We Take Ourselves With Us

The walk to Brookfield from the train station goes through a cute residential neighborhood and past a high school.  We all agreed it would be crazy awesome to have a zoo right behind your school! At the zoo, we were greeted by an amazing peacock, that strolled around casually. We were drawn to Brookfield by the promise that we could walk among dinosaurs.  And, they delivered!  I've clearly been out of the dino-game for too long as I missed the memo informing us that a lot of them were covered in downy, fur-like feathers.  Including the velociraptor--which made it even creepier! And, the kids found the sweet spot at the Stingray tank that let them pet a couple dozen of the balletic creatures. Cool! We caught a dolphin show in which 3 of the 5 performing females were pregnant and all trainers were women--Lean In, sistahs!  Drank ICEEs out of dumbbells (don't ask). And rode the zoo tram a couple times around ...

So, the Chicago Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup. That's hockey, right?  This led to an official citywide party that began at about 6 am on Friday and drew about 2 million (no joke!). So, with Ned ensconced in his library meetings, the kids and I decided to flee to the Brookfield Zoo.  (Trust me, living for 20+ years in an SEC college town takes the shine right off drunken celebrations of athletic victories.).  Although they've taken almost every other form of modern conveyance, the kids have never taken a train. Subway, metrorail, monorail, tram, bus, car, plane, boat, ship, kayak, ferry, horse, scooter, WEDway people mover--yes! Good ol' train, no.  With this, we set off for Union Station to catch the Burlington Northern to Brookfield. It was--natch--colored red for the Blackhawks :) Although he routinely braves the NYC Subway, DC Metro and Miami roadways in full-on rush hour without batting an eye, Penn was a bit freaked out by the idea of the train.  We sat on...