Day 2: Chicago, IL

Nau maiYesterday we kicked off our requests tour with a show at the Concord Music Hall. I picked up a quick to-go breakfast from the hotel’s cafe as I rushed to make it on time to lobby call. The cafe in the lobby of the Crowne Plaze hotel had unimaginative food offerings but featured a hectic array of design elements like 90s hand-painted coffee shop signs, led strip lights, mid century pendant lights, velvet booth seating, metallic ceiling tiles, and striped Parisian awnings. I ordered a parsley and black pepper schmear on an everything bagel, a topping that you may just be able to make out in the hole in the centre of this baked toroid. Shortly after 2pm we were picked up in a van, one of these off the books transportation services driven by an off the books minion that Annie seems to have in every city in the United States. Of course it was a Chevrolet Express, the standard minion vehicle, a stubby white passenger van wearing the rusty scars of a couple of decade’s worth of…