I fly in the Chicago area and sometimes find it awkward on a busy
frequency to break in to tell the controller that I need to check ATIS
at my destination. I've tried listening to both ATIS and ATC at the
same time but have never been able to make that work very well.

I do have the Garmin 396 and can pull up the METAR on that, but my
concern is that's not always timely.

Any other ideas?