Travis Smith: my resume, bio and photos back to the main blog page

Chicago Business Trip

posted at 11:48 am
on Feb. 26, 2005

Comments: 3 so far

Permalink

 

Previous entry:
Why We Fired David Schultz Rentals

Next entry:
Will Apple Buy Flickr?

I just flew in from Chicago, and BOY are my arms tired.

Ha Ha.  I kid.  Actually, My stomach’s tired—I ate a great deal of meat, and in a very short span.

Susie and I were pitching our services to the Department of Cultural Affairs. We were accompanied by Roland Tanglao, a fascinating fellow from Bryght.

The meeting went very well, but we’re up against four other firms.  The good news is that the list used to be 33 firms long.  One little flirtation with disaster: the hinge on my PowerBook snapped for no reason what soever, I was just opening it as usual, fairly gently.  Metal shards now poke out, and I’m facing a fairly high repair bill when I get back to Vancouver.

We’ll see what happens.

Meanwhile, here’s what I learned about Chicago:

  • Red Light is a tasty Asian restaurant with soft-spoken waiters and metal railings in the shape of abstract animals.  We had the catfish—HUGE and tasty, though they brought it to our table a little under-cooked and had to take it back for a quick second dip in the oil. We also had this Hong Kong steak dish that was very good.  Luckily we all agreed on “rare” because we shared both dishes.  The crowd was an interesting combination.  Mostly 30s and 40s couples and groups of 4.  Not many larger parties, no kids.  It was not full of “young and pretty” types, but certainly some interesting people watching.  Attentive service, good bar.  Price: about $19-28 an entree.

  • The Big Downtown is a dark and chummy bar / restaurant with TV playing sports, confused if well-meaning waitstaff, and steaks and ribs that are SO GOOD it will make you wish you were a coyote.  You know, so that you could eat cows all the time.  OK, that doesn’t really work, but you get my drift.  And then, just when we were feeling doped up with so much meat, they brought the dessert tray and I was like, damn, I gotta have that.  Again, entrees in the $17-35 range, but burgers available to, and I bet they’d be good—I almost order the DIABLO burger, just because of the video game connection.  Gin and tonic with a kick.  Seemed almost entirely full of guys who had gotten off work and had come there to hang out for many hours with their office girl co-workers in big and small groups.

  • Final restaurant review: This Italian place called Rosebud about three blocks from the Museum of Contemporary Art.  We toured the museum, then went across the street to Eli’s, but they close the lunch kitchen at 2:30 and so we wandered further away from the water.  We ate instead at Rosebud and it was so yummy.  Very fancy waitstaff.  Great carb sandwich, nice fries.  Roland asked for a non-menu item and they didn’t bat an eye.  And the portions were FAR to huge for lunch, but they said we were there at 3 p.m. so they staff was sort of in a dinner mood already.  I’m sure the desserts would have been great, but we were so full, it felt like perhaps we ought not to all squish into a cab for fear of explosion under pressure.

    • I should add that Roland bought an iPod shuffle, you might want to see what he has to say about that.



     
     

    Who has mentioned this item?

     

    Previous entry:
    Why We Fired David Schultz Rentals

    Next entry:
    Will Apple Buy Flickr?

    Overheard

    “An unexamined life is not worth living.”

    ...who said it?

    “BBFF (Best Bacon Friends Forever)”

    ...who said it?

    “I find myself thinking of a checklist Wozniak wrote a few years ago describing how to become a genius. His advice was straightforward yet strangely terrible: You must clarify your goals, gain knowledge through spaced repetition, preserve health, work steadily, minimize stress, refuse interruption, and never resist sleep when tired. This should lead to radically improved intelligence and creativity. The only cost: turning your back on every convention of social life.”

    ...who said it?

    “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream.”

    ...who said it?

    “Ever have something in your teeth that you cannot stop tonguing?”

    ...who said it?

    Comments

     

     

    what about flickr and apple or did i miss that?

     

    Posted by Roland Tanglao  at  9:58 pm on Feb. 27, 2005

     

     

     

    i believe it was the Rosebud on Rush:

    http://www.rosebudrestaurants.com/rosebudrushlocation.htm

     

    Posted by Roland Tanglao  at  11:10 pm on Feb. 27, 2005

     

     

     

     

     

    iPod Shuffle - yep i bought one!

     

    Yep, as Travis noted, I bought a 1 Gig iPod Shuffle in Chicago. And it is great! I don't worry about destroying it unlike our much heavier, bulkier and much more vulnerable 2nd Generation 20GB iPod. It truly is indestructible...

     

    Tracked from : Roland Tanglao's Weblog  at  9:04 pm on Mar. 1, 2005

     

     

     

     

     

    What the digital camera sites don't tell you - Sony point and shoots have the best combination of no

     

    Travis and I talked about my many blurry photos on Flickr while we were in Chicago. My solution is a digital SLR sometime before 2006. His solution was a better point and shoot because he thinks I need a compact...

     

    Tracked from : Roland Tanglao's Weblog  at  3:18 pm on Mar. 3, 2005

     

     

     

     

     

    Tim Pawsey - Vancouver food writer

     

    I was lucky enough to meet with the food writer extraordinaire, Tim Pawsey today at Sun Sui Wah for a quick dim sum lunch.

     

    Tracked from : VanEats  at  10:04 pm on Mar. 3, 2005

     

     

     

    Next time you're in Chicago, go to Bob Chinn's in Wheeling. Killer crab legs.

     

    Posted by Helen  at  10:20 pm on Mar. 5, 2005

    Add a Comment

     

     

    Name:


    Email:


    Location:


    URL:


    Submit the word you see below:

     

     

     

    Your comment:


    Remember my personal info


    Email me about follow-ups


     

    Syndication Links


    Click here for the main
    XML feed for this blog.


    Column only


    Side links only


    Quotes only

     

    I'm Listening To

    2007/07/29 11:50

    Zero 7
    Garden State

    MetaBlogs

    AboutBlogs

    Clients

    Humor

    Journalism

    Los Angeles

    Mac

    News

    Personal 1

    Personal 2

    Photos

    Politics

    Other A-F

    Other G-Q

    Other R-Z

    SocialNetworking

    Tech 1

    Tech 2

    Travel

    Vancouver 1

    Vancouver 2

    Vancouver 3

    Vancouver 4

    BizBlogs

    Back to Main

     

    Powered by
    Expression Engine

     

    Copyright 1995 - 2005

     

     
    home
    about
    contact
    overheard
    five live links

    Want Column?

    Enter your email address:


    It will NEVER be shared.
    Unsubscribe

    Five Live Links

    1. Condé Nast (i.e. Wired) Acquires Ars Technica # 
    2. How’s Your Ear for Pitch? # 
    3. A blog of short video stories about the people who post to Craigslist Missed Connections # 
    4. Fido’s offering a cell phone service that uses internet connectivity when you’re at home # 
    5. Did you know that Royal Bank had a twee group blog called RBC p2p? # 
    You can scroll right easily by holding down the SHIFT key and using your scroll wheel. (Firefox users trying this will end up jumping to old Web pages until a) Firefox releases a fix, b) they change their settings like so.)