chicago family reunion

well let me first off start by finishing up the events in memphis. i did some more wondering, finding more picture to take.






























then out of nowhere, a huge storm (at least to what im used to) hit the city. it was so bad i had to take shelter. winds felt like they hit around 35 to 40mph and the rain was very very hard.




























































































i left memphis on thursday night. as i am currently making this entry, i am watching the news on the tornado in kansas on friday. they are showing the storms vicinity and memphis is only like 50 miles from the most extreme and is actually in the very bad area. that would explain the weather.
i arrived in chicago friday morning and headed out to wheaton to meet up with my sister and parents (who had come in a day earlier).



























mikkele and i that evening went into chicago to wander around. she showed me all of the "cool" places to see. it was very nice to walk around chicago, especially without my 55lb bag on my back. the weather was great.














































































































































now today, saturday cinco de mayo.
i went to wheaton college to hang around the campus. i was wondering through one of the building and i found the door up to the bell tower open. i wondered in to find something very strange. it was all explained to me later why, but the whole place was filled with graffiti and people had put up pictures papers and clothes. looks like quazi had stuff to keep himself occupied.



































my sister was in a ceremony and received a special certificate because of a program she participated in last semester.
















my brother and sister (in law) got in this afternoon, so after the ceremony the four of us went out to eat and hang out. all in all it was a great day.



























i hope that me saying this at the end of each entry doesnt lessen the truthfulness of it all, but this trip is awesome and keeps getting better and better.

memphis.....good choice.

hmmm. two posts in one day. well the last one was catching up to today, and this is for today. i have been wondering around memphis now for about 5 hours. there is a lot to see and some interesting/fun things to take pictures of. i was never planning on coming to memphis, but when my time in seattle was cut shorter than i had planned, i looked for another convenient place to travel. time and place wise, memphis was perfect. ive had fun im memphis. this blog is mostly just going to be pictures of some of the things i have seen.

one of the first things i saw as i walked away from the train stating were all kinds of elvis cutouts. not just in one store but like 3 or 4 in a row.



i love finding free wireless internet.



i found some cool squirrels to play with. one of them actually bit my finger thinking there was food in it. there is one squirrel way up at the top of a tree hanging upside down off a very small branch.































































































bunch of random pictures.













































































there was a pretty cool metal structure of sorts that let me take a bunch of my reflection type pictures.









































































bridge crossing the mississississisiisppi river.



there is one fun story that i will talk about. i was walking around and i called cory bruce. i told him about the weather and how hot and humid it was. he had the brilliant idea of going swimming. why not, its not like ive never done it before. the pool felt divine. it was indoor on the third floor of a marriott. perfect tempature. perfect time. the only bad part about it was after i was done swimming and freshening up i went outside to the balcony to relax on the lawn chairs. just after i laid down a WHOLE bunch of what looked like very important executives came walking out. it looked like they were touring the facility making sure it was up to snuff. that ended that. one of the directors of the hotel came over to me and asked if i was a guest at the hotel. i was politely escorted out.




i then walked down the street and found out that it was the national day of prayer and there was a ecumenical prayer rally in front of one of the federal buildings. i got to clear my conscience of my swimming fun.

3 days of travel.....memphis.

so its been a couple of days now since i have been in seattle. not much has happened, but a lot has gone on.

i wandered around seattle for a little while because my train didnt leave until around 430pm. everything looked a lot different during the daylight hours than at 300am. here are some random pictures of a seattle park i found.



once it was time to go i headed over to union station. i needed to pick up my tickets for my trip from new york to miami, and miami to charlottesville, so i went up to the amtrak ticket counter. off in the distance i heard this dude say, "i can help you over here." i walk over to him and who did i find. a dude named jessica. i couldnt resist. i took a bunch of pictures with my camera phone, and even felt gutsy enough to take to with my real camera. soooooo scary. soooooo interesting.




that leads me up to the next void. a 46 hour train to chicago. the first 14 hours or so was spent sleeping. i had only got about 1.5 hours of sleep in seattle and was very tired. i woke up around montana. i then started getting off the train where ever i could and took pictures of the train station signs. the shelby picture was taken right after i woke up. i hope that explains the way i look. on of the stops i got off at i went in to see if they had a soda machine. canned sodas on the train are freaking $1.75. i found one and hallelujah they had mountain dew. i buy one and just as i am opening it, i notice that the can looked a little different. it was caffeine free? not that i was looking for caffeine, but weird. anyways, i was always trying to have something to do, so i played with my computer a lot, whether it was watching simpsons or enhancing photo opportunities.










i arrived in chicago about 430pm. which gave me about 3 hours to quickly wonder around. mikkele had given me a general direction i should go and so i did. on my travels i ran into a chipotle. the heavens opened and a beam of light was shown on its door. for those of you who dont know, chipotle is in at least my top 3 favorite (of chain restaurants) places to eat. and well i had been living on bagels and wheat thins for the past 2 days. it was everything i could have hoped for.
as i was wondering around i found the channel 7 news room. i stood outside and as they were signing off they panned the camera outside to say goodbye. kinda like the today show. i was briefly seen. i then took a couple of pictures whenever the opportunity arose as i headed back to the train station.













































































































the trip to memphis was short. only ten hours. we actually arrived 45 minutes early. first time for everything. i then walked towards the downtown area which is where i currently am. i was looking for an internet connection which i found in a pleasant park area. i got to play with some squirrels too. it did kind of suck though, out of nowhere, sun out and all, it stared raining and i had to get my computer out of the rain.




well this leads me up to about 9am, thursday, may 3. as i am typing all the details of the trip out the pictures dont seem to be uploading. i hope that i can get this posted before i head back to chicago this evening.....