Weeknotes 08-20-2026

Little late on these weeknotes, but it was because I was visiting Lauren in Chicago!

It was a lot of fun, I hadn't been to Chicago in a few years.

On Saturday we got brunch and met up with some of Lauren's friends at a huge art market! We biked there and got torrentially rained on!!! Got sushi and then went to a bar where I had a "Handshake" which is some Chicago thing where you have a shot of malort and chase it with a PBR. It was um really disgusting.

Then we went to another bar called Fathom where I got a mocktail and some chips. This bar was really great because it was an actual queer bar. There were all kinds of people there, and it was more of a sit down and hang with your friends vibe than a lot of other gay bars. It was nice to be in a space that isn't split along identity lines.

Sunday was a packed day. I watched Lauren play her ultimate frisbee game where she caught the winning goal! Then we went and saw a play about a girl who broke her leg and lost her professional soccer career. I enjoyed it! We got froyo after which I enjoyed even more! Then we met up with some of her other friends at the lake and hung out for a bit before going to dinner at a Cuban restaurant. Long day but really fun!

Monday we got bagels and then biked to the yarn store where we had a really lovely and long conversation with the employees. Lauren is knitting a pigeon sweater for halloween, so cute. We popped into a couple bookstores and then went back to the water to eat bahn mi and chill for awhile. That night we cooked at her apartment and watched Remarkably Bright Creatures- really sweet movie.

Tuesday was my last day, and we went to the Shedd Aquarium! What an amazing aquarium! I saw so many fish I feel like I'd never seen before, very cool exhibits. I've been addicted to watching this guy's fish terrarium videos, and it really gave me a new appreciation for the plant life in the tanks. Shedd is one of the locations that has accepted some of the belugas who are being rescued from the defunt marine park in Canada. They have 4 new belugas there, but they were not on display as they acclimate. We saw the existing belugas though which was really exciting.

I took almost no photos on the trip :/

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As I mentioned in my last weeknotes, I watched all the Tom Holland spiderman movies so that I could go see the new one. We went last night and I gotta say it was much better than the last two. I think I liked it the same as I liked the first one. The second and third movies were Really Bad. Courtney and I both cried multiple times in the movie hahah, it really was touching and had the least amount of propaganda of them all lol.

Okay that's all!