WARNING: very long post!

*I honestly tried not to be wordy, but some details just must remain with the story*

You ever have a day when you leave the house and things just aren't going right and you feel like maybe you should turn around and go home???

Well we (me, Austin, Andi, John, & Lyndsay) had a day like that.

And if we were a little more faint-hearted, we might have gone back home.

But we stuck it out.

And endured the most bizzare day we've had in Chicago thus far.

1. When we got downstairs to head downtown, the bus tracker said it would be 13 minutes til the next "3 bus" came. So we decided to wait inside where it was warm (rather than go outside in the 20 something degree weather). While standing inside, we see two buses we needed head north. Great.

2. We decide to get ourselves to the bus stop. We get on the "4 bus."

We ride for about 5 blocks and while sitting at a stop, a van whizzes by and HITS THE BUS.

We have to get off the bus and load onto another bus (no one was injured).

3. We finally get to our bus stop. We are enjoying our walk near the river downtown. All of the sudden, police officers on 4 wheelers start pulling up....weird. And then we hear it.

Protesting.

Animal rights protestors with at least 15 police escorts marching through the streets with posters of mistreated animals. They march right past us. Trying to pass out information to us. All the while, some are wearing leather shoes....hmmm.

Unfortunately, the protestors decided to be everywhere we wanted to be for the next 10 minutes or so. And you can't imagine how many people were out. This was "Black Friday!!!"

4. So after my blood pressure went back down after the screaming and pictures of bloody pigs, we decide to duck into some stores (no pun intended). We quickly realized that you could hardly move once you got inside any store. There are a lot of people out there looking for a bargain.

So what would you do??

Well we decided to head to Giordano's for some delicious Chicago pizza.

Nothing can be wrong with that, right??

5. Giordano's is crowded. But it usually is. So I muscle my way up to put our name on the list and we are quoted an hour and a half wait. She also asked that we please preorder our pizza in 45 minutes so that, when our table is ready 45 minutes after that, we won't have to wait on the pizza.

Okay. We can handle that.

After 20 minutes of standing, we finally score a small table and some chairs in the "waiting area." We order our pizza after 45 minutes.

After an hour of waiting, we decide to order an appetizer and some drinks from the bartender.

The most apathetic bartender ever.

We had to go fetch our own appetizer and we determined it had been sitting at the bar long enough to be half way between hot & cold. Ugh.

TWO hours later, our name is called.

We sit down.

And wait.

10 minutes later, our not hot, cheese is already set up, sausage & green pepper pizza is presented to us.

What?!?!? We just waited two hours for cold pizza??

No way. Not us.

My very diplomatic cousin, Lyndsay, catches the eye of the manager.

"Is everything good over here?" - Manager

"Umm, actually, no. Everything is not good." - Lyndsay

After a short discussion of the situation, the manager is having our pizza remade.

Now we must wait 45 MORE minutes for our pizza.

Time drags on but we try to make the best of it by making jokes and laughing.

And then it arrives.

A hot, steamy, cheesy, saucy, spinach and mushroom pizza?!?!

"Uh, that's not our pizza" - Me

"I'm gonna kill those people back there." - our waitress

She had already served two of us. The pieces went back in the pan. And she returned shortly after, with our long awaited pizza.

FINALLY! The pizza was delicious, but I spent almost 4 hours in that restaurant. And it's going to be a long time before I'm willing to go back.

You think it's over, right?

There can't possibly be anything left to talk about.

HA.

Stay tuned for the last installment of "weirdest day in Chicago."

I've gotta quit blogging and get ready to start back to school tomorrow.

See you soon.