I realise I have failed to mention it thus far in this blog… but in addition to doing a spot of city-hopping and attending the wedding of two very good friends, this trip across the pond has another reason behind it. An ulterior motive, if you like. Through a rare coincidence of the most convenient type, I happened to secure employment for a year (in the form of an internship) at the very same time and in the very same place in which I’d already booked flights to attend the aforementioned nuptials. Chicago, baby!

It was quite a spontaneous affair. I received confirmation that I’d got the job about 6 weeks before it started, and after an arduous process, my visa arrived a stressful 2 days before I was scheduled to leave the country. But hey, life’s too short to plan ahead.. sometimes you just have to roll with what pops up!

Anyway. So I arrived in Chicago last night. The flight from Buffalo was enjoyable. We flew over Detroit first and you’re like ‘ooh, that’s a big city’, then about 1o minutes later when you’re still an hour from landing you just see this enormous orange glow in the far-distance against the pitch blackness of Lake Michigan, and it gets bigger and bigger as you approach. The amount of light given off by Chicago is unreal, and it just sprawls as far as you can see.

Pretty sure the pilot had a seizure slash sneezed onto his joystick right after I took this photo, because the poor little plane did some pretty scary shit and for a moment I thought I wouldn’t actually get to see any more of Chicago than this.. but all was good and he landed fairly competently at O’Hare.

It’s gonna be kind of a manic few days while I get settled, go to work for my first two days, and then try to get myself to Wausau for this wedding, but today is my first day in my new home-from-home so I’m going to go out and see what she’s got to offer!