For the last week I have been in Cincinnati. It was my first business trip since March 2020 and I have been working all day and entertaining customers at night (which is also work). On Thursday one of our guests remarked with a combination of admiration and disdain on my ability to nurse a single beer (2 hours).
It has been nearly 50 years since I was last in Cincinnati; it has grown up a bit in the interim. Where I was reminded me of Oakbrook or Schaumburg 50 years ago which is a bit hard to explain if you’re not a Chicagoan. New hotels and office buildings, lots of open space, rather few people. Not completely built over.
The people in Cincinnati remind me of those in St. Louis in my youth in their looks, speech, and demeanor. Very unlike Chicago. Mostly people of Western European descent or black, rather few Hispanics or Asians.
I was also treated to what was possibly the best bourbon I had ever sampled: Weller 12 Year Old. Unlike most bourbons nowadays it actually tasted like bourbon.
It was also the first time I had physically met any of my colleagues at my present employer. We got along famously.
“…entertaining customers at night (which is also work)”
Ain’t that the truth.
“Where I was reminded me of Oakbrook or Schaumburg 50 years ago…)
Less distant, but… I remember driving out from the city to far west Naperville in the early nineties to purchase a set of golf clubs. The store was at Route 59 and Naperville (North Aurora) Road. It was in the middle of corn fields, a few small businesses like HVAC contractors, and a lonely lumber yard. Today any solid drive and 5 iron in any direction is a zoo. Restaurants, a hotel, apt buildings, retail of all kinds. Rt 59 is at least 4 lanes now, and when we left it was planning on going 6 lanes so people from S Naperville (which was ALL cornfields back then) could come up and catch the train to work in the city. Over-cooked. Cincinnati and Indianapolis have similarities. The Indianapolis I knew growing up…………..well, enough of this.
The road construction around Indianapolis was extraordinary.
I got from Chicago to Cincinnati by driving. In theory it should have taken about the same amount of time to drive as to fly but all of the road construction added at least an hour to my travel time each way from detours to avoid the construction.
The only thing I actually was concerned about in the drive was driving on the Dan Ryan. You just don’t know what to expect these days between random shootings, people dropping things off overpasses, and carjackings.
It did bolster my view that the interstates are overbuilt. What’s the ROI on an interstate linking Peoria with Indianapolis?
“What’s the ROI on an interstate linking Peoria with Indianapolis?”
Depends on whether or not you are a Bradley student looking for a rode trip to Indy………..
My brother tells me Indy has reached a sort of Chicago-like permanent road construction mode. Why the Dan Ryan and not the Skyway?
Skyway to the Dan Ryan to the Loop to the Edens.
Unless you’re planning on getting off the Skyway and taking Stony Island to Lake Shore Drive, it’s about the only way to do it.
Bradley enrollment is around 5,000.
Weller 12 is excellent but, lot most Buffalo Trace products, damned near impossible to find the last four or five years. I prefer the Weller Antique, which is 107 proof, but haven’t been able to find it in years.
All of the Weller line are wheaters, whereas most bourbons use rye as their primary backup grain. (All bourbons are, by law, at least 51% corn.) Makers Mark is the most readily available wheater and its cask strength expression is especially good.
The “Peoria” interstate also links to Springfield, Champaign, Bloomington and the quad cities.
We drove through Indy a couple of weeks ago. The worst part was straight east of the city where they are doing a complete teardown. This is what my highway construction relative thinks we need more of, less replacing the top few inches all of the time. It’s Hell.
I guess I’m dating myself. Many times Stony Island to LSD. But I lived at Columbus Ave just south of the river, not Sauganash. I’m not sure what kind of shape Stony Island is these days even during the day.
Coming back from the mill with my buddy Art it was often East Chicago through Whiting and practically any damned road from there. Probably not too smart, but I was 22-24.
“The worst part was straight east of the city where they are doing a complete teardown.”
I assume that means I70, and that they are connecting with Greenfield. It used to be that life ended at German Church road and the corn fields began. If you were out there it was for beer, girls and pot.