103 floors of nothing but air 07/06

I left St. Louis in the morning and headed straight for Chicago. Turns out the only thing between st louis and Chicago is corn. A few hundred miles worth, on either side of the road. Made me constantly think of kidd kraddick saying “EAT SOME CORN!”

Parking is ridiculous. Sears tower wanted 31 dollars each for more than 6 hours for my car and my trailer. Knowing there had to be something at least less outrageous if not cheap close by, I went on the prowl. 7 parking garages and some fancy backwards maneuvering on my part, I found a flat lot a block from the sears tower. The attendant liked my camper and said he wouldn’t charge me for it because it was so cool. Bonus number 1. Bonus number 2 was that it was past 3, which meant the rate went down from 17 dollars to 10 dollars.

So from 62 dollars in one place, to right down the block was 10. Great deal.

Anyway, I went to the sears tower, stood in multiple versions of the same line, but it was pretty cool. 15 dollars seemed a bit heavy for admission to the sky deck, but once I got up there I didn’t really worry about it. I tried the new glass floor extension they have which is a glass room that extends 4 feet past the main building so you can look straight down 103 floors. That was a lot of fun.

I then walked from there to the beach, which had to have been at least a mile. I walked up and down Michigan street, where all the “happenin” stuff was supposed to go down, but since it was Monday, nothing was going on. I walked back to my car and set my destination for the suburbs to try and find a good internet connection. I found one, and also a man named aldo.

Aldo complimented me on my camper, and we talked for about 2 hours about random stuff. He looked like a truck driver, but said he was on foot. I asked what he did and he said he was an inventor. We talked about politics, toll roads, travelling, and “green” tech. I left the burbs and was on my way to Wisconsin.