My father lived in Chicago for much of the 80s and part of the early 90s before he moved back to Australia, and I often used to visit him in the summer, so Chicago like all the places I have lived forms part of my identity. I hadn't been back to the Windy City since my dad left about 20 years ago though, and Lena hadn't ever been so I decided as a surprise to take her on a train trip. There was a little mishap with a train ahead of us, and we got stuck at both meals with a couple of hippies (mentioned in previous episode), but we arrived only about half a day late.

From the hotel we headed to the Field Museum of Natural History, where we saw Sue, the most complete Tyrannosaurus ever discovered.

She has sharp teeth. (All the better to eat you with).

There were lots of other fossils, including a whole room full of other dinosaurs. I liked this fish.

We also saw exhibits on Egypt and DNA. Here Lena is posing with the DNA.

Toward the end of the day they were getting ready to host a wedding inside the museum. It looked like it might be grand if you don't mind footing the bill. You can kinda of tell in the background photo of the totems here.

The first day and a half was fogggggggy and we were wondering if we would ever get a chance to see the city!

On our second day we took a taxi to the Museum of Science and Industry where they had the most amazing train set that I have ever seen in my life. It's meant to depict trade by rails between Chicago and Seattle and so feature appropriate icons such as the Tower Formerly Known As Sears, the L, Amtrak and the space needle.

One thing that has changed at the museum since I was there in the 90s is that they have moved a number of things underground, like the U-505.

Lena enjoyed the museum a lot more that I thought she would, but then again there were lots of knobs to turn and buttons to press so I shouldn't have worried.

There was one exhibit in Net World that explained network disruption in a flow network. This reminded me of my days studying computer science back in the day and is somewhat relevant to my real life job for which I earn money.

I think this fun house was supposed to teach us something about petrol but it was so much fun I am not sure what.

Pretty colours pumping theoretical oil products which again I am sure is meant to educate us about something.

When we got out of the museum at closing time the fog had cleared (yay!) so we took a taxi to the John Hancock where we got a birds eye view of the city.

Lena has a pretty smile, that I enjoy photographing.

On the way to Chicago deep dish pizza for din dins we walked by the water tower, which was the only thing they managed to save in the Chicago fire. You can see it in this photograph along with the John Hancock.

Saw this in one on a facade, and it reminded me to keep an eye on it and not to blink. Thank you very much Steven Moffat.

On the last day we went to Millennium Park to wait for the Art Institute to open. I thought this was a pretty fun fountain. The face on the far end blinks, looks lively and watches a face in the closer block. There were lots of kids getting wet and having fun.

I did at some point figure out what this thing was called by doing a google search for "big shiny thing chicago", but I've forgotten what it is now. I think big shiny thing is probably the best name anyway. It was featured at the end of the film Source Code.

Here it is from underneath. It's concave!

...and from the side.

The Institute didn't open until 10:30am, but we finally did get inside, where I saw several paintings by Georgia O'Keefe mentioned previously.

I liked this ally so I took a photograph of it.

...and the side of this building. The steel skyscrapers and the brick buildings was an interesting contrast.

Then we headed to the Tower Formerly Known as Sears (Willis Tower), expecting to be able to grab something to eat before we went up to the top to watch sunset, but I forgot to factor in the fact that everything was closed on Memorial Day, except for a couple of places in Union Station, like this BBQ place which actually had really tasty BBQ sandwiches (I had the pulled pork and Lena took the chicken).

Lena still had a pretty smile at the top of the Tower Formerly Known As Sears.

I also took a few photos of the city.

also: I am hear by declaring that next Tuesday to be reclassified as Gorfstag.

Melbourne, Day 2

On the second day we toured around the city. Oh, and my camera broke, the day before we were doing the Great Ocean Road! I couldn’t believe the horrible luck. I managed to pick up a used Nikon FM body in perfect condition to replace my FE. The FM is the mechanical version of the FE from the same time period. I could have probably gotten an auto focus camera new for less, but I had been enjoying the feel of my manual Nikon which hasn’t been getting much of a work out since I moved to Australia.

I shot three rolls of 24 in my new camera around the centre of Melbourne, and I felt like for the first time in ages I had gotten my camera legs back. Whatever that means.

Melbourne, Day 3

The next day we did the Great Ocean Road. It’s pretty. There are lots of flies. If you go you should arm yourself with some bug spray.

Melbourne, Day 4

Our last day in Melbourne was only a half day, so we didn’t do much. First we went to the Melbourne museum, where they had a blue whale skeleton. Actually it was a pigmy blue whale, named on account of it being small for the species. This is kind of funny because it was still enormous. They also had a vast collection of bugs. Some of them still alive even. Cicely came into the bug section to tell us that she wasn’t going to look at the bugs because they creeped her out, but by the time she was in she started looking around and didn’t seem so bugged out.

The computer geek in me enjoyed the CSIRAC, Australia’s first digital computer, and the worlds fifth stored program computer, and the oldest intact computer of either type in the world. Joe commented that “your” calculator probably has more computing power, to which I responded, “your” phone definitely has more computing power.

They also had an IBM PC... the original which was simply called a PC, because that wasn’t a generic term when it was produced. I think the oldest PC I ever used was an XT, which came out about two years later in 1983. The XT’s major innovation was that it had a hard disk, whereas the PC had two low density 5¼” floppy disk drives. In Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum, they have a TRS-80. There used to be a whole room full of them at my elementary school. Stuff I used to use is now showing up in museums. What are the museum curators trying to tell me?

For lunch we had Mongolian Barbecue. It was pretty good and all you can eat, so I wasn’t hungry again that day. After that we took a taxi to the airport and flew back to Sydney. When I looked out the window as we were landing, I saw a Tangara, which exists (I believe) only in Sydney and I started feeling oddly nostalgic being back in Sydney. It was really nice being back in Sydney after being away fro a week. It feels like home here.

Sydney, Today

I guess that brings me to today. Brian is off to Fiji. Joe and Cicely are climbing the bridge today and we are meeting later tonight for dinner, along with the girl that I met at Thanksgiving. Joe and Cicely fly back to the states tomorrow, and I’m back to work on Monday.

A few weeks ago I went to the Justice and Police Museum in Sydney for a special exhibit titled City of Shadows, which consisted primarily of black and white crime scene, mug shot, and other miscellaneous police photography from the early 20th century. The pictures were really fascinating, although the presentation really didn't do them justice. I would have really liked to have seen the actual prints!

As a camera geek, it was cool to see some of the old cameras they had on display:

I posted some more photographs of the old cameras and the museum here:

Police?Justice
2006

I've been in Houston for the past few days, visiting my best friend Melly. They really like big friggin' trucks here. I'd be afraid to drive the freeway in my lil'ol civic hybrid. I think we are going to hit a museum today. I'm going to bring my camera, but I don't expect to be able to use it inside. Anyway, this random series of thoughts was brought to you by the letter R.