two wednesdays ago, aaron, katie, emili and i headed out on the road to go to the chicago zine fest. we drove through the night.
we arrived thursday around 3pm. first thing, we met up with leslie at stanley’s, my favorite chicago produce market (i even have their logo tattooed on me).
we picked up some snacks before heading to get some real lunch at sultan’s, chicago’s best cheap falafel!
then we stopped over to hang out at leslie’s house, where amy leigh, from toronto, was already chooglin.
everyone was really sleepy from their travels, so we just layed low for an hour or two to catch up on rest
then i parted ways and met up with daniel for a fancy dinner, one on one. we went to the publican. it was really delicious! we’ve been trying to go to a different fancy, bougie restaurant every time one of us visits. it’s a fun departure from reality, and something we can afford only because we see each other so infrequently (every few months).
after dinner, we met back up with aaron and katie and emili, and we all called it an early night since everyone was still so exhausted from the overnight drive. we crashed at d’s and woke up to egon making friends with everyone.
egon the dog and his big mouth
on friday morning we met up with a crew of people at the handlebar for brunch. it’s weird going there now that i’m not vegan and realizing i can eat pretty much anything on the menu!
amy leigh and emili
aaron, from philly. khristina from NJ. amy leigh from toronto. and katie from philly.
then we headed downtown for the first event of the chicago zine fest
the first event was a silver tongue reading and a panel on race, gender and sexuality in self-publishing with anne elizabeth moore, cristy road, and mimi thi nugyen.
leslie and jen, two zine fest organizers, overseeing the conversation
after the event, katie, aaron, shira and i walked to staples to make copies of new zines
walking back to the train to head up to the evening reading, chicago had a very 80′s color scheme due to reflections from the sunset
we missed the kids’ reading because we took too long at staples. fortunately, we caught the entire adult reading.
leslie, playing MC, and an asl interpreter caught in a funny moment
jim joyce, always a favorite
following tradition from the previous two years, the reading was packed, with all chairs filled and people standing all around the edges and many having to sit on the floor.
helping put the room back together, post-reading
the last event of friday night was the zinester olympics. my favorite thing about CZF is that it’s always included kind of cheesy events that could either be a flop, or be really fun. it’s totally dependent on how willing people are to get really into them and just have fun with it. zinester olympics was like that, and in true czf fashion, people had a blast. lots of yelling and cheering, cheesy team names, celebrations, etc. the first event was stapling for accuracy, for time. teams sent one representative to try to staple within specific targets, in a certain order, as fast as they could.
billy da bunny invented zinester olympics, and reffed. he was really funny. he’s a chicago native but lives in new mexico now.
aaron, stapling for my team, the liberty belles.
he did……not good.
some person was shit talkin to fil
i love that heather is ducking here
heather and jen, serious time keepers
my event was precision cutting
we had to try to cut shapes as close to the original as possible
khristina and shira
matt walsh and aaron, two of my teammates
i won a bronze medal in precision cutting. that’s leslie, one of my chicago favorites, and an organizer of czf. we finished up around 1am and then went back to daniel’s to crash.
daniel reading list #15, on saturday morning. preview!
on saturday morning we headed down to columbia and set up our tables for chicago zine fest.
aaron’s table
one of my earliest visitors at my table was my old nanny family from chicago, rishi and ravi and their parents, ranj and rohit! it was great to see them.
rishi hung out for a good while behind my table
rishi, reading an older issue of my zine. i nannied for rishi from when he was a brand new one year old, until he was two and a half.
his younger brother ravi. i watched ravi from when he was newborn age until he was one and a half.
d. visiting my table. i got to table right next to amy leigh!
matt walsh at the diy chicago table
a visit from daniel’s roommate, bouchard. bouchard is egon the dog’s person.
a pretty fun and cool thing that chicago events often have is glitter guts, a free “photobooth”
other visitors, molly, marissa and dylan
2012 czf organizers
another family i sat for in chicago also visited. they’ve gone to czf each year! this is celeste and her parents, rachel and jason
lil cutie celeste
after 7 hours of tabling, czf was over! aaron, katie and i headed back to logan square to eat burritos and drop off stuff.
after a quick bite, we headed down to pilsen for the czf after party, a big karaoke night at the spaceship, a loft apartment that does shows and art shows. pete was visiting from new york and showed up with daniel.
karaoke went really late on saturday night. people had a blast. sunday morning, i got coffee and said goodbye to D.
then i went to a post-fest brunch at leslie’s house, where lots of other zine folks were hangin out.
bloomington, montreal, ohio, dc
trying on leslie’s fake glasses
khristina trying out leslie’s foam roller
bum, leslie’s cat. typical bum pose.
getting tacos before heading out of town for another all night drive, this time with the DC crew.
i rode back with shira, jen, fil, and melissa (i think?). i slept most of monday at mikey’s house, and monday night went to see tin armor and delay.
jen, lizz and shira. dc babes. well, jen lives in chicago, but she’s still a dc babe.
celebrating beautiful weather with rooftop hangs outside of mikey’s bedroom.
i know what you did last summer
at sticky fingers on tuesday
before going back to lizz’s to watch buffy
after buffy, we returned to mikey’s house to find tin armor and delay there playing hackey sack
it was the beginning of the first week to really feel like spring time
we appropriately chilled out pretty hard before i hopped on a megabus and headed back to philly.
oh hey, look-more-wasted-than-i-actually-am eyes.
thanks for that one, rambo ;P