fast passports!?

The good news: my band is going on a brief tour of Europe in September.

The bad news: I don't have a passport. I'm told they take between 4-8 weeks to get via normal means, and I don't have that long. One of my bandmates found an online source that can get them more quickly, but it costs something like $220 I'll be damned if I'm gonna pay that much money for a little #%&#@$ book with my picture in it (and if anyone has ANY idea why it should take that long to get one in the first place, feel free to explain...), so here's the question I pose to all of you worldly travelers:

Does anyone know a cheaper way to get a passport in less than a month or so?

I will love you forever (or any equivalent you prefer) if you can help me out.

 

Hm, that's quite a drive, but an 8-10 hour round trip is still better than $220! Any idea how much the passport actually costs once I'm at the office?

 

Just figured I'd post an update on this issue in case anyone ever decides to search for it or whatever. I got my passport with plenty of time to spare, for less money than I expected (although still a lot!!), and I didn't have to bother with any online crap. The best place to go turned out to be my local Post Office I just went in with my e-ticket, photo, various IDs and two checks, paid for the fastest expediting they could offer, and that was it. I don't remember the exact cost, it was somewhere around $175 total. They said it would take up to 10 business days, but I got it faster, barely over a week I believe.

So that's it; the Chicago office is definitely the way to go if you're close and/or in a huge hurry, but when it's a five-hour drive, the post office works if you've got the time. Speaking of time, 17 hours till I leave for the UK...