most of the blogging going on lately is on the training log, but a few other items of note:

+ flag day (june 14) marked our four year anniversary. for the occasion we treated ourselves to dinner at cafe babareeba. not exactly a romantic, candlelit date spot (the noise can be deafening), but the spinach- and manchego-stuffed mushrooms with lemon hollandaise sauce were a celebration all by themselves. they were positively euphoric. i am left without the necessary language to adequately describe their goodness.

++ No. 78: Attend a modern dance concert with someone who knows more about it than me. so chelsea took me along to see Hubbard Street Dance Chicago‘s annual Inside/Out concert, in which company members showcase new works-in-progress that they’ve choreographed themselves for each other. unlike theatre, i find myself without the language to talk about dance. i know what i like, and don’t like, what moves me or awes me, but it’s hard for me to express why i have those reactions. in part, because i have training and background from which to talk about theatre, and not dance, and i think in part because theatre generally has a more clear-cut narrative. not that modern dance doesn’t have a narrative – it’s just that it communicates with us on many different, and more primal, levels than i think modern theatre does. anyway, it was the sort of thing that i’d never have thought to have gone to, so yay for chelsea dragging me along.

+++ last night was chelsea’s “suprise” (how does she always find out about these things?) bachelorette party. we kept it classy – no penis-shaped accoutrement (oh, the ratings that phrase will garner in my blog traffic stats) or parading the bride-to-be around in a veil or t-shirt emblazoned with tasteless messages – just all the sushi nine women could eat followed by a trip to Jet lounge for dancing and much drinking of the vodka. the club itself was gimmicky and fun (decked out to look like a private jet, with curved walls and white leather bench seating, plenty of high perches on dance on and specially-designed tables (also danceable, as we discovered) with recessed ice trays to keep the vodka cold), but we seemed to be the only group of people actually having fun. ah, clubbing lifestyle, i’m not hip (or rich) enough to understand you or fully do you justice on the page. we capped the evening with last call at the Village Pub, where we met up with the boys celebrating justin’s birthday. happy birthday, justin! you sent out an email bemoaning how old you feel now that you’re 27. all of us who are already OLDER than that cringe.

++++ and finally, a shout out to my favorite world traveler’s new blog, as mari chimes in from berlin with some pretty stunning architecture photos.