The Adventures of Team Parker

Sameer had worked well last week and had some free time on Sunday. So we went to the LakeView part of town for brunch at a place called Orange. This place is so trendy that the young and hip patrons have to queue outside for a good half hour before getting a table. It’s no Bongo Room in that, when breakfast comes you’re quite happy to eat it rather than just stare at it. But still the menu is enticing.

Orange is famous for their Frooshi (sushi in which the fish has been substituted with fresh fruit) and their Pancake Flight which is a platter of four pancakes built around a theme. The theme on Sunday was chocolate so you’d get a chocolate chip, chocolate mousse, mint chocolate, and chocolate pecan pancake. I wasn’t in such a chocolately mood, so I settled for the Jelly Donut Pancakes – two plate sized pancakes with a homemade jelly between them (Sunday’s jelly was a stewed apple preserve), sugar sprinkles on top and a dollop of citrus butter creme. So simple but yet so yummy! The other thing I liked about it was the pitcher of coffee they bring to your table. You have a choice between regular coffee and orange coffee. I went with the orange infused coffee which tastes like a mixture of coffee and orange juice. Sameer wasn’t too keen on it but I liked it.

After breakfast we had to waddle out of there and onto the street. There a couple of nifty clothing stores and comic/gaming stores and we went into a few of them to look around. The comic store was a mistake coz of course we ended up buying something. I got the second Buffy season 8 graphic novel, which is called No Future for You. It’s Faith-centric, which is awesome. Can never have too much Faith. And Sameer got Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns.

Then we walked towards the lake. The reason we came to Lakeview in the first place was actually to hire bikes so we could cycle along the lakeside. This is one of those “things to do in Chicago”. We’d accidentally left our Real City Chicago book at home so we didn’t have any maps to go by and weren’t exactly sure where the bike rental places were. But we realized that since biking in this area is so popular, we could just keep walking and would in all likelihood just stumble across one. And so we did. We rented two town bikes and we were off.

Along the way, we saw

load of kids playing soccer along the way – little boys and girls and teenaged boys and girls and all their parents and siblings cheering them along.

people taking their dogs out for some fun and exercise, letting them run along the lake and swim through the water.

walkers, joggers, runners, skateboarders, rollerbladers, and cyclists of all ages along the path. This was one of the less crowded parts. There were other parts where all you’d hear was “On your left, on your left” every five seconds as someone tried to overtake you without veering into oncoming traffic.

the beach at last. The water was nice and warm but for some reason there were hardly any people swimming. So we just sat for a while enjoying the calm, laid back vibe.

We had a really good time cycling along the lake and probably could have stayed out longer and followed the bike path further but we’d only rented the bikes for an hour and had to return them on time. Afterwards, we caught a bus back into town. Along the way we saw more and more people flooding the parks, paths, and beaches. We got off on Michigan Avenue to mosey around because the weather was good and everyone seemed to be in such a summery mood. With the amount of people on the streets you would have thought that there was some event on but there wasn’t. I think Chicagoans are so good natured and outdoorsy because the weather is so awful for six months of the year, that when it’s dry, warm, and sunny they have to go out and make merry.