Month: August 2024

Solar Energy

I have been a community solar farm subscriber for over four years, and I couldn’t be happier about it – not only with the environmental impact but also with significantly lower electric bills. Since the time I subscribed, I have orgotten about the concept of “summer peaks.”

The savings work the following way: Nexamp bills me the price of electricity and sends my credits to ComEd, which subtracts them from my ComEd bill. The problem started at the end of February when ComEd switched to a new billing system and changed all account numbers. Somehow, they forgot to include Nexamp into this conversion process, and it took several months to resolve the issue. Finally about a month ago Nexamp informed their subscribers that the issue was finally resolved. They warned us that we “will receive a gigantic bill” from Mexamp, but no worries, it’s for all these missing months. They also suggested that we should request an immediate refund from ComEd, instead of waiting for them to adjust their bills with our credits.

I decided not to do anything and just wait until ComEd will adjust all the credits. It turned out that is was the right decision! The “gigantic bill” was $48, which I just paid, and ComEd had already sent me two $0 bills. 🙃 And that’s for two months with the hottest temperatures outside. I am wondering whether they will bill me something in September

Ann Arbor: Greenview Nature Area

On Sunday, August 21, we spend the whole day in Ann Arbor. Lena suggested an early morning walk to the Greenview Nature Area, and it was a total delight!

Continue reading “Ann Arbor: Greenview Nature Area” →

Looking For Coffee In Detroit

Several more things are left from last weekend’s trip to Michigan. We had two great positive experiences in Detroit: Michigan Central and Ford Plant, and one-and-a-half bad experiences. A “half-experience” was that, once again, it appeared to be challenging to find any relatively fast and decent quality food, and one really bad – it appeared to be impossible to find a coffee place in the afternoon. I ended up having the second coffee of the day when we returned to Lena’s place.

On Sunday, we stayed in Ann Arbor and spent most of the day in the Downtown area. Lena was sure that coffee wouldn’t be a problem there, but the place where we stopped to get coffee turned out to be really bad. Lena went back to the coffee shop and asked for a new one, but it was only marginally better.

Finally, Lena spotted Roos Roaster and said that they should be good. When we entered, I told a barista that I had to have one positive coffee experience and what he would recommend. He recommended a long, and it was perfect.

Both I and the reputation of Ann Arbor were saved!

Shakespeare In The Park

Glenwood Art Fest was this weekend, and I could not make it there until today. On Friday and Saturday, the rain randomly stopped and started, and when it started, it would pour! I got completely wet at least six times during these days!

But today, the rain finally stopped, so I took my mom and went there. Yesterday, when I was exporting, one of my fellow escorts told me that there will be “The Twelve Night” performed at 2-30. so I planned to be at the fest before that, and the timing was perfect.

OMG, they are so good!!! That’s how you should do Shakespeare – on the market, with no mics, with very simple props and costumes. Loudly. Over-expressive. Almost vulgar, but not. To the lough and joy of the audience.

Also, I really liked how they decorated the underpass under the CTA tracks!

DNC

My friend who lives on the West Side was planning to visit me the upcoming Saturday. We planned this day several months in advance: my schedule is busy, and it’s a long way to her. She uses paratransit, so she needed to arrange a ride. On Monday she texted me: sorry, I won’t be able to come. When we talked the next day I asked her what happened. She said: I know we planned this visit several months ago, and I know that it might mean I won’t see you for several more months, but the there will be protests because of the DNC.

I told her: wait, the DNC does not start until Monday. She though for a moment, and then said: I know for the fact, that there will be protests over the weekend. She continued: you know how they sometimes go wild, and if the car happen to be in the middle of it, they might encircle the car, and then the passengers will be in trouble, and I do not want to end up in jail. I paused for a moment to process and said: you are right. I have nothing to say.

I managed to find an alternative time for her visit, so we will see each other before fall, but it looks like the prevailing mood in Chicago for the next week is worry about what is going to happen. It’s sad, but not unjustified.

Things Are Working When People Are

Today, after a very long break, I went to the Art Institute with the youth from the shelter. C. tried very hard to make things happen that time, but in the end, the only reason everything worked was the staff, who suddenly became available and ready to drive the youth to the museum. I just started to describe what was going wrong and how there was no way it could work, but then I deleted two paragraphs because, in the end, the important part was that there were three really engaged residents and the amazing staff, and everything worked perfectly!

For all of the youth, it was their first visit to the Art Institute, and they were overwhelmed with the options. They wanted to stop by each object on their way and read everything about it. As always, there were remarkable observations and unexpected questions. As always, there was a stop at Amorino after the museum was closed. As (almost) always, the youth thanked me for the outing. One of the youth was especially thankful and said: Sorry, I am not really cultural, I do not know anything about art and I didn’t know what I would like, but I liked everything!

And here is very tired and very happy I.

Tranquility

On Wednesday morning, I finally did what I wanted to do since Boris’ departure: I went to the beach between working out in the morning and going to work. I just got the sunrise, and the water was warm, and there was absolutely nobody on the beach!

It felt so good and gave me a great start to the day!

Then, I took a short break from work in the afternoon and walked to the Tiny Cafe on the Riverwalk. This summer, they finally opened their coffee corner, and they have ice cream again (and great espresso!). I took an ice cream cone and espresso and sat on a stone step, looking at the Chicago River.

And one more time, I was not running anywhere, if just for five minutes!

Ford Piquette Avenue Plant Museum

Here’s more from my visit with Lena. After the Michigan Central tour, we were going to tour the Fisher Building. We still had some time left until that tour, and Lena suggested we go to another museum—Ford Piquette Avenue Plant. The museum looked rather small, so we thought we would check out everything in forty minutes and then go to our Art Deco tour.

However, we spent there two and a half hours, and we easily could have spent more.

Here you can learn more about an amazing story of the first Ford Plant building and how it was saved. We didn’t know any of that when we entered the building. We were told that the tour would start in 20 minutes, and we decided to wait, and meanwhile to walk around.

Continue reading “Ford Piquette Avenue Plant Museum” →

Current Events On The Front

I kept quiet and didn’t want to jink it when things started to unfold last week, especially because even BBC was quiet. My friend Lena has relatives in Sumy, so she started to message me “did you hear the news” in the beginning of the week. At that time, her relatives experienced retaliation shelling from the Russian forces, and they had to shelter for over 24 hours.

When I visited Lena several days later, she said: I was hoping that now Russian people will understand something, but it doesn’t look like it! Unfortunately, I have to agree. Moreover, I am shocked with reactions of those few politicians who appeared to be normal so far. Now, all of a sudden, “you can’t be happy when your fellow citizen suffer” and “you can be against the current government, but you can be against people”.

I have no comment on that. None. Except for citing one more time late Frau Traudel: “Of course, we wanted Germany to be defeated!”

Michigan Central Restoration

Continuing from here. It is such an amazing, such an unbelievable, and such an American story! Between 1988 and 2018, the building was not only vandalized but also looted. When Ford Motors bought the building and started the restoration, they wanted to have as many pieces of the original station as possible, so they asked everybody who had taken something from the abandoned building to return these pieces, no questions asked. And people started to bring these things back! There is a whole exhibit on the station’s ground floor showing what was returned – it’s amazing! Not just small objects, but the pieces of staircases, parts of light fixtures, and even the big clock!

Continue reading “Michigan Central Restoration” →