Home again
The last leg of my trip was a random frozen whirlwind. I got to spend time with my great friend Veronica, the very best bit of the worst job I've ever had, back in another life. We'd planned to Ferris Bueller our way around the city like we did when I lived there, but the weather had other plans, namely, freezing rain. So we decided on the spur of the moment to drive up to Milwaukee for the night. Before we left, we grabbed the most perfect breakfast of my life at Nellie's Restaurant in Humboldt Park. If you have never had proper Puerto Rican breakfast, I weep for you. Get to Nellie's and have the avena de coco. Trust Candy. I have no pics of this: we ate it. On the way back to the car I stopped in the freezing rain to snap this fantastic mural.
Total surprise: Milwaukee is way hipstery! I had no idea. I'd only been once for a comedy show and unfairly judged the city on the sea of neckbeards in plaid flannel at the venue. Sorry I had you all wrong, mate. Veronica's only wish was for comfort food, specifically meatloaf and mashed potatoes. I googled up what looked like the spot and we took an uber (that was almost certainly a litterbox in its off time) to the Comet Cafe. I have never before been in any restaurant where I felt so strongly that I was in an indie film. If you're in Milwaukee, get there. I rarely order cocktails off a drink menu, but their Key to Happiness is so close to what I drink at home, I had one. Ok I had two. I can't remember all that's in theirs, but for the curious, my drink is a nice bourbon on ice, couple dashes of spiced cherry bitters, fancy Italian Luxardo cherries, a little cherry syrup and a splash of ginger ale (I call it an Old Cherry). Veronica got her meatloaf and the most decadent cheesy mashed potatoes in America. There was also coconut cream pie. Then a coma.
The next morning was bright and brutally cold. We took a quick driving tour and stopped to grab a few photos of the Milwaukee Art Museum, starting with this orange star, The Calling, by Mark di Suvero.
It closes its wings twice a day and we caught them folding in on the way out.
From the city i headed out to the burbs for dinner with my high school bestie, Allen. We had a fancy tapas dinner at Mesón Sabika in Naperville, a mansion that's been converted into a beautiful restaurant. The food was fantastic. The manager thought we were a couple and sent over free champagne. I blame the hangover on that champagne. I was so happy to have a few hours afterward to catch up with one of my favorite friends, Taylor, who I met at a wedding a few years back. He's the nephew I never had, and so much fun. We took a tour of the local bars and I realized: I cannot hang with the under-40s. I overslept and missed my window to get to House on the Rock, but there's always next year. The last few days of my trip were spent back at mom's, getting glared at by her cats and learning to crochet. I feel like crochet is my birthright; I spent my childhood watching my grandmother crochet and my mom has made me the most beautiful blankets throughout my life. I always knew how to make a chain but after that, I was lost. Mom was a patient teacher and I've come home and bought my own hooks and yarn and a how-to book, and I'm hoping to whip up some better things than this first effort to throw into my holiday care packages this Christmas.
The flight back to LA was an hour fast, and I arrived home to summer heat in low winter afternoon light: as surreal as being back in my hometown. The Viking and I put together a late Thanksgiving feast and put up our Christmas tree. Early, like everyone else, it seems. I'd had serious FOMO seeing my friends' and family's posts on facebook of their gorgeous dinners and fairy lights. I've never had a tree up so early, but this is my first Christmas in California and I am happy to have it be a long holiday season. The Swedes do it right: as soon as it the days get short, the lights go up.
As ever, thanks for visiting, and if you hosted me or hung out with me in Chicago, thank you so much! The only real gift we have to give is our time, and I'm so grateful you shared yours with me. Before the creeping crud sent me to the doctor, I started plotting my December muse. Watch this space for upcoming holiday madness. xo, Candy Hometown touristIt's been sort of surreal to be back in Chicago after three years in Los Angeles. There was a blizzard raging when I left. After about a thousand days of reliably gorgeous California weather, my heart has hardened against my hometown. Of course, it's cold and raining as I write this, which isn't helping. What has softened me a bit has been spending time with people who mean so much to me. The first few days here were for family and old friends. Mom drove me out to the Morton Arboretum to try and see a few changing leaves, but like the song, all the leaves were brown and the sky was grey. Still, it was lovely to be out in the trees. I love the smell of fallen leaves in crisp air, and there was the very last of the fall color to be found.
It's actually called Illinois Landscape No. 5, by artist John Henry. I was happily surprised with a park full of great art. The Viking laughed when I sent him a link to the collection; he ran through the site's pics and it is something like this: abstract metal sculpture, abstract rubber sculpture, abstract metal sculpture, huge lumberjack, abstract metal sculpture. And though the weather was trash and the ground was mucky and wet, I trudged around to see a few and to get up close with that lumberjack. Phoenix by Edvins Strautmanis:
Frame by Richard Rezac:
Flying Saucer by Jene Highstein:
If you're a Stephen King fan like me, Tony Tasset's Paul will forever be the one you imagine tormenting Richie Tozier in Bassey Park. Though from behind, he's kind of sad.
From the sculpture park I headed downtown and caught up with both my lovely friend Tania and a very old buddy, Chicago deep dish pizza. After our dinner I can now definitively declare: I prefer thin crust to deep dish pizza. Add it to my List of Unpopular Opinions, with love of lemon Starburst and pickles on my peanut butter and jelly. Still, it's pretty. This one is from Lou Malnati's. Likely, my final deep dish. Au revoir, le pizza.
After pizza we headed up to the Signature Lounge on the 95th floor of the Hancock Tower. It's free to ride up to the lounge, you just have to grab a drink. Tip for tourists: the ladies' room has unobstructed views. You can press your face and phone right up against the glass and get great pics (no such view in the men's).
I'm spending the rest of the weekend with my bestie Veronica, and I'm SO excited that her son is working at this amazing Cuban fusion place, Nini's Deli. Check their Instagram for droolworthy pics. We went for lunch and I'll be dreaming of the chicken empanadas until I get another one. It's a family run business, and I have never felt more warmly welcomed or more like family. We ordered as much as we could! The cafe con leche had an impossible tower of cinnamon dusted whipped cream. The plantains were dreamy. The elote. Was crusted. In hot cheetos! Just let that sink in for a second. We had four kinds of empanadas. I suspect I'll have to visit again before I leave. Go if you can!
xo, Candy
November muse: Alex HensleyMaking friends with people is super hard. I meet people but sometimes feel I don't know how to, like, human properly. This January will mark my third year of living in Los Angeles, and I'm proud to say I've made a few true friends in LA. The very first friend I made here is Alex, my muse this month (next month's muse might be a chocolate glazed from Bob's Donuts, so enjoy this beautiful person-centric post). We just did an incredible shoot in an historic Hollywood building. Alex rocks a suit like nobody's business. Back in 2015, the Viking and I decided to go out and try something new: leave the house, talk to strangers, maybe make some friends. We went to a daytime wine tasting in Santa Monica and (not on purpose) sat at a table with--straight up--the weirdest people I've ever met. Not fun weird, just weird (and we are the kind of people who surreptitiously googled the weirdest guy after he gave me his business card...disbarred lawyer! disco!). But the server was funny and charismatic, and she seemed instantly familiar to me in a way that made me hope we'd be friends (could've also been the wine). The Viking and I got stupid, purple-toothed daytime drunk, and chatted with her after the tasting. I gave her my card and we talked about maybe doing a photo shoot. I guess this is a thing that happens all the time in LA, though I've found people rarely mean it when they talk about making plans. It's like asking strangers "how are you?" in that it's just a thing people say when they're really thinking about themselves. For Alex and me, this was different, though, and in the weeks that followed we got together, conceptualized a crazy fun shoot, shopped for wardrobe at the consignment shop, and took our partners out to the desert to shoot. In many ways it was the oddest photo shoot I've ever done: four strangers stuck in a car together for hours on the way to the desert, then me bossing them all around for the rest of the day. It turned into an all-time favorite shoot, as we collaborated completely and had a wonderful time and launched a fantastic friendship. Also I love to be bossy. I am a boss.
A very bizarre aside: I saw with shock that Alex is Facebook friends with someone I knew from another life. I called to ask how she knows him, and they used to work together in North Carolina. It's my ex-fiance. Small world, y'all. Tiny. I can't always make it to all my friends' shows, but Alex is the Executive Producer and Artistic Director of a comedy group called the Fun Police, and I shot their hilarious Halloween show. In one sketch Alex played Samara the drowned horror girl from The Ring and her partner played an agent trying to sign her. I caught the giggles so bad I had to pinch myself to stop or I was gonna make a scene in the small theater.
After Halloween we decided to do a different kind of shoot than I'd done before, and as ever, her openness to my ideas, generosity with her own, and her willingness to collaborate made these photos some of the best I've ever taken. I am so proud of the images we made together. I love watching her success: just last week she was on American Horror Story: Cult (grateful to have been spared watching her get murdered, but as ever, she lit up the screen). I'm so thankful for her kindness in my life and that we get to make this gorgeous art together.
As always, thanks for visiting! xo, Candy Bright lights, big citySpent the afternoon wandering some amazing furniture and art shops and exercising profound self-control in purchasing almost nothing. It was another stunning fall day in Los Angeles: huge puffy clouds, low sun, the slightest chill in the air, with a sky so clear that the mountains loomed in the distance looking so crisp and close enough to touch. On a whim, I packed up the camera and drove up to Mulholland Drive to get some nice shots of the city from above. The first stop was at the Universal City Overlook. There seems to be a storm over the mountains, but more importantly, if you look closely, there's Hogwarts down there! I wanted to see the city, so just another five minutes up the twisty mountain road is the Jerome C. Daniel Overlook. The sun had just slipped behind the mountain when I arrived. Bonus points that I didn't have to drive on the freeways to get home.
Good night, Los Angeles! xo, Candy Creepy fun for Halloween: House on the Rock
I've been meaning to put this post together since American Gods was on TV this year, but Halloween is the perfect time to share. If you haven't read Neil Gaiman's American Gods, the iconic House on the Rock is in a pivotal scene. I'm a massive fan of the novel and after I settled back in the states in Chicago, I made many trips to Spring Green, Wisconsin to visit. It's much more than just a house, and if you haven't been it's tough to explain. Very small part house, very large part extreme oddity museum, it takes about four hours to walk through the sprawling complex of buildings and exhibits. The man that built it was an eccentric collector of...everything. He just kept adding on to the house to accommodate his collections. The tour starts in the "house" section of the property with Asian art and artifacts and a ton of Tiffany stained glass. Before you know it, you're going past room after room of musical automatons: rooms full of instruments that play themselves. There's a room full of airplanes. A room with cars--including one completely covered in tiles. Halls of armor and weapons, cobblestone Streets of Yesterday. And then it gets weird. Here is a small selection of some of my favorite creepy things from my visits to get us in the Halloween mood. The owner built the house on a rock cliff, and you can get a view of the canyon below from the Infinity Room, which hangs out over the cliff and has a section with a glass floor, and beyond it an optical illusion that the hallway goes on forever. If you don't like heights, it's not great. Wobbly knees. Enter a huge exhibit and a propos nothing, find yourself in a cavernous nautical themed room with wooden ships on the walls and memorabilia from famous ships in history. In the center is a massive sculpture of a 200 foot whale wrestling with a giant squid. Team squid!
In the Streets of Yesterday section, there is a (horror) doll shop. Some are nailed to the walls. I assume that's for your protection. You're hours from the entrance now; there's no going back.
Bonus! House on the Rock has two carousels. The next one is a smaller double-decker, with dolls riding all the mythical creatures. I think this is the creepiest part of the whole place. In the very best way.
I'm going back in November to see it decked out for the holidays, but for now: happy Halloween! As always, thanks for visiting! Candy
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