Madnessmatrix | Eric Bowers Photography

I’m posting this from the sidewalk in front of a hostel in Chicago’s loop. I figured I would forgo the racket of paying $250 per night for a room, and instead pay $30 for a bed downtown. All of that is well and good, and I’ve taken over 600 pictures in less than three days, but a cold that was developing within my innards before leaving Kansas City has taken an uptick, and now I’m hacking, and probably making all my bunkmates sick in the hostel as well.

Also, I can be a doddering boob sometimes. Nearly all of my Chicago photos have been from the downtown area. Although downtown Chicago is expansive enough to keep a photographer busy, I found myself walking around in circles and not realizing it. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve traversed State Street and Michigan Avenue. Which, by the way, gives me something else to complain about - my camera, a Canon 5D, is just heavy enough to put a strain on your neck if you walk around with it long enough.

I wanted to explore and photograph one of the more notable Chicago neighborhoods, so Lincoln Park sprang to mind. Of course, in my blithering, doddering, spazzmatic method, I got on the wrong train and rode way the hell out to some place I couldn’t recognize. So I got an another train headed back toward the city. I stopped in some other neighborhood and ate breakfast food at 2 pm.

And also, my legs are severely taxed after all the walking (600 pictures of downtown Chicago translates into a lot of walking), so I hobbled and hacked my way back to the hostel, saying to myself, to hell with it, 600 pictures is enough. I’m supposed to land at KCI at about 1pm tomorrow (Sunday), but given that the airlines are managed by a gaggle of mewling chimpanzees, I’m not holding out on that working out either.