Live Chicago: 5-Day Weekend in December

ONE OF A KIND SHOW AND WHITE BEAN CHICKEN CHILI

During Merchandise Mart's One of A Kind event, I snagged two ready packaged bean soups to satisfy my urge to splurge feeling. The first package of soup I picked up was the white bean chicken chili. I was really tempted to get two packages of the split pea soup but decided it would be better to try more things instead of one.

Since Dominick's was pulling out of the Midwest market, everything except fresh produce was on sale for 50% off. Sadly the tea section was raided so when Stella and I got there, there was nothing good left. I did however pick up a bag of sweet onion and white cheddar tortilla chips which I thought would be perfect for white bean chicken chili. Since the package contains seasoning and beans, I had to go to Trader Joe's to buy some chicken. I decided to throw in some roasted corn into the chili because I wanted some kind of vegetable in the soup and some mild cheddar because I like cheese.

Xiao took the Tuesday and Wednesday off the third week of December and offered to cook me something at my own place. Since I have a workout class on Tuesday and tutoring on Wednesday, he came over Monday after a pretty pleasant weekend of rug shopping and dining at Sola where I picked up a pint of sesame brittle ice cream.

Unfortunately on Sunday night, Xiao didn't close my freezer properly, so on Monday morning I found all my frozen goods melted. The fact that the ice packs were melted made me feel a little questionable about whether I can still use my thawed out vegetables and meat anymore. After much googling, talking with my engineering group in the morning, and my sister who is a cooking expert, the major consensus was that the products were still good for use. My popsicles ended up more like freezer pops, and I ate my frozen bao from San Francisco that day for lunch. The only thing that had to be thrown out then, was the ice cream we barely had the night before. Since it wasn't intentional there was no point in being upset or mad about it. Accidents happen sometimes. Monday didn't really get better though, because we both stayed late at work and then we kept taking the wrong buses to get back to Lakeview. It was a series of unfortunate events that day. Despite the lost time and pint of ice cream, we made white chicken chili for dinner around 7-8pm.

He wanted to eat more than take a picture so this was the best I could do :/

WINTER FLOWER SHOW FLOWER OF CONSERVATORY

My five day weekend started after the annual holiday part at the Ritz Carlton for the ADA. Since then I have been on and off bored. I really wish I had two more vacation days so I could have gone back to San Francisco but I guess it is okay that I am not. My sister told me I should just visit her for Christmas and as tempting as it was, I wasn't down with the holiday prices of airfare.

On Saturday I went to Michael's to do some shopping to find craft holiday stuff to do for Xiao's first Christmas since we were going to spend it together. As I was walking through the isles I saw some light weight frames that were much sturdier than the ones I got from Target and bought a few to re-frame one of my favorite pieces and have a few more for other drawings to come some day. In addition I got some letter stickers to put on the keys of my keyboard. I was making mini upgrades to my studio.

Sunday was a pretty eventful day. I had lunch with Ping Jing at Half Shell, went the to Flower of Conservatory, and watched the Book Thief with her. I was a little worried the Book Thief was going to be a depressing movie but it turned out a lot better than I thought.

This movie is narrated by Death during the genocide of the Jews around World War I and II in Germany. The main character of the story is a girl who was given up for adoption by her mother because she had no means of taking care of her and her brother. Although her brother dies on the journey to Germany due to lack of nourishment and harsh circumstances, the girl makes it to Heaven St and is taken in by her adopted parents. She learns how to read from her father and becomes enchanted by words and books. One day, a Jewish man stumbled into their home. It turned out to be the son of a man who was friends with the father and died in a war to save him. Since then, he gave their family his word to do whatever he can in their time of need, so they hid the young man in the basement of their home. The girl and the young man become good friends during his stay but eventually left the family because the military was starting to check the homes of the German people for refugees. The war eventually took her adopted family and friends away and left her alone again. Despite all this, a woman who lost her son in the military takes her in and she stays with them. After the end of the war, her Jewish friend and her were reunited and stayed good friends until their deaths at a ripe age of ninety. The girl who had lost her family twice survived, became a published and recognized author, and went on to having a family of her own and saw her grandchildren before her time has come.

After watching this movie Ping Jing and I talked about how lucky we are that we are not in the battle zone of war on our home front. Back then it was somewhat advantageous to have war on the home turf because of the knowledge of the terrain and the manpower. Nowadays, wars can be fought with drones and weapons of mass destruction, which means fighting on enemy turf is more advantageous. Crazy and scary stuff when you think about it.