I think Chicago and I got off to a bad start. I visited my sister there earlier this Spring-- my first time back in 10 years-- and asked her to take me "somewhere cool." We ended up at the cafe in Nordstrom's on Michigan Ave. They did have really good chili, but still.

This time I was further uptown, near Wicker Park, for Pitchfork. I had been told two things about Pitchfork before I went: 1.) That it's extremely smelly and 2.) That the Chicagoan attendees are cherubic hipsters. Neither turned out to be true. It was 60 degrees the entire time so there was no sweating, and everyone seemed hot and svelte. The boys had a certain bearded lumberjack look. A few crazypants teenagers had seizures and at least one aging hippie fainted during the Flaming Lips. I drank Sparks from 2 until 10, my teeth turned orange, one night I got my first lap dance from a stripper named Alicia who had just graduated culinary school, and I didn't poop for three days. It was pretty frakking fantastic.