Tag Archives: chicago

How I learned to love coffee and get over myself

When I was a freshman in college, I was a little shit. I wanted to trade my former good student, Sunday school volunteer life for something else. College was a chance to be a different person, right? But I overcorrected: I was arrogant, entitled, cocky. 

In a moment of hilarious buffoonery, that changed for the better.

Sipping October

This article was originally published in the Chicago Tribune. One of my best friends was in town for the first time, so I was showing her my sleepy little corner of Ravenswood Manor. “There are a few breweries nearby,” I offered after we’d walked enough to work up a thirst. “Show me!” she said. We setContinue reading “Sipping October”

Chicago’s Best Bookstores: A Bibliophile’s Take

The smell of freshly baked bread, the fabled aroma of “new car,” the scent of a freshly talcum’d baby: these are but some of life’s olfactory pleasures. How boring it would all be without them, right? And then, of course, there’s the woody, musty, leathery and wise smell of an old book, oft overlooked whenContinue reading “Chicago’s Best Bookstores: A Bibliophile’s Take”

EOD Reading List: Merit Badges, Cookies, Pie + More

I woke up this morning grumpy as all get out. Within minutes of waking and wiping the sleep from my eyes, I found out the hard way that the my building’s hot water was on the fritz (a rarity). As I got dressed, I fell over. My walk to the Metro North station was aContinue reading “EOD Reading List: Merit Badges, Cookies, Pie + More”

Wine and Me: Contextualizing My Enjoyment

As I find myself falling more deeply in love with wine—its pleasures, its history, its nuance and subtleties—I also find myself more reflective of how I am where I am now. I was never a huge wine drinker before, and even food was a passing interest, nothing more than the food I shoved down myContinue reading “Wine and Me: Contextualizing My Enjoyment”