Walking the Windy City

Kate has a political science nerd fest in Chicago this weekend, so being the good husband I came along to keep her company in her free time. :-)
Kate was the chair of a panel this morning so I took off on foot to explore and find a shoe store that sells a very special shoe.
You would think that I could find any shoe to wear quite easily. This particular shoe has taken me on a multi-state search. First in D.C., Maryland, and Virgina. No luck there. I got to try some on, but they didn't have my size. Doh! Next we tried Oregon, and Washington when we were in Portland and Vancouver. Still no joy. Finally I found another store in Chicago. I got there at 8:30 this morning and found the store to have hours from 10-7. Really? Okay, so to kill time I walked to the next nearest store. I had nothing better to do and it didn't look that far on the map. Well the map I looked at only shows every fourth street or so. What looked like 5 blocks turned out to be 20. Note to self: Don't use bus transit maps to navigate by foot. I got to the store in Lincoln Park at about 9:30 only to find that it also didn't open until 10. No great loss though, I got to see some new territory and had a nice walk.
Back to the Hancock Tower where the first shoe store is and they have the shoe AND it fits.....sort of. I got back to the hotel room and adjusted it a little more and found it too big. Really! Why wouldn't you put on BOTH sizes at the store to make sure! So after lunch Kate was free and we both walked back up Michigan Ave. and the mirical mile to get the next smaller size. That size fit perfect BUT they didn't have my color choice. Much to may happiness they will order and ship my color and my size to me in St. Peter for FREE. I'm already looking forward to getting that package in the mail. :-)
How far did we walk today? Well my tally shows just over 10 miles of walking. It kinda surprised me when we google mapped my route. I didn't think I'd walked THAT much. Kate knocked down about 3 miles.


Kate and the figures from "American Gothic"
Me and very clearly a Bull moose
Something for our Vancouver friends!