekend Edition: A Weekend in Chicago

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It has become a bit of an annual trip for us in January to take a weekend trip to Chicago and mix friends, shopping, and food.  We have gotten pretty good at this, and we made a few great stops to recommend to the world.  First, here are the necessary ingredients to a great weekend in Chicago:

1. A fun and funky hotel for your stay
2. Some shopping on and around Michigan Ave.
3. A delicious restaurant for dinner
4. A purely Chicago brunch joint on your way out of town

We accomplished all of this and more!  Let me share my favorite spots from this weekend.

Hotel: Hotel Monaco, Chicago
I love to stay at Kimpton hotels in general, and Hotel Monaco in particular.  The décor is colorful and worldly, the entire staff is so friendly, and as a pet-friendly hotel, they lovingly provide me with a goldfish during my stay as a travel pet.  Meet Sven, my pal fish for the weekend:

I also love that I get to raid the mini bar with a free $10, drink wine during the daily happy hour in the lobby, and lounge around in my animal print robe.  The Monaco always has great rates during these slow weeks of January, and it is an awesome value.


Shopping: Michigan Avenue and the surrounding area
I make sure to do two things to prioritize my shopping time: I only go to stores that I can't shop at near home, and I make sure that I don't stay in one place for too long so that the hubs doesn't get too bored.

Dinner: Eataly, Chicago
The Chicago location of Eataly (a play on the word Italy) opened recently and has been incredibly busy ever since.  It is an all-things-Italian marketplace/restaurants/café/bar.  And it. is. INCREDIBLE.

The restaurants are so busy, you need to go put your name in and expect to wait 90 to 120 minutes.  While you wait, you can get a coffee, wine or beer, some prosciutto and fresh mozzarella, or buy anything from pasta to fresh meat and fish, cheeses and meats that you've never heard of, chocolates, or cooking utensils.  We ate at the pizza and pasta restaurant area, and everything we ate was incredible.  I have an entirely new outlook on what pasta should be, and I can't wait to experiment with my new found pasta respect.

Make sure you save room for dessert because the night would not be complete without a delicious LavAzza coffee and a gelato, artisan dessert, or crepe from the Nutella bar.  I bought a giant bag of beautiful Italian treasures that I have never seen before, and the next week will continue my culinary adventures.  Eataly serves as dinner and entertainment for a full night out.

Via Eataly

Brunch: Eleven City Diner
This cute, totally Chicago-type restaurant feels like a hybrid between an old school diner and a Jewish delicatessen.  And the food is impeccable. 

The challah french toast is a great staple to the menu, and the Bad A** breakfast sandwich was a perfect breakfast sandwich with perfect potatoes.  Intelligentsia coffee tops off the menu with love. While there are a lot of fantastic brunch restaurants in the city, this one continues to deliver every time I am there.

Bonus!
Mariano's Fresh Market, Halsted and Monroe
Even though we were so full from breakfast, we still managed to buy a ridiculous amount of fresh food.  Why go grocery shopping anywhere else when you can go buy lots of deli salads and pot pies, topped off with delicious gelato, oysters, fresh sushi, or bulk spices in the same place?

This was my own suggestion for a weekend in Chicago, but there are lots of other great weekend ideas for the taking!  If you need an idea starter, check out a book like this for your path of travel:
The New York Times - 36 Hours

True confessions of the retail world, and please, don't be that guy.

I have a feeling that y'all have already started your holiday shopping, so this is my public service announcement for you.  As a veteran of the retail store battle ground, I am here to share some knowledge for you.  This is not knowledge about where to get a good deal, or how to get what you want this holiday season; there are a million other sources for that.  This is a snapshot from the other side - the retail workers.

While you are out shopping for Christmas gifts this year, might I suggest this year you do your best to take care of the people helping you shop?  Whatever craziness you are feeling for the holiday season, I promise you, yelling at the lady at the service counter won't help, and her day will be worse with the six other people who yelled too.

If I were to give you my best advice on being a shopper that doesn't make it into our dinner conversation, here it is:

Smile, make eye contact, and say, "Thank you."
Yes, this sounds oddly similar to what you might expect from retail employees, but we are people too.  And wouldn't it be nice for you to make someone else's day better too?  Try it, it's fun even when you aren't getting paid for it.  Trust me, you would stand out above the rest.

Don't get mad at me when there aren't any more PS4s on December 23rd.
Often the person trying to assist you in the store is not directly responsible for the outage of a product.  Please don't be mean about it.  Unless you want me to personally knit you a replica, it is out of my hands.

"Since it didn't ring up it must be free."
Oh boy.

[me] "Is there something I can help you find?" [you] "Yeah, my wife!" or "Yeah, a million bucks!"
That's a cute joke and all, but literally you are the 12th person to say that to me today.  I suggest coming up with something much more entertaining for us, like "I'm looking for heavy rope, black garbage bags, and a metal shovel," or "just  your beautiful smile," or start up a Hall & Oates song as a flash mob.  Something, anything.

Black Friday - do you really need that $6 coffee maker?
Whatever you are looking for on Black Friday, please do so with the mentality of fun and not trampling.  We don't want to have to budget for medical triage tents next year.  That $6 coffee maker will probably leak in 3 months anyways.

This is such an exciting time of year, but remember just because you won't see that person again doesn't mean they won't remember you.  I still remember all of the people who crazy yelled at me, so don't be that guy who lives on in our war stories.  If you go in with the mindset of having fun and bringing cheer to the people around you, I promise you will feel better than if you went in with a 'tude.