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I'm travelling to Chicago this week. It is hot, humid and hazy. I'm on the Miracle Mile but I can't see very far up the street. I'm on the top floor of my hotel but I can't see a quarter mile from here. I'm skipping the trip to the observitory on top of the Hancock Tower because I just wouldn't see any view. All of the locals are complaining about the heat in June. Global warming is a pain.

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I did walk around the neighborhood I'm in. There are many residential buildings here and a lot of people on the street. People from the burbs are always afraid of 'downtown', but the part of Chicago around the Hancock tower is very clean and pleasent.

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It is a little expensive for my tastes. If you can't read picture at the left is says "Elegent Homes priced from $1.5m". These are "homes" that are in a several story building on the shore of Lake Michigan, but still, I'm sure the "starting at" homes are on the non-lake veiw, setting sun side of the building. And a deal at only 1.5 million.

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This part of Chicago is shopping crazy. Most of the buildings around here have several floors of shops. These are all upscale mall stores that cater to the people who can afford the 1.5 million dollar residences around here. Shops range from coffie shops to a Bentley automobile showroom. The Hershey's shop shown at the left was very disappointing. Since I really like chocolate, I check out the shop and thought I could find things is the special Hershey's shop. I expected to find a special dark chocolate the can only be found at the you-have-to-go-to-Chicago shop. Saddly, the only thing they sold here was packaged chocolate that you could purchase anywhere else in the nation. Another company making a little marketing mistake.

Had to upgrade WordPress again. Seems version 1.5.1 broke the RSS feeds. Things are better now.

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Last year I reported that Christmas started on June 12th. This year, they are a little late -- the first Christmas junk mail came on June 25th. I guess the stores aren't as anxious about Christmas this year.

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Last night, my son graduated from high school. He has been attending a small high school and there were only 18 people in his graduating class. But, there were many scholorships and people going to prestgious schools, so the experience of the school was great for him.

Now it's off to college for him, but, in the short term, there was a celebration of the four years of work.

A few weeks ago, a report hit the news on the U.S. Geological Survey report on lack of monitoring of U.S. volcanos. Most of the new reports focused on the fact that Yosemite moved up to number 26 in the list of volcanos most likely to do something.

Well, I read the report and I did notice that, for me, the real news was that the top four volcanos in the U.S. that are most likely to do something are Mt St Helens, Mt Rainier, Mt Hood and South Sisters. These are all mountains you can see on a clear day from here in Portland.

It adds a little interest having volcanos in your yard.