Or the Roller Derby Play

Yesterday was my half birthday and I celebrated with theatre and cupcakes (actually, that sounds like just about every other day in my life... but I promise I was celebrating!).

Photographic evidence

It was a nice day out, so I actually decided to walk a large portion of my journey (which ended up being two miles according to Google). The play was north of Chicago Theater Works so I ended up taking the bus to where I would normally get on the train and walking from there. It was really interesting to see things that I had been passing on the train for months up close and get a new view of things. I also ended up going closer to Wrigley Field than I ever had. I took a picture to prove it. (I also think I ended up being closer to Wrigley Field than I ever have been to Fenway Park, which is a little embarrassing for someone whose spent almost an entire lifetime in Boston...).

Now, I take my half birthday very seriously. It is like my regular birthday except better because there are zero expectations but I still get cake. You would think I've sampled every cupcake in Chicago at this point, but I was just as surprised as you are to find out that I have not! Jennivee's Bakery! Just a few blocks north of Chicago Theater Works! (South of Wrigley, I figured I would take some poetic license and get my Wrigley Field bit out of the way before writing about things that I actually care about). The bakery is fairly new, opening between when I created the Cupcake Crawl list and when we actually began our journey, which is how we missed such a conveniently located spot.

I was at a crossroads (Sheffield and School St to be specific). Do I stop at this bakery and treat myself or do I return to my non-cupcake sampling ways until Mr. Ryan Lind makes a triumphant, but currently undetermined, return to the Windy City? (I swore off trying new bakeries between October and Ryan's visit so that we could try them together). I decided that it was my half birthday and I obviously could not have a proper half birthday without a cupcake so I went in.

I didn't get a good pic, so I stole this from their Instagram.

Honestly, everything in the bakery looked delicious. I decided not to get a monstrous slice of cake, although it would have been well within my right as half-birthday girl (although I'm not sure my wallet would have agreed as a slice cost twice as much as a cupcake!) I probably would have ordered the "Bad and Boujee" cupcake on the name alone (the sign did proclaim it to have the best name ever) but I couldn't resist a chocolate cupcake with a champagne-infused raspberry mouse! It was a celebration after all, and it wouldn't be a proper one without champagne! (Although I'm pretty sure I've never celebrated anything with champagne in my life, unless you count mimosas at brunch, where I am celebrating the weekend ritual of overeating at mid-morning meals).

This cupcake was UNREAL! The mousse was perfection and the chocolate cupcake was very dense -- almost more muffin like -- but didn't make me feel like I had a cement in my stomach once I'd devoured every bite of it.

Perhaps the best part of Jennivee's is that it is kitty corner from one of the cast of TnT's favorite post-show hangouts AND it's open until midnight, so maybe next time the cast wants to grab a beer (or five), I will fill my stomach with the one thing I love more than alcohol.

After cupcakes, it was on to the Pride Arts Center to see For The Love Of... (Or the Roller Derby Play). Yes, that was the show's real title (it also came with an equally wordy tag line "A show about women who skate hard and love harder). I was going to see a play about roller derby! The show had been written and directed by women, along with having an entirely female cast.

The show reminded me a lot of a play I did in college called Shooting Stars about an all-women's basketball team in the 1960s. I played a character named Gay and there was also a character named Butch but it definitely wasn't a play about lesbians, unlike what I saw last night. I would say that For The Love Of... was 95% modern-adaptation of Shooting Stars and 5% what Shooting Stars would have been if Gay and Butch had been lesbians.

It wasn't perfect but it's great to see women represented in all of those creative and on-stage roles. We can always use more of that! It also made me consider strapping on skates and finding a roller derby league for what feels like the zillionth time.

After the play, I didn't walk home, just to the train station (and I talked to my sister while I walked because while I might be a big bad feminist, I'm not a naive big bad feminist and I was walking in a neighborhood that, while not appearing too shady, is not one I often visit). We discussed binge-watching Netflix's newest series 13 Reasons Why, which you didn't really need to know but I've included because when I take the time to write a long-ass post like this one, I like to make sure it is overly detailed. Whitney might come to visit me at the end of the month, along with my dad, so that would be very exciting.

The plans for today include hitting send on this blog post and going to work at CTW tonight. I have no idea how I'll fill the time between now and then, but if it is blog-worthy, you shall be the first to know (or maybe you'll know in a month or two, depending on how I am feeling...).