Hi ya'll! It's been what? A month? As a kinda-sorta teacher that means my summer is halfway over... I'm not ready yet. There's so much to do and so much to see. I have managed to check some things off my summer bucket list though. Want a roundup of my actions? Here it is!!!!

The easiest action item on my list is undoubtedly the ICE CREAM CONE box.. coincidentally (?) there are also multiple of these on my list. Truthfully, I have probably used them all up because: 

IamanadultandcanstopbyMcDonald'sfora99centconeonmywayhomefromworkifIwantto

However, one I chose to count and highlight is when my sister, my nephew, my PaPa and I went out for National Ice Cream day last weekend. There's a small batch ice cream shop in my community called Go! Ice Cream which is amazeballs. I tried their ice cream before they moved into the storefront and it was literally ice cream for sale on the go: a bike food cart. It was great to experience Go! Ice Cream's glow up with 3 generations of my family together. Additionally, the shop had a special sundae/cone just for the holiday. It was a confetti waffle cone, scoops of sweetened brown butter ice cream, chocolate shell and a dusting of Pop Rocks!!!! It was literally a musical treat in my mouth. Do you remember the sound Pop Rocks make when eaten? I do. It was nostalgia and my brown girl bougie tendencies all in a cone! 

Last month I also took a 3 day trip to Chicago and managed to get in a lot of action in a weekend. I must #humblebrag that I was able to do so much in such a small span of time. Usually at some point the reality that I have a chronic illness catches up with my and my side effect symptoms flare up. That weekend I magically got through like an ac tual healthy person! 

Upon arrival I did what any respectable person would do: when my friend Lilly mentioned a street festival with tacos I said "Yes and...." So Lilly, picked me up and we headed to Pilsen for aptly named: Taco Fest. Over the course of 2.5 hours we managed to have a great time while hacking the festival by habitually picking the shortest line no matter what and buying whatever we could at the end of it. There were elotes, tacos of multiple varieties, Micheladas and Coronas.







After eating our fill in the hot heat of Chicago in the summer we walked over to a local brewery to kick back in the AC and "hydrate." Unfortunately I was so bust wiping sweat from my brow that there are no picture. After an afternoon of food and fun I went back to Lilly's for a power nap before my night time shenanigans. What was planned you ask? I found a Groupon for a live comedy show which was actually being taped for the comic's special. My very good friend from undergrad Ben, agreed to meet me at the show downtown to see Barry Brewer crack some jokes. 

An interesting thing happened on my way to the show... My power nap ran late and then my Lyft driver showed up in a minivan (plot twist!) and only drove 40mi/hr on Lakeshore Dr. If you've ever tried to get from north of downtown and taken Lakeshore in Chicago you know that speed is to slow. In short, I was late and my friend Ben being the only White Jewish man in the audience was a champ for being that random White dude at a Black comedy show. He literally had a mote of space around him when I arrived. Later on over tapas at Cafe Ba Ba Reeba he joked that he wanted to announce, "I was invited, I am not crashing this sacred space!!!" I told Ben, I was pretty sure there'd be a closeup of his reaction when Barry made "White people be like..." jokes in during the video recording.




The next morning I woke up refreshed and ready to eat. I had plans for framily brunch with Lilly, another undergrad friend Melanie, and a Americorpse cohort member Gilad. I was super excited to connect with Melanie, and Gilad whom I hadn't seen in ages. They both opened their homes and hearts to me when I used to travel to Chicago on a regular basis. Additionally, Melanie has been working on rehabing her home to make it super hippie certified and LEED certified as well. 


My trip to Chicago, is only part of my month of making summer happen. I also made plans and broke them because I had a flair up of side effects/was too tired/or literally too sick. However, below are highlights of some of the plans I made and kept. Here's to keeping oneself accountable regarding scheduling self-care and "me time."







Whew! I've been busy ya'll. To close out here's an update version of my Summer Bucket List 2017.