Shileen's Blog

Story conference itself was good, but not great. We all agreed that this year it was a bit too philosophical and not very practical. Although we each took away some very useful things to ponder.
The highlight for me was Chicago, the city. After spending the previous day walking everywhere, I convinced the guys to take us to the Sears tower, and oh wow, it was amazing. They had a skywalk where you could step out on the glass floor past the building and see straight down. The first step was kinda scary, but then it was just pure awesome. After this we decided to hit Chinatown for dinner. Another crazy experience. Our waitress didn't speak good english and got our order wrong and then went home. Our second waitress said we ordered"too much food" so she didn't serve us what we ordered. A couple of us actually left hungry so we wanted to stop for ice cream, however since dinner took like 3 hours everything was closed, except a gas station. The ice cream there was amazing.

Chef Isaac in Chinatown, serving up "hotpot"

alone in a dark rainy city looking for the train to the airport

the Story stage

I am so glad I went. The whirlwind tour of the city with friends was so much fun, and I haven't laughed like that in a very long time. When you get 9 creative minds in one minivan (very tight) you are bound to laugh until you hurt. So thankful for this opportunity.
Friday night, when it was time to go, Audra and Laura headed to Midland, but my flight was out of O'Hare several hours later, and the guys flight wasn't until the next morning. So I rode with the guys down to the pier to do some shooting. However it started to rain and it was getting dark by the time we got there and at this point I was an hour and a half away from my airport on public transport so I said goodbye and went and waited for a bus. In the rain, and cold wind, for 25 minutes. It never came. So I picked a different route (Thank God for Google maps that has transit info) and hopped on a different bus. 15 stops later and it tells me to get off and walk a block to the train. So I did. No train. Another block, couldn't find the train. For the past 3 days we've ridden elevated trains. This one happened to be a subway, so a nice old man pointed out the hole in the ground to me. An hour later I finally arrived, and I rode in first class all the way home :)
My need for great adventures was satisfied.. for the time being..