Date Nights - May

We only managed to stay local for one of our date nights this month, but part of the reason is that we spent a good chuck of the month out of town. Chris found a documentary festival at Gateway, a local independent theater. I had my eye on the RACE exhibit at the Chicago History Museum.

We watched two very different, but equally interesting documentaries at the Gateway festival. Our first was Big Sonia. Wow! What a lady...and what a story! She is a Holocaust survivor that owned a shop in what had over time become a dilapidated mall complex. Due to the building being destroyed, she was forced to relocate her business. All the while, she tells her story sharing with local students and national media sources alike. The second documentary was in regard to standardized testing and its essentially purposeless existence. It was interesting, but didn't quite ever come to a conclusion or final outcome. The information provided was valuable to know, but it didn't really seem to matter or make a difference. Both were interesting topics, but Big Sonia was by far most compelling.

The main purpose of our little Chicago road trip was to visit our friends, Tarra and Evan. It is always great to spend some time with them! Our secondary goal was to catch the RACE exhibit while it was still at the Chicago History Museum. The exhibit was extremely thorough and covered so many different aspects of race. It was particularly interesting because it offered a number of interactive elements throughout the space. There was a plethora of information - we spent several hours combing through each room. The exhibit was well done - and the rest of the museum was pretty neat, too. Lots of Chicago history to be seen!

Do you enjoy checking out museum exhibits or watching documentaries?

Andrea :)

Book Reviews: Read the Rainbow (Blue)

This year, I decided to link up with Mia to Read the Rainbow. I only managed to read one blue cover this month despite by best intentions to get through a second one.

I really enjoyed Hillary's book, What Happened. It covered what happened that led to the bizarre outcome of our most recent election, but also went further than that to discuss some of Hillary's policies and ideas. It was really neat to listen to her read the book, too. Audiobooks read by their authors are my favorite these days. If you have interest in the media's role in our political process and how a campaign works from beginning to end, I highly suggesting checking out this book.

Andrea :)