***WARNING: RIDICULOUSLY LONG ENTRY TO FOLLOW***

Well chicago was really fun, except that i lost minnie. i mean, my only real issue with that is, who would want it? it seriously upsets me that yes, i lost $50 and Dads credit card, but think about it. I'm 19. I will never see that billfold again in my entire life. Even when I didn't carry it, it was there in the junk drawer, so you could go through and look at the boys of Dawson's Creek real quick while you were on the telephone or something. And now it's gone, forever. I'm not even exaggerating. I mean, it wouldn't be lost if I never started carrying it. Nothing would be; I started carrying it for the credit card which was practically the only thing in it. My Fitness East pass was in there, and I'm pretty sure those have phone numbers. So someone could have called me. I'm very distraught over this, you don't even know. Ugh. I don't even want to think about it. It just ruins everything. Gosh. Even if it wasn't a big part of my life, clearly I still remembered purchasing it, but I hate when things are lost. It's one thing to know something is buried underneath a pile of clothes on my bedroom floor or that it's been shoved in a shoebox and cleared to the attic or something, but this is lost FOREVER.

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Mary and her friend Elizabeth were very fun to hang out with. We went on an architectual boat tour which was actually pretty neat. One of Mary's favorite buildings was the boeing building. It had a big arch on the top for support because many of the building were built on top of the train and don't have much of a foundation to keep them from collapsing. Then there's the carbon building that was build during prohibition and looks like a bottle of champagne. I like Merchant Mart because it has it's own zip code and the Jeweler building because the tour guide (who was so hilarious he should be a flight attendant for Southwest Airlines) told a cool story about Al Capone.

The tour guide also told us the Signature Lounge, which is the 95th floor of the John Hancock, is higher than the observation deck at Sears. He advised us to go have a drink in the Signature Lounge because a cocktail would cost about the same as admission to the Sears. So we did. Very tourist-y. Mary and Elizabeth call themselves resident tourists. Dave, Hayes, and Zach all went back when we went shopping with Mary and Elizabeth's co-worker. We think Dave and Susan should meet. Could be true love. You just never know.

I didn't get anything shopping. A) We were shopping for men's shoes and B) I couldn't afford anything.

Oh, we went to the Taste on Saturday, after I got into town via train. Isn't that great? That I took a train, I mean. The Taste was awfully crowed and awfully expensive, and the last thing you want when it's hot is a lot of food. Mary got Italian Ice and I got an ice cream.

I really like cities, and Chicago is really neet, but they are so expensive. I'd go back for another weekend before school starts because I had so much fun, but even just buying food I spent more money than I normally do in weeks. Time probably won't allow it, either.

Dad filled you in on what we did Tuesday. I was ready to go home at that point. Just one of those days when you wake up crabby and just can't get out of it. I mean, I really try to tell myself to have a good time. I'm not a fun hater by any means. Still, I'm sure most of those pictures will turn out Washington DC style. I was so mad I didn't have any sunglasses.

Sort of on the subject of cities -
I had been thinking lately that if Mary got an offer in NYC, my junior year I would do a domestic exchange rather than abroad. I think vacationing abroad would be fun, but I really just want to go to New York more than anywhere in the world. Living in Boston or DC wouldn't be bad. Out east. Iowa is lame because they are not a part of any domestic exchange programs. Not the National Student Exchange most state schools are in or even a smaller group with midwestern schools. I suppose I could go to UNI or Iowa State for a semester, but that's dumb.

Anyway, the reason I've been thinking about it all now is because I filled out something for NYU way back when and I got a brochure about a spring semester there. It won't work out because it's more expensive than two years at Iowa, and thats just outrageous. I was researching it online and there was an article in the NYTimes from when the program started saying they initiated it to increase the number of students in the dorms when majority went abroad. I don't know how many applicants they get, but they didn't have big numbers participating. About 30.

It's so difficult to find programs that allow you to participate even if your school is not involved in the program. And if they do, they charge you an arm and a leg more than everyone else. A Washington DC semseter got a lot of hits, but price varies, school to school and then moreso if you're school is nonmember, like Iowa, so they'll send me material. A program in Boston at Simmons got a few hits, but I gathered the tuition and board and fee to still be close to $18,000. It's so much money. Still, I requested information from both. It's almost cheaper to go abroad. I e-mailed my advisor to ask for any resources she can provide, but I know she won't be very helpful. She seemed annoyed when I told her I'd rather go to NYC than Spain at our last meeting. We'll see.

This weekend I have to come back home to get my Chi and my laundry. I think I'll work on my DI application and maybe make a phone call or write some e-mails to make that contact at CNN. I need to do that before the internship applications are due for next summer.

My hips hurt a lot this past weekend, partly from walking around the city. I didn't run in Chicago. So tonight I went to the track at City High to get some flat ground. It was a party out there, let my tell you. I had done 800m when this guy comes and starts stretching. and he takes an hour. so you know he's a sprinter. Let me rephrase that. He was a sprinter. He was clearly old. Not competitive. But He stretched and did strides and knee highs and skip its and all the dumb stuff sprinters think they need to do. I ran over two miles while he did that. He did like 8x 100m strides. I mean, you are old. you are clearly not competitive. I mean, I don't sprint, but I think I know a pretty good pace when I see one. for lack of better words, the guy was just a real tool. He'd jog past the line and jump up and down and do some leg swings and I'm just thinking, "you are a tool" because whats the point of doing it. It's not a work out. If you aren't fast there is no solid reason to do that. It's not like an aerobic activity, doing 100m strides. He didn't even do the full 100m. Didn't want to pull anything. He's not even that fast. He didn't even burn a beer off, I bet. How do you feel like you got a work out after doing anything. AND he turned on the hose that feeds into the water fountain troughs football players use and hosed himself down when he was done. What a tool.

Then there was the token old guy in aqua shorts and a tank top and sweat band. Like, and we aren't talking Dad old and Dad slow. Worse. He came down to the track from the side, fell down the hill, because it does get steep, and did 6 laps, which, if you didn't know is 1.5 miles. Not much. But hey, it's better than sprinting. The thing about this guy was he just stopped randomly. Like, I always start at the finish line or the 100 so I can keep track of laps easier. He just randomly stopped and walked the whole length of the football field, in the grass and everything, and went back up the hill.

The last guy was a long distance runner, too. He was running in lane 8, which is fine, but I was running in lane 6, and he was going a little bit fast so this means we were parallel for the whole mile we ran together. Thank heavens I didn't have much more to go than that. I'll have to make it out there earlier if I want to aviod them. Started off just me and the softball game. I mean, I feel like we should have had a team huddle, slapped hands and gone for a drink or something.

I'm going to bed. This entry is longer than necessary. I'm hungry. I can't afford food. But I buy it anyway. Mom and Susan sent me a loaf of bread because they are on a diet now. Geesh. I thought it was unanimously decided through the family that I'm the one who needs to diet? Susan, bullet some fudgesicles for me, will ya?

Mary pretty much saved my life because she found my ribbons in her bed after I packed and was leaving. I'd have been the very opposite of thrilled when I got home to have realized that. I don't even know what the opposite of thrilled is.

TTYL