Thus far in sixosix history, the Intersection Section has taken one location in the city and discussed its relative merits and faults.

Rather than choosing just one intersection this time, we've decided to play Sim City with Chicago and create the one perfect intersection with everything you need. Why focus on just one area when five disparate elements from all over town could get the job done even more effectively? This fictitious intersection, were it able to be put together, would be one the biggest attractions in the city, I'm sure.

So let's say it's a Saturday afternoon and you're looking for something to do with that person that slept over last night and just won't leave. You've been guilted into spending the day with said person. Lucky you. What are you going to do while you plan your getaway?

Millennium Park: Chicago’s really got its collective shit together. Rating: 8.9.
I was recently downtown during one of the unseasonably warm days we've had lately, and decided to walk around the new Millennium Park . The first thing I could come up with – and I know this is erudite – is “Wow. This city's got its shit together.” A cracked sidewalk led up to a miniature golf course, a winding metal bridge led to a open-area grass field with all sorts of speakers above it, and so on. It's great to see an abandoned railroad depot become one of the biggest tourist draws in the city.

But don't stand on the concrete walls. This is very important. While I was watching the gaggle of children play under the 50-foot glass-block faces that spray water, I was standing on a concrete retaining wall, eating frozen lemonade, pretty much keeping to myself. Apparently that's not kosher, because a security worker – and you know how secure everything has to be now, so security workers have replaced homeless guys as the most annoying part of any public thoroughfare – yelled at me to get off the concrete wall. This would have been fine, had he not a) hit me with the yellow rope that was hanging in front of me and b) been standing on the wall himself. Like I said, those security guards can do pretty much anything they want.

Since all our intersection elements have been rearranged, it's easy to walk across the street for lunch. Go ahead and do that now.

Broadway and Barry: Getting good, solid eats for the day. Rating: 9.7.
There are certain small neighborhood fast-food joints that just fit the bill, no matter what day it is. I don't mean “fast food” in the McDonald's sense of the term, but more in a “hey this food isn't horrible and was ready extremely quickly” way. And while McDonald's workers have great taste in headgear, with cooks and cashiers alike sporting über-trendy visors, the cook at Chili Mac's – normally located at the corner of Broadway Street and Barry Avenue, one block south of Belmont Avenue, but now right where you want it – has a great, well, hat of sorts. It's not so much a beret, but it has something of that shape. It's not so much a chef's hat, because while it has billowing folds, those folds hang backwards rather than straight up. It's like an oversized hair net from your high school lunch lady, only made of bright red fabric that's dotted with yellow chili peppers instead of black netting.

Oh, and there's food there too.

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