Spotlight Chicago

On Thursday in Chicago, a small delegation of International Olympic Committee members arrived for their Evaluation Commission visit to assess The Windy City's potential as the 2016 Summer Olympic Games host.

Both the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun-Times (and many other media outlets) have early reports on the IOC arrivals, including a photo gallery highlighting the IOC evaluators (for those reading in Atlanta, see if you can spot the former Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games ACOG executive in the Sun-Times' gallery -- hint: he has been in the "bid biz" since the late 1980s).

During the next few days, I will be volunteering with Chicago 2016 and Tweeting from the experience (twitter.com/nickwolaver) while posting on this blog as time and the scope of the volunteer assignment permits.

As I understand it, one of the "E.C." activities will be in progress as my afternoon United flight touches down at O'Hare -- the iconic John Hancock Center hosts a private sunset gathering in its newly refurbished Observatory from which guests can see four states and all of Chicago's magnificence (my girlfriend and I visited last summer and it is spectacular). (disclosure: the John Hancock Observatory is a client of Edelman, the P.R. firm where I work)

At least a couple of reports state that one Chicago "Big O" and our nation's "Big O" will meet with the world's "Big O" Games executives while they are in town. Oh, to be in the thick of Chicago's Olympic bid gives me big, oh ... um ... goosebumps.

Reminds me of this one time in Beijing when Chicago's Mayor Daley shared a few minutes in front of my Flip Camera to talk about the bid.

But seriously, the Olympic bid process is fascinating to me, and I hope to learn a bit more about the nuts and bolts of the effort while contributing to Chicago's Olympic bid team.

Anyone can volunteer or be a part of it with just a few clicks -- more than 1.1 million people already clicked their support, and many of them are following Chicago 2016 on Twitter at http://twitter.com/chi2016.

See you in the Second City!