Saturday,
December 22, 2001

Hoo boy, we're in the money

I'm writing this from a perfectly charming little minisuite at the Drake Hotel in downtown Chicago, which was not where I expected to end up this evening, but I'm damn well not complaining.

Some explanation -- after rousting me gently out of bed this morning, Lyndon worked on doing laundry and packing the big bag while I staggered out to drop off Bill's kids' presents at his house. I still have presents for Lisa and Elizabeth's boys, but since I don't know where Elizabeth lives and I couldn't remember Lisa's apartment number, they'll have to be delivered when I get back (okay, Lisa and Elizabeth?).

Back home to redo my hair and eyebrows, take a shower, throw the last of the clothes into my new suitcase, pack various programs into my laptop bag for Mikey's new iBook, then off to the airport we went. Because I'm cheap and we're gonna be away for a week, I parked the Hoosiermobile in Value AA parking, which is somewhere out in Ulan Bator as far as I can tell, and shuttled it to Terminal A for the first leg of our flight -- Dallas to Tulsa, Oklahoma.

This was done via American Eagle, aka the smaller plane branch of AA, and Lyndon wondered aloud if they wound the rubber band tight enough on the propeller to get us there. Yeah, that kind of a plane -- we're talking TINY inside. I haven't flown on anything like that since Holland -- very weird. But Lyndon had the single seat in the aisle across from me, a nice young man had the window seat next to me, and the flight attendant should have been doing stand-up, so it was a good trip to "The Big T."

"The Big T." Why does this smack of desperate pride to me?

Anyway, leg two -- Tulsa to Chicago. This time we were in a bigger plane, and the flight attendants were married to each other and recreating scenes from "Married With Children" all the way to Chicago, which was entertaining (this was obviously our trip for amusing flight attendants). Down and out at Terminal 3, over to Alamo where we rented a mid-size Oldsmobile (hey, might as well enjoy them while they're still in business), and down through some amazingly sedate traffic to the Drake.

The Drake, if you've never been here, is a beautiful old hotel on Walton overlooking the Oak Street Beach. Very snazzy -- kind of an Art Deco takeoff of the Gilded Age, built in the 1930's and trying to look pre-War. Lyndon spotted a lot of similarities to the Waldorf-Astoria in New York, especially with the lower-level arched passageways -- here, they're lined with shops and whatnot, while the W-A uses them to link up with the parking garages. In any case, the hotel is very nice, and a couple of parties were going on while we were checking in -- it felt odd to be wearing jeans, boots and a black leather jacket while all the women around me were wearing velvet dresses, jewelry up the wazoo and fur. And then I remembered that millionairesses in Dallas wear jeans and boots, so I just pretended I came from old oil and felt much better.

The room -- we were originally given a fairly small but nice room on the sixth floor, until we got up there and realized that it was a smoking room. Lyndon immediately got on the phone with the concierge and explained that he had requested a non-smoking room and had the paperwork to prove it, at which point we were moved down to the first floor.

Oh. My. God. They gave us a mini-suite -- two double beds against one wall, with a couch, two chairs, coffeetable and desk against the other. There's an entertainment system in the corner, and we have a view of the lake.

But wait -- there's more.

The actual entrance to the room is through a foyer, seen at right -- in the foyer is a huge walk-in closet, a closet that's been turned into the honor bar, a dresser for clothes, and not one but two bathrooms.

We have two bathrooms -- I'm utterly flabbergasted.

Once I was able to shut my jaw and we tipped the bellboy, we headed downstairs to the Cape Cod Room on a mission. Well, for dinner, too, but my mission was to see if my ex-boyfriend and now regular friend Tom was still bartending there. After all, it had been eight years since I last saw him, I hadn't gotten any replies to my last few letters -- for all I knew, he'd thrown up bartending in favor of the mercenary life or gone off to do performance art in Europe. With Tom, you never know.

I spotted him the moment we walked into the restaurant -- behind the bar, wearing glasses and. . .oh, my God, he was cleanshaven. He'd had a mustache the last time I saw him, which threw me for a moment. And then I heard him bantering with the customers and realized, yeah, that was him.

Of course, he didn't recognize me at first -- we were seated in a booth directly across from the bar, and I told him to stop harassing the customers. He shot back that it was part of his job and he'd get docked if he didn't harass customers-- "Besides, you came back, didn't you?" he added, still in bantering mode.

At which point I realized that he thought I was just another customer. "He doesn't recognize me!" I whispered to Lyndon. "I dated the man for three months, for God's sake! I'm miffed!"

So, being the kind of gal I am, I had to get up and go over to the bar. "I know it's been eight years, Tom--" I began.

He looked at me, and the light went on visibly. "Melanie! Oh, my God, I didn't recognize you -- your hair is shorter!" he exclaimed. He came out and hugged me, I introduced him to the Bodacious Brit, and we chatted for a couple of minutes before he had to dash back behind the bar. I left my business card with our room number, so with any luck I'll be having lunch with him sometime this week.

Afterwards, we staggered back up to the room and Lyndon crashed while I jotted notes for this entry. The total so far is:

• I got most of the presents off and delivered
• we got to the airport on time
• we had entertaining flight attendants
• we wound up with a gorgeous room at the Drake, and
• I met up with Tom again.

All in all, it's turning out to be one heck of a Christmas vacation so far. Stay tuned, campers!