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Trip to Chicago Part 1 - Where to stay and eat
So have a few free moments after returning from Chicago. Lots of folks have been asking for a quick breakdown on the trip. In short, it was a great trip. Chicago is a great metropolitan city with all that you would expect (great food, shopping, sites) and some things you wouldn't (very nice people and surprisingly very affordable).
We flew in to Midway on Thursday and headed straight for our hotel. We stayed at the Palmer House Hilton ($75 a night from Priceline!) on Monroe and Wabash. Super conveniently located hotel in the middle of the city. It has an L stop right outside and is only a block away from Millennium Park, The Art Institute of Chicago, and the Chicago Harbor. Plus there's a 24 hour CVS across the street and a Dunkin' Donuts around the corner. Just for shits and grins, I toured a high rise condo across the street from the hotel, the Park Monroe. Super luxurious with amazing views of the water, the city, and the park. What was crazy was how cheap (relatively speaking) these were. A 2BR, 2BA 1400+ square foot unit with water and city views was selling for only $600K. The salesperson even hinted I could bid much lower and probably have my offer accepted. A comparable location in San Francisco would be the Embarcadero Plaza area just outside the Financial District and the same unit would probably sell for twice the price. Even crazier were the 1BR, 1BA 900+ square foot units which were only selling for $300K! There are condos in Oakland that are smaller and more expensive than that! I guess it just highlights how out of whack Bay Area real estate still is. On to the food. We did our share of high-end and normal food. On the high-end side we hit Alinea and Blackbird. Both good though I have a hard time justifying the cost of Alinea. I guess it's one of those "do it once" type of places. Impeccable service and definitely high on the creativity scale. We opted for the monstrous 35+ course tasting menu (a 4.5 hour meal!). Though I definitely felt as if some of the dishes were more about the flash than the actual substance. Blackbird, on the other hand, was much more reasonable and the flavors were very good. We also hit Miller's Pub a few times. Just a no nonsense pub with very good food. It's right next to the Palmer House so we were able to sneak over whenever we had a craving for a midnight snack or drinks. They're open until 4am and seemingly always busy. Great buffalo wings and a pretty decent fish and chips. Sausages with peppers and onions was not bad and though I didn't have it, they are known for their Canadian baby back ribs. All in all, I'd have no problem vacationing in Chicago again. If I had the dough, I'd even consider owning one of those condos and renting it out!Comments [6]
Tara's Ice Cream
Taking a stroll in the old hood. Dinner at Tachibana and then dessert at Tara's Ice Cream. Really interesting flavors. I ended up getting Chocolate, Turkish Coffee, and Tasmanian Honey. Wife got Sage, Saffron, and Pink Peppercorn. I even tried Lemongrass! Not my favorite but interesting to see the experimentation.
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Getting caught between the rain and Jack London Square
So I'm back on the bike today. My short term schedule will be Mon, Wed, and Fri with basketball on Tues. Once I'm in better shape, I'll add Thurs to the mix. Bad news was about 15 minutes into the ride, it starts to drizzle. Not a ton of rain but enough to fog up my glasses which was a pain.
Good news though is that I found a new route to work which has fewer cars. I basically hit Webster at 51st and ride it all the way down to about 29th Street where Webster hits Broadway. I then cut over to Telegraph till it ends at about 16th Street. I went down Clay the first time around but that had its issues. Today, I went two streets over to MLK and took that all the way down to 2nd. Far fewer cars but slightly longer. Also there's a nasty little hill on Webster by the hospital. No worries though, in time, I'll be able to power through it.Comments [0]
My first day of bicycling to work
I inherited my brother-in-law's old mountain bike and decided to start biking to work. Our office has a shower to encourage people to bike to work plus I need to start thinking about getting into better shape. My route is basically to go down Telegraph Avenue from Rockridge towards Downtown Oakland and then cutting over to Clay to avoid Broadway which is always packed with cars. The only issue I found was that Clay is a pretty narrow street that runs along City Center and the Federal Building so there's always a fair amount of delivery trucks. Maybe I'll cut over one more street to Jefferson next time. Overall, it felt good to bike in. Since I'm going downhill in the morning, I'm not sure how I'll feel tonight when I have to bike back uphill. Hopefully after a few weeks of doing this, my body will build up the necessary stamina. No pain, no gain, I suppose.
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Shots of the new office
So it took me a few days, but here are some shots of the new office. In the week or so that we've been here, the building was renamed from the original "The London Building" at 160 Franklin to now being known as "The Commons at Jack London Square" as to incorporate the three buildings on the block (160 Franklin, 140 Franklin, and 384 Embarcadero West). Here are some exterior shots of the new mural painted alongside the back of the three buildings:
As I said earlier, the inside is currently being renovated to reflect a more minimalistic industrial design. The great thing is the original brick is still maintained. Here are some hallway and stairwell shots.
Our suite is pretty simple. Couple of private offices and a large open area. We're not fans of private offices so we're using one as a conference room and another may house 2-3 folks. Our landlords at Equistone were nice enough to provide us with some desks, chairs, and a conference table. Still need to get some more desks for the open area and some whiteboards. Not entirely visible are the four large skylights that bathe the suite in natural light. For most of the day, we never turn on any of the fluorescents. That'll probably change as we enter the winter months but the spring/summer months should provide enough natural light for the entire day. An amazing suite in the building that was recently renovated has glass walls for each of the offices so the natural light flows from the ceiling and the office windows. Maybe if we expand, we'll ask for these TI's in our next space.
Part of the charm of the neighborhood is that we're in the heart of the Produce District. Below is a shot from our conference room of the warehouses just outside of the building. From midnight to about 10am, there is a bustling produce trade with goods being trucked in from all across California and the Port of Oakland. Small grocery store owners and restaurants come by to get their produce for the day. Taco trucks and other street food vendors set up shop during this busy time to support the workers in the area.
Finally, some pictures of our view outside of the conference room of Downtown Oakland and the Oakland Hills.
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Taco Truck Tuesday
Took a break from moving into the new office. Tacos El Gordo is in a different location during the day (usually on International and High Street at night). No nonsense, cheap, and good.
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Centrro is moving again!
It seems like only yesterday that we moved but now we're at it again. After the BarNone acquisition, we were starting to get very cramped in our current shared office space. Thankfully, we were able to sign a lease in a great building just a few blocks away. The London Building is just across the street from the Barnes and Noble in Jack London Square, right in the heart of the produce district. It's been newly renovated and is LEED certified with the latest green features. Our top floor suite has a ton of natural light and beautiful exposed brick on one side. Our official move in date is Monday so I'll snap a few shots then and post here.
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