Celebrity connection

When I mentioned that I was going to be at a film festival, it was not out of the ordinary to be asked if I would be meeting any celebrities. The event that I attended does make it easier to bump into them, but it's not like I go out of my way to make such encounters happen. Plus, while these may be recognizable folks, they aren't always people whose names people know. I've met Robert Forster at it, for instance, and a couple directors. I've stood in line next to Michelle Monaghan for concessions and John Malkovich for coffee.

One of the filmmaker guests at this year's event was an actress with whom I share an alma mater. I'll wager you may not know her name, but you probably recognize her from one of her roles in films, episodic TV, or your pick of I Love the (name your decade) VH1 programs.

I happened to be wearing a polo shirt with the school's name on it one of the days. After the last film of that day I came around the lobby's corner to meet up with some fellow critics for a night on the town. It turns out that one of them was going to introduce me to her, but it wasn't necessary as she and her director noticed what my shirt said and asked if I went there. Thus I ended up entering into a brief conversation with her.

The weird thing was that by this point we'd shifted outside the theater's front doors and were talking while a photographer was standing several steps away trying to get pictures. I imagine it was for the local newspaper, or maybe it was for the festival. Anyway, it was slightly strange to be speaking to her while that was going on. We'd also be interrupted periodically by those who wanted to get their picture taken with her.

It was a nice chat, even if I came clean to say that I wasn't crazy about the film she was in that played at the festival. (She asked and didn't seem put off by my trying to be tactful answer.) She graduated two springs before I started attending the school in the fall, so we were never there at the same time. (I initially guessed our years there might have briefly overlapped.)

From there it was time for the group to make its way to a nearby bar for karaoke. This actress and a couple of the other filmmakers tagged along. This festival in particular builds a sense of community that I doubt you get at much larger events, so the social intermingling of press, filmmakers, and whoever else is in the know isn't out of the ordinary.

Our group pretty much took over the bar, although there were some locals around when we happened to descend on this place. I had no intention of singing anything and stuck to it, and anyway, I might have been gone by the time my selection would have reached. (I stayed until nearly 2 a.m., and some people had yet to have their names called.) The actress in question did take her turn on the mic, as did the other filmmakers in attendance. I wouldn't be surprised if it's on YouTube, but I haven't found it.

So, there you have it, a little bit of my Hollywood hobnobbing in central Illinois.

Let the good times roll

No photos of cars for today, which breaks a two day streak. In fact, there's not really anything I have to say other than what one might put on a post card. So...

Having a good time. See you soon.

Gotta go back in time

It was an even later Friday evening--and one that was spent writing in earnest--so I forgot to post here. So why don't I hop into this car, seen near the event I'm attending, and go back in time?

See, I've posted on Friday now.

Packed to the gills

Dear readers, I do have tales to tell of my evening here, but they will have to wait until another night when I have time to do them justice. I've not done a lot of socializing while at this event in past years, but going to tonight's shindig gives me celebrity interaction and festival party anecdotes.

In the meantime, here's a car I spotted nearby. The owner is apparently hoarding all manner of paper. There's room for a driver in the interior, but that's about it.

Lollapalooza

Sunday in Chicago meant heading down to Grant Park for the final day of Lollapalooza. Initially my friend and I talked about going Saturday and Sunday, but I told him that just Sunday was fine with me. I figured that otherwise we'd have no time to catch up and take it easy, particularly the last part. I wouldn't have minded attending the whole thing, but I figured one day would be plenty, especially since it would allow me to catch the band I wanted to see most out of all of the acts playing the festival. Let me say it now: that was the right call.

(If this fountain in the middle of the park looks familiar, I'm told it was in the opening credits to Married with Children. I've not fact checked this, but it seems true.)

On Monday the newspapers reported 240,000 attended the three days of the event. Assuming an even division among the days, that puts 80,000 there Sunday. Needless to say, that doesn't make for the easiest movement from stage to stage. We ended up alternating between the two facing each other and then just staying at the bigger stage in the hope of getting a decent vantage point for the last two acts to play on it.

This is what I mean by a decent vantage point. Oh my, was it a tight squeeze. I'm not claustrophobic, but I felt like I was on the verge of a panic attack or something during the first portion of MGMT's set. Granted, it had already been a long day and it was hot and more people than should have been were pushing their way toward the front. The feeling passed, perhaps due to some hydration, and I was good for the remaining three and a half hours. Seriously, though, there were a lot of people.

Lollapalooza was about music, but the organizers didn't mess around when it came to dining options. Noted Chicago chef Graham Elliot was the festival's culinary director. I ate at the stand for trendy hamburger spot Kuma's Corner. (Side note: I ate at more foodie-approved places in these two days than I probably have in a lifetime. This was not a bad thing.) I went with the Judas Priest burger, which was a massive 10 oz. burger with bacon, bleu cheese dressing, apple, walnuts, and dried cranberries. I did not need to eat the rest of the day.

Being in Grant Park for the festival afforded some nice views of the Chicago skyline, although since I stuck primarily to the Budweiser stage, pictures such as the one above had to be taken by turning around. There was another stage parallel to this one across the way, but negotiating one's way between the two just meant being smack dab in the middle of both. In the end it made more sense to pick a side.

With Blitzen Trapper, Yeasayer (pretty terrific in this setting), MGMT, distantly heard sets by The National and Mutemath, and a sampling of Mumford and Sons (and, accidentally, Switchfoot) out of the way, it was time for the band that had everyone hyped, including me. I wouldn't have minded seeing the reunited Soundgarden all the way at the other end of the park, but I came to see The Arcade Fire. This was just a little different situation than the one other time I've seen them.

Their 90-minute set was marvelous. Arcade Fire play big, majestic rock that is well-suited for a field of tens of thousands to sing along with, and did the crowd ever participate. The band played a lot more from their first LP Funeral than I expected, especially since The Suburbs was released the previous Tuesday, and the audience, myself included, ate it up. The crowd was completely into the performance, but at least where I was it was a much better behaved one than there had been for the previous group.

The night was finished off with "Wake Up", an anthem that would have blown the roof off the place if it had been indoors. Being amid that many people singing every word, especially the opening (and repeated) refrain, was the kind of hair-raising experience you hope to, but rarely get, at a concert. The enthusiasm even carried over as people sang it on the slow path out of the park and picked it up again on the blocked off downtown Chicago streets. My friend said something to the effect that Arcade Fire won the game. There was definitely a celebratory feeling spilling into the streets, as though our team had claimed the championship.

Catching a train back was a slow motion adventure that took about an hour and a half--metropolises!--but yeah, I was still humming with the energy of an exhausting but pretty terrific day of music.

The Windy City

Contrary to conventional wisdom, Columbus is a pretty sizable city. According to this list, it's the 16th biggest by population in the United States. I'm sure it slides down the list when taking the greater metro area into account, but let it be known that it's not a podunk college town, which seems to be the general impression people have of it.

Still, there's an enormous difference between #16 and Chicago's spot at #3, starting with the fact that Chicago has around four times the population of Columbus. Walking up to the street from Millennium Station to find the skyscrapers and elevated train platforms is like stumbling into a whole other scale for a city. It's huge...and I kind of love it.

I was a little intimidated about venturing into Chicago alone and navigating public transportation to meet up with an old friend. It's not that I think myself incapable of doing it or have never done it in a big city. I'm just out of practice...not that I ever really was in practice. Honestly, though, riding the 'L' was some of the most enjoyable parts of the trip. (Exempt from that: piling into a train after the Cubs game and having to stand post-Lollapalooza on the way back to where I was staying.)

I guess I've never seen Chicago that way, so I thrilled at the sights of being up so high among the towering structures and weaving in and out of the grids. You can get some pretty spectacular views of downtown from the train. The expansive perspective drives home how big of a place, vertically and horizontally, you're in. While I don't know that it's where I'd want to be every day--I prize the ease of movement around Columbus, which isn't exactly something Chicago has even with the trains and buses--I do find it enervating to be swallowed by a metropolis from time to time.

When it was time for me to leave, I mentioned to my friend that it felt like my short visit to Chicago had gone so quickly. In part it's because everything was bigger or took longer, thus blowing things out of proportion. After I was picked up, we went to Hot Doug's, a sausage store whose extreme popularity entailed waiting in line for two and a half hours to order. It's a trendy spot for foodies, but for what it's worth, my order--the blue cheese pork sausage with Sir William pear cream and roasted almonds and ribeye steak sausage with black garlic aioli and double crème brie cheese--and a shared basket of duck fat fries were awfully good.

Going to the Gene Siskel Film Center, seeing parts of downtown and my friend's neighborhood on foot, and popping into a large Middle Eastern restaurant later at night also reinforced how packed with options this city is. (Sunday was attending Lollapalooza, which is another enormous thing that I'll hold off writing about until tomorrow.) Forget about being bored in a place like this. How does one control oneself from always being on the go?

With all that time spent waiting and going to places, there was plenty of time to talk, which I hadn't done at length with this friend for years. Nowadays it's a given for childhood friends to still be in close contact when they go their various ways. (This is a development I'm not sure is entirely positive, but that's a topic for another time.) While I stayed in touch with this friend through college and a few years out of it, inevitably we lost track of each other. I last saw him at his wedding in 2002, but that situation didn't present the opportunity for much substantial one-on-one conversation. So, for as exciting and fun as it was to be in Chicago and soak up what it has to offer, it was also very satisfying to catch up with someone I've known since junior high and his wife.

Chicago did things up in a big way, and I certainly enjoyed the magnitude of my experiences there. Still, there's something to be said for one's own small corner, like a late night dinner with friends, to put everything in its proper context.

The Friendly Confines

As a lifelong baseball fan, I'm very familiar with Wrigley Field. The stadium, built in 1914 and home of the Cubs since 1916, is hallowed ground among fans of the sport. The ivy-covered outfield wall, the mostly manually operated scoreboard, day games, and bleacher bums...they're all part of the place's rich lore.

I've seen Wrigley Field countless times on television, but until last Friday I'd never set foot inside it. The strange thing is that after all this time peering into the home of the Cubs via telecasts, looking upon the field from the stands felt like something I'd done hundreds of times before. I guess it was kind of a deja vu moment. Here I am again for the first time.

My dad and I began our journey from the South Bend airport, which is where we picked up the South Shore train. About two and a half hours later we arrived in Millennium Station. Emerging from the train station, it felt like walking onto a movie set with tall buildings towering over us and the tracks and platforms for The 'L' framing some streets. Not entirely sure of which way to go to catch the red line train to the stadium, we followed people in Cubs jerseys based on my assumption that they were probably going the way we needed to be headed.

Within another fifteen or twenty minutes we walked out of the next station, turned to our left, and there was Wrigley. As you would expect, plenty of people were congregated outside the stadium, whether they were taking in the sights or hawking tickets and other items. And this was two hours before the game's first pitch.

If I'd been better prepared, I might have had a better idea of where we'd eat. Instead we popped into a pizza place across the street from the stadium and each got a single huge slice and pop for $5. As far as cheap, unpretentious eats by a ballpark go, this got the job done and was more localized than the Subway my dad initially suggested. Plus, I suppose it conveyed the big city experience and the neighborhood one that's unique to Wrigley.

Once inside the differences between it and pretty much any other stadium one will visit were immediately apparent. The concourses and ramps aren't as big. There are few concession and restroom facilities in the upper deck. All video highlights and replays must be viewed on monitors hanging in the stands. The seats themselves are a little narrower than those found in modern stadiums. Oh, and there are a fair number of columns to obstruct views. (I thought I'd be smart and buy tickets on the end of the row, which turns out to be where columns are placed. The two seats next to us were empty, so we didn't have to put up with a severely obstructed angle.)

Even without many of the modern stadium amenities, I really enjoyed being in this cozy little ballpark. All I really missed was being able to see replays and the radar gun readout. I appreciated the lack of elements that try to make a ball game the full entertainment experience. Who needs t-shirt cannons, dancing mascots and prize patrols, loud music, kiss cams, and the like when the game itself will do? I'm not completely opposed to all that other stuff, but the sheer volume of it becomes suffocating and detracts from what you are, in theory, there to see.

Wrigley's charms are from another era, and it benefits from its seats being mostly filled with enthusiastic fans. Let's not get carried away in praise of the place, though. Its specialness comes from being one of the last remaining old-time ballparks, one where you feel like you're seeing a game more or less the way that your grandparents and before might have taken one in. (My dad, who was also attending a game there for the first time, mentioned that it reminded him of the long-gone Crosley Field.)

When we arrived up top to get to our seats, the usher told us that we were free to wander around. Other than getting different perspectives on the field, there wasn't much else to see. The small patio that is underneath and behind the press box affords the opportunity to gaze out at the city and the neighborhood. A concession area with slightly more offerings than the small stands near the seats down the lines is about the only other draw.

Still, you get the sense that the team and its employees know what they have in this nearly century-old stadium even when considering its inconveniences. The spot has seen plenty of Cubs losing--which it also did on this day, as my visiting Reds won--yet its ability to function as a time machine for however much longer means more to the people walking through the turnstiles than any wins or snazzy updates to the yard could ever provide.

Sunday in the park

The majority of today was spent at Lollapalooza in Chicago's Grant Park. Between departing for the show and getting back to my friend's place, twelve hours were spent mostly on my feet. So yeah, I'm wiped out.

I've had a good time during my whirlwind weekend in Chicago. More details on the blog will have to wait until I don't feel like collapsing.

Sent from my iPhone

In the big city

Today in Chicago:

-Reunited with a friend I've known since junior high and whom I last saw several years ago at his wedding.

-Waited in line for about two and a half hours to eat gourmet sausages and duck fat fries at Hot Doug's. I've included a photo of part of the menu above, assuming it works out through the submission method I'm using. The wait didn't seem that long since there was plenty to talk about and the weather is fairly mild for this time of year.

-Visited the Gene Siskel Film Center to see a re-released classic that is coincidentally getting its only Columbus screenings this weekend.

-Saw a decent bit of the city by train and on foot.

It has been a pretty great day. Now to get some rest for what should be a jam-packed Sunday.

Sent from my iPhone

End of the line

The good news:

-I eliminated the virus from my computer, even though it required staying up a lot later than I intended.

-The Reds won 3-0 over the Chicago Cubs as my dad and I visited Wrigley Field for the first time.

The bad news:

-That's all I have time for today. I'd like to spend more time to write about the Wrigley experience, but I need to do some packing to go back to Chicago first thing in the morning. (We took the two and a half hour train ride to the Windy City and came back. I'm hopping back on it and meeting up with an old friend in Chi-town tomorrow.)

Manning the needles

I've been hard at work for most of my waking hours on something that needed to be done a long time ago, so today I'm only able to provide a link and spare a stray thought or two.

Why, look, it's an article about men who knit in the Champaign-Urbana, Illinois area. I'd have to check, but I'm pretty sure I've been to both LYS locations mentioned in the article. Other than the local angle, it's a prototypical story that weeds out the condescension that creeps in sometimes.

And of course I had to laugh at this:

"It's not the kind of thing you're going to be as open about ... as women are," Brechin said.

Whoever would have such an attitude?

Checking out

Random thoughts from the road...

-The hotel room alarm clock that does not allow the guest to change the time and date, even when both are wrong, and which the management does not know how to make correct has to say something about modern life.

-The clocks at Red Roof Inn must run ten minutes faster than the rest of the world's. They've been (and are) my hotel of choice during film festivals, and I don't really have any complaints. That said, I've been pushing it regarding how much sleep I can get, so wake up calls that come ten minutes early add insult to injury.

-Note to self: turning on the fan at night helps cover up the sounds of cars on the nearby interstate.

-Maybe it's more the exhaustion that comes from attending the film festival, but I swear I sleep harder in a hotel than I do at home. That is, when I'm not waking up every half hour as morning approaches because I'm afraid I'll sleep in late.

-Getting up early to write festival coverage rather than staying up late to do it makes a lot more sense, at least at the event I just left.

Hide and go seek

This morning I had a few panicked minutes when I could not find my wallet. For the life of me I didn't know why it wasn't in the pants I wore the day before. I remembered when and where I had last taken it out, but it should have gone right back in the pocket.

Ordinarily losing one's wallet would not be a good thing, but seeing as I am three hundred miles from home, the prospect of having no money and no identification was even more problematic.

While I searched in the hotel room, where I was certain the wallet had to be, I started going over scenarios for what I could do if I was unable to locate it. Check with lost and found at the theater even if I seriously doubt the wallet fell out there. A branch of my bank is across the street from the theater, so perhaps they can give me a hand if I can't locate it. (My biggest concerns were being able to eat and having enough gas to get home.)

It turns out that my wallet had slipped out of the pants pocket and among other clothes in the suitcase. Being able to come up with an alternate plan was somewhat reassuring. I'm just glad I didn't have to implement it.

Up top

Another festival day, another push to write my coverage elsewhere and find a few hours for some sleep. I'd really hoped to be getting more rest than I am, but I am getting the "work" done. I'm sort of proud of that accomplishment even if the text is banged out against a nonexistent but internal deadline and may or may not be worthwhile.

I thought I'd share the picture above to provide an idea of where I'm spending a significant portion of these five days. I'm one of those festivalgoers lurking in the balcony. I think this level provides a superior viewing experience, but there's also something of an Upstairs, Downstairs self-selecting quality that I can't exactly put my finger on to describe.

The movies have been good--mostly--and the weather has been really pleasant. It's nice to think that spring may finally be here and the heavier coats can be put away for awhile when I return home.

Quick hits

I did not get enough sleep last night and probably won't this evening, so today's entry from the road will be brief.

I've been vigilant in keeping my eyes searching for the stop lights posted at the sides of the road. I haven't run any red lights. Believe me, there are times it takes my full powers of concentration to look for them because I don't encounter them on a daily basis.

Due to Twitter and my desire to post text and photo updates via my phone, I have slowly become aware of all the things it can do. Prior to this I was lucky to have added people to the address book.

I did see someone knitting at the film festival audience today. I might have struck up a conversation except she was working on a fun fur scarf. I'm not being a snob. (Well, at least not in this instance.) I just don't have anything to say regarding that particular yarn.

Typing as fast as I can

I'm coming to you from Champaign, Illinois while I attend a film festival, so if you're looking for substance over the next few days, your likely bet for it is at my film site or, quite possibly, on Twitter. Those in-the-know or ingenious enough will know where to find these things. (Yes, my effort to compartmentalize myself and keep this site separate remains.)

I awoke around 7:00 a.m., hit the road around 8:10, and arrived two states west four and a half hours later. (No stops!) I arrived in town with plenty of time and even checked into the hotel before noon, if you can believe it. There was no local yarn shop visiting this year, although I know where to find them and the chain stores if necessary. One of the nice things about having come to this event for several years in a row is that I have a reasonably good handle on where things are around town. Plus, there's no stress when it comes to determining when to be at places or where to park.

There is one thing, though, that preoccupies my thoughts while I'm behind the wheel. Look extra hard for the stop lights! Many of them in downtown are to the side of the road and not above and in the middle. If I don't remind myself of this constantly, I swear I'd plow right through them as oblivious as can be.

So far the weather is gorgeous, at least while the sun is out. (It turns pretty chilly after dark.) It might seem silly to care what the weather is like since I'll be inside watching movies, although not in as high of numbers as I did in Cleveland. Traditionally the weather has been pretty lousy during this event. One year my shoes were still soaked the next morning after standing in line to enter the theater the previous night.

Everything's off to a good start here. Now to turn in for some precious sleep.

An Illini yarn

Now that I'm home and not writing when on the verge of collapsing into bed, I can go back to my Champaign-Urbana yarn store adventures on Wednesday.

Via Ravelry I learned that a new yarn shop opened in town since I was last here, so I was determined to check out Klose Knit in Urbana. It took a couple phone calls to find exactly where it is--figuring out where Champaign ends and Urbana begins is kind of unclear to this visitor--but the helpful employee directed me there.

As you know, it's uncommon for me to buy yarn without having projects in mind for it. I intended to buy some cotton for a ballband dishcloth in University of Illinois colors, but they didn't really have the right orange or blue. The employee told me that there wasn't any sense in using the nicer stuff for something like a dishcloth anyway. Makes sense. I had a nice chat with the employee and enjoyed seeing the shop but left empty-handed.

At this point it was time to hit the local chain stores to find orange and blue Sugar'n Cream for the dishcloth. I should mention that the night before coming here I stopped at a Jo-Ann's in Columbus, which had the orange but not the blue, and a Hobby Lobby, which carried blue but no orange. I didn't buy from either because I figured I'd have no problems finding Illinois colors in the university's backyard.

A Jo-Ann's was near my hotel, so I assumed it would handle my Sugar'n Cream dishcloth needs. Not quite. They had orange but no blue. Rather than make the same mistake twice, I bought the cotton and set out for Michael's. They also had orange but not the dark blue I needed. Who would have thought that color would prove to be harder to find? The afternoon was quickly getting away from me, so I decided to peruse the yarn aisles at the nearby Meijer. Thankfully they had the blue I needed--but not the already purchased orange--which meant I didn't have to hit up a Hancock Fabrics, assuming it's still open, or the LYS I visited last year.

Lesson learned: buy it where you find it rather than hoping to make a single location purchase.

Road photos

Knowing full well that I'd have no time to write tonight, I snapped some pictures around town today. I'll get home Sunday evening, so something approaching normal content ought to return then.

Apparently this is the best road in the area for ridin' the storm out.

I suppose Champaign-Urbana is no different from any college towns with large schools. Yes, the fire hydrants are a U of I orange.

Out of time

Quick hits before getting much-needed sleep after a full day at the film festival:

I started knitting a ballband dishcloth in the University of Illinois colors today. It's looking really sharp, if I do say so myself. Since working with two balls of cotton can take up some space, I'm limiting myself to how much I knit at my seat so that it isn't a hassle for me or anyone else. If the weather is nice in the morning, I hope to knit outside while waiting in line to enter the theater for the day.

I've been largely absent on Ravelry over the last month or two because of being busy with everything else, but I did find a thread about this film festival on there. Today I spotted a fellow Raveler and dropped by to say hello. She'd said where she usually sits and what her husband looks like, so it wasn't too hard to find the person who met these criteria. And the knitting (or crocheting) helped too.

Saturday is going to be even more brutal in regard to when I crawl back to the hotel to get a few winks for the night, so I fear this is the best I'll be able to muster here tomorrow too.

Another quick one

Knitting and blogging time are in short supply, so for today's entry I present two photos taken in Champaign-Urbana. I can't tell where one city ends and the other begins, thus the hyphen.

As usual, updates pertaining to the reason why I'm here are on my other site. Since I'm planning to skip the panel discussion in the morning, perhaps I can get a head start on a legitimate entry over here during some of that time.