Back from the other Twin Cities.

I am now safely back in Toronto, after spending about 12 hours travelling yesterday. The University of Illinois was great, and I took literally thousands of pictures of archival documents---on Friday, I took 1,524 images at the University Archives. No joke. All that photographing is hard on the back, but good on the wallet. Some highlights of my trip include: hanging with KP; spending time with kitties and Lily, the lovely white dog; eating with Illinois Russianists; marvelling at the campus and the grounds; and doing some more marvelling at the residential areas. I didn't realize how flat Illinois is until I took the train back to Chicago. Every time I looked up from my laptop, there were more corn- and soy fields.

I decided not to spend any time in Chicago, staying Friday night in Champaign-Urbana. So yesterday I took the 10:15am train to Chicago's Union Station, and then got on the "el" to O'Hare. And, oh my, I am not a fan of that airport. It was very confusing, and I was particularly unhappy being lost with my heavy luggage. Although I bought my ticket from United, it turned out I was flying Air Canada. Grrr. But it worked out in the end. Pearson is the worst signed airport that I've been to; O'Hare is the busiest. Minneapolis is the best signed and the nicest. Apart from finally arriving at home last night, the best part of my day was seeing Canadians get off the Air Canada plane at the O'Hare gate where I was waiting: some of them had poppies pinned to their lapels! It made me smile.

Here's Lucy, one of the two cats. I am retarded and forgot to change the setting on my camera before snapping this, but there you have it.

FN, ST, and I went to a great little place in the 'hood for a late brunch today. Nice!