New Year's in Chicago

Dispatches from the Road, Cont.

If a true Minnesotan heads north for their winter vacation (see earlier post), what qualifies for runner-up status?

Heading to Chicago.

With an air temp of about 25 degrees today, my 7 year-old noted (correctly) that "it's a lot warmer here than Minneapolis."

Kowalski vs. Anderson

The other thing you notice as a Minnesotan in Chicago is that people here seem a lot burlier.

Best guess: it's got to do with all the surnames that end with "ski" and "cik" rather than "son" and "sen."

In other words, more Kowalski's, fewer Anderson's.

Other quick observations:

--the two iconic Chicago skyscrapers, the John Hancock and Sears Tower (now Willis) are now joined by a third: the Trump Tower (given all the variants, "a Trump Tower" would be more accurate).

At 90-plus stories and with a strikingly small footprint, it's hard to miss between the other two.

--At first glance, the elaborate, block-long awning covering the steps in front of The Field Museum looks like an architectural flourish, or maybe some sort of "red carpet" greeting. Once you're underneath, you realize what it's really about: keeping the steps ice-free.

--Lots of residential Chicago looks like the area around 36th & Portland in South Minneapolis: block after block of classic, pre-war brick apartment buildings. Solid and gritty, not sexy -- in keeping with "the city of broad shoulders," I suppose.

As a native Minnesotan who's also lived in Manhattan, Chicago has always struck me as a hybrid of the two.

By contrast, my native New Yorker wife's take on Chicago is that it's much more like Minneapolis than Manhattan..

"You say to-mate-o, I say to-mah-toe" . . .