Interview Trail Stop #7: Chicago, Illinois

Chicago Skyline
Originally uploaded by ironchefmike.

My second visit to the Windy City, unfortunately a little less fun than the last - nothing bad, but just a bunch of mildly annoying things that added up to an unpleasant experience. To wit:

• crazy cab drivers driving me between the hotel and the airport, a journey making the chase scene from The French Connection look like child's play
• ambulance sirens keeping me from a restful sleep
  
• my return flight to Boston being delayed over and over again, eventually being cancelled - I wasn't prepared to spend 10 hours in the airport. 'Plan A' was to read my Neurology textbook. That kept me busy for the first 5 hours. I eventually came up with 'Plan B', which was essentially doing a bar tour down each concourse of the airport, then sitting down and writing Thank You notes to the program directors of the programs that I've interviewed at. Really - such an AWESOME plan.
  
• an extra night in a hotel - dang these Chicago hotels are expensive!
• the airline overbooking every single return flight the next day
• having to find an alternative way to get home on one of the heaviest travel days of the year, combined with my total suckitude in doing so - if this were an episode of The Amazing Race, I'd be so eliminated

Somewhere amongst those things I had another interview.