Hey, just so you know ... this post is now about 13 years old. Please keep that in mind as it very well may contain broken links and/or outdated information.

This past weekend I flew up to Chicago to see my little sister and go to the Lightning/Blackhawks hockey game at the United Center.

My Saturday afternoon flight seemed to be filled with spring breakers returning home. Since I was only going up for the weekend I just had a carry-on bag and luckily had an exit row seat so I still had plenty of leg room. At 12:45pm we were all boarded and ready to go when the pilot indicated the guidance system was malfunctioning (“that’s what tells us if we’re upside down”) so the secondary system needed to be tested before we could leave. Finally around 1:25pm we were in the air and on our way. The flight was smooth and uneventful and we landed at O’Hare shortly after 3:00pm. About half an hour later I was with my sister who picked me up and drove back to her place north of the city in Bowmanville.

That evening we took the red line south to have dinner with some friends at Burger Bar (which happens to be across the street from the Lincoln Park Apple store). The place had an excellent beer selection and an even better selection of burgers. We also sampled the fried pickles and green chile mac & cheese. After dinner, we walked down the street to Uncle Julios for a few more drinks. Then it was back to the train and home.

I had a slight headache when I woke up Sunday morning 😉 but we eventually made it out to lunch (salads) at Potbelly in Andersonville. We ran a few errands and I helped my sister with a few repair/maintenance issues around the apartment (including a TiVo hard drive installation). It was then time for the real reason for the trip (which we had planned last August): hockey!

We drove to the United Center (also known as the Madhouse on Madison) and got there about an hour before the 6pm game.

I only saw two other people wearing Tampa Bay Lightning jerseys like I was. Overall, though, the Chicago fans were well-behaved: I was only booed once (before the game even started!) and commented to once or twice. It was a good game (for me, but not the other 21,000 some fans there) and the Bolts beat the Blackhawks 2-0 (which included an empty net goal with 22 seconds left in the match), their fifth straight win.

Goalie Mike Smith blocked all 31 shots and was even mentioned as a “star of the game” by the United Center announcer (another classy touch by Chicago).

My sister dropped me off at O’Hare around 7:00am on her way to work Monday morning. I was a little nervous attempting to use American’s mobile boarding pass on my iPhone, but I had no problems with the scanners either at the security checkpoint or when boarding the plane. We left Chicago on-time shortly after 8am and we were on the ground in Tampa at noon. I had taken the morning off so I grabbed a quick lunch and then drove straight from the airport to work for the rest of the day.

So overall it was a great weekend!