Jiggety-jig
Am home. Am jet-lagged.
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Yesterday I made my ritual visit to the Art Institute (with a quick peek en route at the Chicago Cultural Center, formerly the Public Library, rather splendid if not quite in the NYPL 42nd St class). Spent some quality time with Georgia O'Keeffe, Monet, Kandinsky, and Barbara Hepworth's Two Figures (I had some thoughts about why this reminds me of Brahms's Double Concerto, which I will not inflict upon my dear readers, at least not until I am a bit more coherent).
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The weather in Chicago yesterday afternoon was horrid: warm and sticky and the rain chucking down. It was probably not the most sensible decision to walk back, but there were one or two final errands I wanted to do before getting back to the hotel, retrieving my luggage, and waiting for the airport shuttle.
As a result I was sitting around for quite some time in patchily damp clothes, until I could co-ordinate getting dry ones out of my packed luggage, and finding somewhere to change that would not involve either public scandal or leaving my luggage unattended.
O'Hare purports to have wi-fi, but I didn't have much success in accessing it, and anyway, what with the traffic hold-ups due to the rain delaying the shuttle, seemed to spend most of my time after checking in walking miles and miles to my gate (have these people not heard of travelators?).
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Flight not bad, as these things go, I had two seats to myself and even managed to catch some sleep, which is never a guaranteed thing. Though was rather annoyed that the films were exactly the same as on the outward flight, since according to their schedule they should have been the alternative programming.
Arrived in good time but then had to dither around waiting for a gate, and also, enormous queues for UK/EU Passport Control. Again, walked for what seemed liked miles (and some of what travelators/escalators there were, not in service).
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A couple of further thoughts about the clique post yesterday: that saying 'I'm nobody' is straight out of Joanna Russ's definition of Trembling Sisters in Magic Mommas, Trembling Sisters, Puritans and Perverts.
And that, although it is never wise to say 'Don't you know who I am?' (which is one of those things, like whingeing in people's ljs about their adverse comments on your books, that persons of good ton should eschew), there are situations when it is at least realistic to suppose that in some general sense, other people in a particular situation will know who one is (even if they don't recognise one). And others in which this is not realistic because one's grounds for being known are unlikely to resonate with the group in question.
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Like a number of other people, I have created a GreatestJournal, under the same username. At the moment it is a Bellman's Map, but it is there just in case.
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Must finish unpacking and put on some washing.