Chicago is my kind of town, that is I think it might be. I should know more about Chicago because I’ve been there seven or eight times. The problem is I always flew there for business, hobby industry conventions to be specific. Therefore, what I experienced first hand were very rocky plane flights, encampments in hotels, long hours standing on cement floors in cavernous buildings that could have been located anywhere in the known galaxy, and the occasional hour when my trade show buddies and I could ride a commuter train to the center of town and get lost. Managing and working Chicago trade shows wasn’t all bad. It was mostly all bad, but we did have some funny moments and some surprises. I’ll tell you about the catastrophically funny bits some other time. They take up a lot of words. Today I’m going to share things about Chicago that surprised me: Cold. Thanks to Chicago trade shows I now know that snow sometimes falls up, not down. If a building is tall enough and the ever-present wind is just right, you can stand on the 20th floor, look out the window, and watch snowflakes fall up. In Chicago. Fur Coats. I watched two women walk into a restaurant, remove their floor length mink coats and fur hats, and sit down to eat. Did I sneer at them or make nasty remarks about animal slaughter? No. Did I throw my beet borscht on their furs? No. Why? I wanted to be them. I wanted an ankle-length mink coat of my very own, with matching earmuffs. Also, their kid leather boots and gloves. Then I might be able to stop shivering. In Chicago. City Maps. If you stand outside a subway station, three or four of you, clustered around an opened paper map of the city, obviously confused as to which way to go to reach the destination that’s across the street, a total stranger will walk up to you, ask if you’re lost, and then kindly (as if explaining to a kindergartner) tell you where to walk. She or he will do this without taking your wallets at knifepoint. If it’s daylight. In Chicago. The ‘L’ Peep Show. You must ride the L, especially if you’re in town to sell videos of trains. If you’re riding the entire loop for the fun of it, you can look into strangers’ apartments, assess their furniture, notice what they’re wearing, and see what’s on TV. There are endless rows of brick apartment buildings that abut the elevated rails so that the windows of one look in on the windows of the other. Few have blinds, shades, or curtains. Apparently if you’re lucky enough to live next to the noisy, rattling L you earn the right to be a peep show. Nobody objects. Nobody stares in shock, other than those of us from California. Life next to the L is an open book. In Chicago. Traffic. There is no way for a car to enter traffic on a busy downtown Chicago street. It’s too crowded and no one will let you in. Therefore, you need to enter the line of traffic by bumping your car into one next to you. If you bump too lightly, you loose. If you bump too hard, your engine gets busted. Just as with the three bears, you have to bump into an oncoming car with just the right amount of determination. You will receive a barrage of swear words, which you won’t be able to hear because of the din of honking cars, but you will force the other car to slow down enough to let you enter. In Chicago. Fashion. The poor people begging along the walls of the subway tunnels dress better than business folk in Los Angeles. They do so particularly in winter when all the cast-off clothing is kidskin leather. The starving musicians with guitar cases filled with dropped dollar bills dress better than the business people I worked with on Wilshire Boulevard. Everyone looks like they just went shopping at Saks Fifth Avenue. In Chicago. Wind. The Southern California Santa Anas are pretty mean winds. I intend no disrespect when referring to them. After all, they did remove about 500 trees up the street a few years ago. Yet our winds are seasonal. If you go near lake Michigan, tie your mink earmuffs to your leather shoelaces. In Chicago. Commuter Trains. I’ve ridden buses and commuter trains all my life. I grew up on trolley cars. However, I’ve never found myself holding onto a guard rail one moment and sitting atop a strange man’s lap the next second because the train just started. Metra Rail has two speeds: stop on a dime and go fast. There’s no building up speed or slowing down. One minute the doors are closing and the next minute you’re splattered against the vestibule door or flung onto a stranger’s lap. In Chicago. Food. Everything everyone says about how good the food is in Chicago is telling the truth. Everywhere we went was the place we wanted to eat at the next day and the day after. German food? Out of this world. Italian food? Mamma’s paradise. Deli food? To die for. Hotel food? Who cares? The wine was fabulous and the gorgeously adorable young waiter was so irresistible that a very old man, a very young man, an attractive single woman, and a sedately married yours truly kept ordering more food and more wine just to pinch his patootie. I think we drunkenly closed down the place and followed him through the corridors until he escaped us. In Chicago. Mafia Trash Train Crews. Everyone knows, or used to know two score years ago, that contracts for the very lucrative business of hauling garbage from Chicago to the deserts of the wild west were awarded to the Mafia. So it came as no surprise when a posse of beefy men wearing dark denims, thick boots, white t-shirts, and expensive black leather jackets descended on the booth where we were displaying our latest videos of Chicago’s famous railroad hub. This was on the public admission day when the men in our team were elsewhere, leaving the attractive single woman, a volunteer female associate and yours truly to hold down the fort. Our latest video was playing on our display TV. I had the remote control. One minute the booth is moderately empty and the next minute I’m surrounded by a pack of men looking like the Fonz but without the aura of safety he radiated. I glance around for backup and way over there, at the far corner of our 20x20 booth, I see the two other women huddling in terror. The Boss Fonz says to me, in da tickest Fonz drawl, “I can’t hear da train. Turn up da volume.” “I can’t.” “Why not?” “It’s already as loud as it gets.” “Hey, Georgie! Getta look at dat!” All the trash train thugs are gaping in joy at the sight of trains rolling by the camera. That is, all but the cutie with the black curls. He’s making goo-goo eyes at Boss Fonz. Aha! Now I know what I’m dealing with and I’m starting to have fun. I shout, “Wait! I got another one you’ll like even better!” I’m still surrounded by mountains of musclemen but I’m grinning with glee. My booth mates are staring at me in horror. Should they call the police? I give them the thumbs up. I’ve got this. “Whaddya think? It’s good, right?” “Yeah. You got a copy? I wanna buy it.” “Absolutely! That’ll be thirty dollars. I don’t have change.” Boss Fonz reaches into his jeans pockets and starts pulling out wadded-up paper bills. He throws it all down on the table and says, “How much is that?” Ya gotta understand what’s going on here. The Mafia trash train boss man can’t add up five plus five. He calls one of his buddies over to help him—not the cutie who is still making flirty eyes at big daddy; the one who knows how to add up five dollar bills after first straightening them out. My heart is now devoted to them all. I accept the crumpled money and put a video in a plastic bag. Then I add another one. “Here. It’s special, free, just for you.” It’s okay. They’re used to getting a little extra when money is shoved across the table. I suppose in a fight they’d be terrible foes or saviors, depending. But on that day they were just another group of gay guys who love trains and look like fierce mobsters. Me, now I’m feeling right at home. In Chicago.