Old Town Art Fair v. Blues Fest

The summer officially kicked off in Chicago this past weekend with the Old Town Art Fair and Blues Fest. I attended both festivals and both were entertaining experiences for very different reasons – all related to the people that were there. For those of you not from Chicago, Old Town is a juried art show that has been around for about 60 years. You would think that this would attract a certain crowd of folks, but not so, my friends. There were 3 types of people there: women who should be arrested by the fashion police, “fratastic” guys, and the stroller brigade. These groups had very interesting interactions with each other. Since it’s a residential area, there are a lot of house parties. Young people get completely drunk at these parties, and then go stumble around the festival. This is a terrible scenario for all! The stroller brigade is cruising around, trying to get through the crowd. The strollers are not the kind of strollers I was wheeled around in as a child. They are these big fancy beasts. They are all "blinged" out with huge tires and fancy canvas awnings. They easily take up a whole sidewalk. The parents were just getting annoyed at the drunk frat guys because they couldn’t push their children through the crowd. Then the frat guys, would snicker at the parents and then turn their hats the wrong way – all the while, staring at the girls who should have been arrested by the fashion police. I wonder if they even looked at a mirror before they stepped outside. They wore low cut shirts, bad accessories, and hair that went on for miles. This is not the suburbs, ladies. The whole thing was a train wreck in action. I looked at a few booths but nothing caught my eye like the people!!

The Blues Fest was a stark contrast to the Old Town Art Fair. This free fest, sponsored by the city in Grant Park, is both massive in scale and number of attendees. The music was amazing. You really could feel the bass guitar pulsing through the crowd. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that old stoned guys shouldn’t be dancing. But to each his own, right? They were having fun, and that’s all that matters. There were also a few bikinis that came across my line of site – interesting selection for a festival considering how exposed they all were. But again, they didn't care. They were enjoying the scene. The sun shining on my face, I realized how long the winter was and how happy I was that summer had arrived. I was set to enjoy every minute of it, and the people that come out of hibernation in Chicago between June and September!