First, lunch at Aladdin's Eatery, where I had the Mujadara Plate, a delicious dish of lentils and brown rice topped with toasted onions and Lebanese "salata" (salad) veggies: Aladdin's is a Middle Eastern/Lebanese restaurant chain, with locations in about five or six different states these days, that emphasizes fresh, healthy dishes, both vegetarian and non-vegetarian. I don't know why it's taken me so long to get back to Aladdin's since they opened a location in Chicago, not far from where I live, some years back. I used to eat at the one in beautiful Lakewood, Ohio, a Cleveland suburb I enjoyed living in for fifteen years, back in the '90s when it was the first and only Aladdin's in existence, before the company became a local and then a seminational chain. The company headquarters is still located in Lakewood to this day. After lunch I took my daily afternoon walk, which today found me ending up at the Lincoln Park Zoo, where I didn't get to see very much except for the cats in the Lion House: lions, leopards, jaguars, and various others. I wondered how the lions liked being cooped up in very small cages with hordes of humans passing through and gawking at them. I think if I were a lion in those conditions, it might drive me batty. I saw one animal (a jaguar, I think, but I can't really remember) playing with this large, wide cylindrical-shaped object which he had already partially ripped to shreds. It was like he had a toy! He was very entertaining. I wish I'd had a camera with me. After exiting the zoo, I took a brief stroll through the Lincoln Park Conservatory which is right next door. I was blown away by some very beautiful, brightly-colored orchids I saw there. Both the Lincoln Park Zoo and the Lincoln Park Conservatory are free admission, year-round. I found this afternoon's outing very therapeutic as I've been out of sorts for the past couple days. On Tuesday I had a bit of a dental mishap while having some Thai food; a piece of something I was eating got wedged in between my gum tissue and the crown on one of my upper front teeth, and it seemed pretty serious. I thought I might have compromised the crown's integrity and that it might have to be removed, but now I think I'm going to be OK. There's been some intermittent physical discomfort in the vicinity the past few days, but it's diminishing over time. Still, I hate when things happen that induce fear in me. It was exactly this time last year when a big piece of something broke off the back of my lower front teeth one morning... I was convinced I'd lost part of a tooth, but as it turned out, it was only a giant piece of tartar which broke loose.
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