Illinois Channel: Christmastime at Illinois' Executive Mansion

[VIDEO] Been quite a while since I linked to anything from the Illinois Channel. It's very much worthwhile to see a program about Illinois' Executive Mansion.

You know it's still unclear to me if our current Governor Pat Quinn actually lives at the residence when he's in Springfield. Perhaps he stays there when the General Assembly is in town but otherwise he makes his way to suburban Oak Park when he has no business in Springfield.

When he replaced Rod Blagojevich as Governor in 2009, it seemed his plan to move into this place and often referred to it as "The People's House". Blagojevich seemed to refuse to even stay in the mansion during his time as Governor opting to take flights back and forth between his Chicago home and Springfield. When his work habits were examined not long before he was removed from office one of the grips was how much it cost to fly him back and forth.

Well sorry to turn this positive program into a negative. We have another weekend to go before Next weekend is Christmas and I promised that this year I'm going to feel the spirit. Hopefully if you're an Illinoisian you will feel the Christmas spirit watching the 10 minute program from the Illinois Channel about the Executive Mansion.

In spite of the many issues of this state which will include the fiscal issues and the corruption for which Blagojevich was recently sentence, let's recognize that Illinois has plenty of treasures. And not all of those treasures reside in Chicago or the Chicago area either.

BTW, in Chicago you can watch Illinois Channel programming on CAN-TV!

Time for News Year's resolutions

Well I mean what do you expect It Is "My Mind" we're talking about. While I talk about a lot of things here at this blog sometimes I delve into the personal. Usually about my educational background but not much more.

Now that my birthday has passed it's time to look into New Year's resolutions. If you follow me on Twitter I have only hinted at that. Next year there are some goals I hope to accomplish. Most of them are from 2011 that I never realized.

Perhaps 2012 will be a better year for me. Perhaps up until New Year's Eve, this will be further fodder for this blog. In fact, perhaps there will be a New Year's resolution for this old blog as well.

You will have to stay tuned to find out.

Oh and Happy Holidays to everybody. Merry Christmas! :)

Today is 11/11/11

Or Veteran's Day which is November 11, 2011. The last binary date for the rest of this century! And it was preceded by 11/10/11 or November 10, 2011.

BTW, many thanks to our nation's veterans! There sacrifices will be forever appreciated. May you inspire many others to either do what you have done in serving our nation, but also inspire many others to know how blessed they are to live here. Thank you!

AP: Will Apple Continue to Thrive?

[VIDEO] I found out just yesterday that Apple Inc. founder and former CEO Steve Jobs had passed away. At that time I was no where near a PC or a TV when the news broke. In fact, I found out through an IM courtesy of my non-iPhone :P

This video looks at the future of Apple without their visionary founder and leader. In August he stepped down from his CEO position at Apple Inc. He had been fighting cancer and already had a leave of absense since January, but returned to the public eye to unveil the iPad2.

There was another unveiling of products at least a day before his death when Apple had revealed the newest version of the iPhone. I understand that he wasn't there to even show support.

As you see in this video people are talking about him. In the beginning he had a rough start. He may well have revolutionized the personal computer, but before the 80s was over he was out of the company he formed building computers in his parent's garage. Then he came back by the late 1990s and then a string of products with the iPod, iPhone and then the iPad. Of course let's not forget about those Macs.

As was the quote in that AP video, there is hope that Jobs' vision will continue even though he has passed away. Perhaps we'll continue to deal with the Macs, iPods, iPhones & iPads for the foreseeable future!

Check out Google's homepage today...

They're celebrating Lucille Ball's 100th birthday. Click on the numbered dial and you will find several clips from Ball's classic TV series I Love Lucy. I remember the time she passed away, was creeped out by the very colorful pictures of her that aired on FOX 32 back in the day. Back in the day it was hard to get away from I Love Lucy reruns today I have a hard time getting away from reruns of The Simpsons, The Office or Seinfeld for example.

I have three other posts scheduled for today and all of them tech related. So consider this today's fun post. :P

Saw this about the Siskel Film Center...

I did lament that there isn't a movie venue downtown. It was known for many movie venues, but many of them have been either razed or converted to other uses.

For example down the street from the Gene Siskel Film Center (a marquee posted to the left) in either direction. Block 37 had been vacant for many years to the south near State & Randolph but there were a number of movie theaters there before that block was razed in the late 1980s. Then a little north was the old State/Lake theater which is now a TV news studio for Chicago's ABC affiliate.

Then directly across the street is the Chicago Theater. These days it's more of a live theater venue. Many years ago it played host to an episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Anyway today I'm reading this Chicagoist post about the Siskel Film Center operated by the Art Institute of Chicago. It's a good read and while this venue mainly shows more art and specialty features it indicated how the film exhibition business is changing and attempting to adapt to the current climate.

Interviewed is Marty Rubin who is the Assistant Director of Programming at the film center. This is merely the second part of a series.

Chicago Tonight: Phunny Business

[VIDEO] This 11 minute interview on Chicago Tonight featured owner comedy club owner Raymond Lambert and John Davies who directed this documentary Phunny Business: A Black Comedy. It was the story of a Black-owned comedy club that once operated in Chicago's South Loop called "All Jokes Aside" that featured mainly Black audiences being entertained by Black comedians.

It was very successful while other comedy clubs in Chicago were closing for business. One thing that put this club on the map were the comedians who eventually went on to Hollywood such as Jaime Foxx or Steve Harvey. Will there be another incarnation of "All Jokes Aside" in the future?

It was mentioned that this film was screened at the Gene Siskel Film Center on the Saturday after this program aired on June 16th. I would've liked to check out this documentary!

FuturePundit: Olive Oil Cuts Stroke Risk?

Well I won't excerpt this one, but this is worth sharing. Cutting stroke risks is one thing, but I saw a news story on TV years ago that suggest that consumption of olive oil staves off some of the worse effects of aging. In fact this story had a 77-year-old man who said that he had taken up roller-blading. I just hope that we can all be so lucky and you out there as well!

Via Instapundit!

Two pictures of Amtrak locomotives

I was walking along Roosevelt Road and just so happen to see this Amtrak locomotive sporting an interesting livery. Then I saw the years 1971 and 2011 on the side of the locomotive with Amtrak's old logo. It hits me that Amtrak has been around 40 years already.

It was such a sight I only wish that Amtrak could have locomotives like this all the time. The current livery isn't as colorful but then again I do really like Amtrak's new logo. Still a fan of the old one and used to draw it all the time, but the new logo since the last decade is a really nice touch.

Let's hope Amtrak lasts another 40 years in some way!

Still thinking about that Star Trek movie...

[VIDEO] I intended to post this video over at the Shedd School blog. Why was it relevant there? Because my time there are the old elementary school was when I first became a Star Trek fan. Any this video was the music for the end credits from the 2009 Star Trek movie.

Between 6th & 8th grades I began to collect not only the first 6 Star Trek films, but also many of the books about the franchise as well as even motion picture scores. Now this was all before the internet and before everyone got DVD and Blue-Ray crazy. In fact, my movie collection still included VHS tapes with the first eight Star Trek movies on VHS tape. Only the eleventh Star Trek movie is on DVD.

It's also relevent at the Shedd School blog because this is the time to end the school year. Around that time Star Trek: The Next Generation was ending it's 7 season run. The next movie would feature the cast from the 2nd Star Trek series and also Captain James T. Kirk.

Another reason is that Star Trek has once inspired me to consider becoming an astronaut. Until I reached college my goal was to major in engineering. While that idea hadn't entirely changed by the time I reached the 8th grade there was another aspiration that still has a lasting effect.

After studying for the required constitution exam for both the US & state constitution, my interest in government was so great that I declared in class that I'd like to be President of the United States. The lasting effect was that my major at Morehouse College was in political science.

The "fried chicken rebellion" at the state house???

Apparently state house Speaker Michael Madigan doesn't want people to eat at their desks on the floor in the House of Representatives chamber and there are some members who wants to change that rule according to Ward Room:

On Saturday, though, one hungry politician rose to condemn that rule. Every year, Rep. Raymond Poe, R-Springfield, caters a fried chicken lunch for the entire Capitol. Rep. Jim Sacia, R-Pecatonica, wanted some of that chicken. But the House was in session, and being a conscientious legislator, he didn’t want to leave the floor for the designated chicken-eating room behind the chamber. So instead, he rose to make what is known as a “point of personal privilege” to criticize Madigan’s “Hey, this isn’t a diner” policy. The Speaker instituted the no-eating rule six years ago, after the House chamber was renovated.

“In the Illinois Senate, if you’re hungry and someone provides chicken, you bring it into your place and you sit down and you eat it like the grown adults each and every one of us is,” Sacia shouted, to the applause of his colleagues. “This is not a partisan issue. We all worked hard to get here. We go into the finest restaurants, and they don’t stuff us into a little room in the back and tell us, ‘Sit down and eat.' This is a shame, Mr. Speaker, when one non-elected person makes the rest of us act like children who can’t even handle a spork and dribble out of both sides of our mouth. This is a beautiful chamber. We should be allowed to eat in here.”

Sacia is correct. Senators are allowed to eat at their desks. I have personally witnessed Sen. Emil Jones III stuffing his face with something out of a white paper bag. I think it was popcorn.

Madigan’s spokesman, Steve Brown, says the Speaker is only trying to enforce the same standards as the U.S. House and the U.S. Senate, which also ban eating.

“There’s no reason to turn this into a mess hall,” sniffed Madigan spokesman Steve Brown to The Dome Blog.

Hard to argue with having the same standards at the federal counterparts in Washington. It shouldn't be that much of a problem to allow legislators during the course of a session to eat at least once at their desks in their respective chambers.

The year 1999 as shown in the year 1966!

[VIDEO] How about a little fun today?

This video was made in 1966. It seems there were a lot of films made back then to depict the future. And surely those who made such films saw the year 2011 as a different world. Of course if some of those film makers were put into our current year it probably would be the same world as theirs. Of course I can only image how the year 2111 would look. That just has to be a different world right.

Of course, this video strikes me as not very liberating towards women. It still assumes that the man pays all the bills. Although for some out there passing the bills off to someone else would be very liberating now would it?

So the wife does her shopping on a PC (well the 1966 version) and in addition to that she checks the monitors around the house in keeping with her domestic duties. The husband is more of a geek here as he has three screens to look at. Also it appears he uses a stylus to write an "e-mail" to be sent to anyone around the world.

Of those three screens the husband uses he uses one of them to check his account information. So he's looking at his wife's bills as she went shopping "online". I'm not sure the husband was happy as he printed off his information.

Well some aspects of this video was off, but in concept, it was dead on!

Mary Shmich on The Chicago Code...

Watching The Chicago Code right now, found this column via Sloopin. She noted a couple of fans who have started their own campaigns to save the show. But the excerpt are Shmich's comments:

When "The Chicago Code" premiered in February, I was not an instant fan. The writing was better than average, the plots were ambitious, and Chicago, even in the broken neighborhoods, looked as gorgeous as a tourist brochure. Still, something was slightly off in the pace, the dialogue, the tone.

But week by week, like a stiff new shoe that loosens up, the show has gotten better.

The story, centered on a corrupt alderman played by the riveting Delroy Lindo, tightens like a blood pressure cuff. The annoyances — constant references to the Irish mob, some bad Chicago accents — have either diminished or I've gotten used to them. I've turned into a big fan and think there's an untapped audience for the show.

When word got around Tuesday that I was writing this column, I started hearing from fans from all over.

Several Chicagoans said the show has introduced them to parts of the city they didn't know existed. Out-of-towners said it made them want to visit. Some noted the jobs it brought to the city and the exposure it gave Chicago talent.

And all of them raved about the good acting and uncommonly intelligent, adult plots. Sadly, those credentials don't rival the allure of the show's usual 8 p.m. time-slot competitor, "Dancing with the Stars" on ABC.

Yet Ford and her fellow fans reach for crumbs of hope. Monday's ratings were up 12 percent among viewers 18 to 49. And was it a happy omen that the come-on for next week's show referred to the "season finale," not the "series finale?"

Next week's finale, by the way, is called "Mike Royko's Revenge." I knew Mike, the late, great Tribune columnist, well enough to believe he would have liked "The Chicago Code."

And he'd have let the genius TV executives know just how dumb it was to let such a good show die.

I mistakenly referred to this week's episode as the "season finale" on my Twitter page. As noted in the quote that episode will in fact premiere next week.

Hmmm, another book to add to the book list in the sidebar, Boss: Richard J. Daley of Chicago by Mike Royko. I need to find it and read it however

FOX cancels "The Chicago Code"

I was just starting to get into the show. Read a comment at the Entertainment Weekly article that this show should go to FX. There should be a campaign to get this show a second season somewhere on the TV dial. This really is a good show that should've been renewed. Especially since it was a bit of a midseason replacement.

Besides FX was the home of another creation of Shawn Ryan, a little known show that ended it run within the last two years called The Shield. There's got to be room on FX for another cop drama!

April Fools Comes Late to the Sloop?

April Fools Comes Late to the Sloop?

There's more about this at Curbed Chicago. It seems this was a hoax by a group with an agenda and they took aim at a company that owns a power plant that already operates in the city. A clean power ordinance was stalled recently in the Chicago City Council that would've forced this company to switch from coal to natural gas.

One way I suppose to at the very least bring attention to a subject. Although to be honest I know very little about whether or not coal or natural gas is much cleaner fuel.

Rehabber wants to grow grapes, make wine in sweet home Chicago

 

[VIDEO] This is a fascinating idea. Turning an abandoned, boarded-up landmark home into an urban vineyard to grow grapes and make wine. In addition to teaching people how to make wine. I'm giving great credit to the young man well he's not so young any more who wants to make that a reality.

BTW, here's more about this historic landmark referred to as the Raber House located at 5760 S. Lafayette Ave.

Bill Lavicka's renovations have always been unusual. The veteran rehabber and owner of Historic Boulevard Services has trucked four buildings intact from one site to another, converted small churches into homes, remade entire Near West Side blocks and showcased his quirky aesthetic by topping spires and balusters with bowling balls.

But the next remodel he has his heart set on raises the bar on unusual. Lavicka wants to turn a boarded-up Washington Park mansion, one of the city's last surviving examples of a multiacre country estate, into a winery.

And he doesn't want to import the grapes.

He wants to plant about 5,000 vines in the yard — what's now three or so bombed-out-looking blocks along the Dan Ryan Expressway just south of Garfield Boulevard.

Complicating matters, the vacant land and long-neglected mansion are owned by the city of Chicago. For nearly two years, Lavicka, 66, has been trying to persuade the city to sell 40 to 50 lots that were once part of the John Raber estate to him for $1 each, plus commit to streetscape and road improvements, and subsidize part of the renovation in some way.

Ald. Willie Cochran said Wednesday that he is "confident this deal will get closed," saying the winery would be approved along with an adjacent urban farm and new park with a baseball field. But details remain to be ironed out, and those will have to wait for the new mayor's input, he said.

The project, Lavicka said, has taken longer to plan than it would take to remodel.

"I probably like the buildings more than wisdom would allow, or should allow," Lavicka said as tears began to fill his eyes. "I can take an old building and fix it up, and everybody else goes by for years and years saying knock it down."

I hope this can happen. I'm all for finding creative ways to revitalize urban areas. Just another plan for an urban farm in an area with land that well real estate developers haven't discovered yet.

Via Bill Baar!

YouTube Blog: Mashups, parodies and lip dubs: Ask a legal expert...

YouTube Blog talks about Fair Use and how YouTubers are able to take clips from other media sources without being sued for copyright infringement.

Another "original" YouTube cited fair use in one of his videos. I used "original" to say that he posted videos people watched starting a short 8 years ago. Man it's unbelieveable how long ago that was.

Lee Bey took pictures in Detroit

Photo by Lee Bey

Blogger and architecture "geek" Lee Bey takes a brief trip to Detroit and takes pictures of the architecture of that Great American city:

I was in Detroit last weekend participating in Art X Detroit, a five-day festival of art, music, dance and discussion.

Fortunately, I squeezed-in a Saturday morning photo stroll of the city's downtown, taking stock of the wealth of buildings that remain despite Detroit's well-recorded decades of decay, demolition and disinvestment. The city has a fine collection of vintage downtown architecture, much of which can hold its own against any Chicago or New York has to offer. And while many sit vacant, scores are being reused, bringing life and vitality to the city's core. The above six-story building, completed in 1891, is a former conservatory of music and is among the first generation of tall buildings on Woodward Avenue. And it's still impressive after 120 years.

You should go there and see the other building he took pics of in Detroit. Some of these buildings are impressive. Hopefully something to rebuild a city around.

The pic about from Lee Bey is of a former conservatory building on Woodward Avenue in Detroit. Well actually is coincidental that the pic I posted here is exactly what Bey was talking about in that quote I provided.

VIDEO: Marc Sims drives around Roseland

[VIDEO] Marc Sims, a cable access personality was driving around in the Roseland Neighborhood. One minute he's driving on Michigan Avenue the next he's on 111th driving near Alex Haley Academy, then he's on State St. then he's on 115th, then he near Fenger High School, then he's on Halsted, then he's at Julian High School on 103rd then back to Vincennes.

Just note that while you're hearing sights and sounds of this part of the far south side, you will also hear him babble for over 17 minutes.

YouTube Blog: YouTube is going LIVE

YouTube Blog: YouTube is going LIVE: "With over 2 billion views a day, it's easy to think about YouTube as a place to watch videos recorded in the past. But you’ve told us you w..."

The third Batman movie may not be filming in Chicago...

But at least Chicago will be the real world stand-in for Metropolis:

The Dark Knight Rises" will film in Pittsburgh starting this summer. Chicago will not be featured in the third installment in director Chris Nolan's franchise.

Chicago starred as Gotham City in 2005's "Batman Begins" and 2008's "The Dark Knight." The films brought an estimated economic boost of more than $50 million to the city.

Maybe the Man of Steel scared off the Dark Knight?

Nolan is producing "Superman: Man of Steel" about the same time as the new Batman movie.

Richard Moskal, director of the Chicago Film Office, told the Chicago Tribune it would have been "challenging" for the filmmakers and the city to handle both films.

I look forward to seeing how Chicago will turn into Metropolis. In The Dark Knight the city looked less like Gotham and more like...Chicago. At least in Batman Begins, Chicago looked like Gotham City.

Pilgrim Baptist Church to be reborn from ashes of 2006 fire

Pilgrim Baptist Church to be reborn from ashes of 2006 fire - Chicago Sun-Times

Since this historic church went down in flames in early 2006, I've written a lot about this building. In addition the church were involved with scandals involving none other than our Ousted governor who pledged money to Pilgrim only for the money to not be accounted for. It was in fact sent to a school that leased space in the building. In fact, there were concerned about whether or not a government in this country could directly give money to a religious institution.

Well it looks like a new effort is beginning to bring this church to light, and they're not waiting for gov't funds to rebuild. Certainly good news for a building that was designed by the famed Chicago architect Louis Sullivan. Let's hope this succeeds.

Related

• Fire rages at Pilgrim Baptist Church...
• Pilgrim Baptist Church to get a grant...
• Did gov break vow to help church?

 

 

Vintage YouTube

[VIDEO] As if YouTube had been 100 years old instead of 6 years old. Whoever made these videos, well this was uploaded to a profile for YouTube, they did use vintage material. Most of the other video well it was made to look vintage. I like the results of this endeavor. Below is the vintage YouTube 1911 logo.

UPDATE 11:31 PM So there is a post about this over at YouTube's official blog.

Kaskaskia: First Capital of Illinois

[VIDEO] Earlier this month the Tribune took a trip to the town of Kaskaskia, IL

As noted the town of Kaskaskia was the first state capital of Illinois located along the southwestern border of Illinois which is essentially the Mississippi River. According to the Wiki article about the town the population is only 14 as of 2010. It is the least populated area of this state.

Kaskaskia was the state capital until 1819. Illinois became a state in 1818 so it was only a year where state government was located. After 1819 thru 1839 our state capital was located in Vandalia, Illinois. As a matter of fact a State House was built in hopes that state government would remain in Vandalia.

Unfortunately for Vandalia, state government would move again to Springfield, Illinois where it has been since 1839. Also note that a future President of the United States, one Abraham Lincoln, was instrumental in moving the state capitol from Vandalia to Springfield.

More history of Illinois' state capitols can be found here. That page is part of a website @ http://www.ilstatehouse.com/ which is dedicated to promote the current state capitol building in Springfield.

The Worst Late Night Snacks

The Worst Late Night Snacks

Making a record of traversing the Chicago L

There's a Briton in town seeking to stop at all of the CTA's 144 "L" stops according the CTA Tattler blog. Then I was alerted to an FB group for those who had actually traversed the L system in the shortest amount of time. And according to that page it was roughly three hours.

As of January of this year, I have traversed all of the CTA rail lines. Athough I didn't do it in three hours. I have only done it within the last 12 years.

In 1998 I took the Blue Line all the way to O'Hare. In 1999, I not only took the Red Line from 95th all the way to Howard, but also took the Purple Line to Linden. Also I took the Blue Line to both 54th/Cermak & Forest Park. Also in 1999 I departed from both 63rd/Ashland and 63rd/Cottage Grove on the Green Line to travel downtown.

In 2001, I took the Orange Line all the way to Midway and back to the loop. In 2006 I took the Brown Line all the way to Kimball and also the Green Line to Harlem/Lake. I took the Purple Line express on the way to a temp job in Evanston in early 2008. Also in 2009, I took a ride on the Pink Line to 54/Cermak. Finally in 2011 I took the Yellow Line to Skokie.

If I was to do all that again it wouldn't take me roughly 12 years, but I'm not going to make a world-record time about it either. :P

On the train yesterday...

Pulled into 95th which was the only time I felt comfortable enough to take a picture on board the train. Before the train pulled into the station there were people who sat right at this position from when I got on the train downtown all the way to the final stop. Been wanting to ride on this train for a while.

These cars are to be the new trains the Chicago Transit Authority plans to order and offer more high tech amenities such as digital signage and displays, lighted maps, even sounds that alert you to closing train doors. In addition the seating arrangement will be similar to what you'll find in either New York or Boston. My last ride aboard these cars was heading to the north side on the Brown Line late last year. Before that several trips on board these cars as they started their testing on the Red Line.

Thing about the testing as it is now, there is no set schedule where I could know when these trains begin their runs. This trip and the trip on the Brown Line was totally by chance. Look forward to the day we will see these cars in service throughout the system.

VIDEO - Detroit: City on the Move (1965)

[VIDEO] Today we're going to take another trip to Detroit, Michigan. Just that well we're going backwards in time to 1965 when the Mayor was Jerome Cavanaugh who you see in the first few minutes of this video. It makes you wonder what happened between the 1960s to today where Detroit is seen as a declining city. Look no further than that link provided earlier to Mayor Cavanaugh's wiki profile. Duration is over 18 minutes.

Via Electronic Village!


BTW, I would to refer to this post at Urbanophile:

Gen-X and the Millennials have a much more optimistic and positive views of urban areas than baby boomers and previous generations. I think this results from the rupture that those earlier generations experienced when our urban cores declined. If you read a newspaper interview of someone in that age bracket, you always here the stories about the wonderful things they did in the city when they were younger. It was the land of good factory jobs, the downtown department store where their mothers took them in white gloves for tea, of the tidy neighborhoods, the long standing institutions and rituals – now all lost, virtually all of it. Unsurprisingly, this has turned a lot of people bitter. Many people saw everything they held dear in their communities destroyed, and they were powerless to stop it. These people are never going to be able to enter the Promised Land. 

For people about my age or younger, it’s a very different story. None of us knew any of those things. Our experience is totally different. We’ve basically never known a city that wasn’t lost. Gen-X, which Jim Russell views as the heartland of Rust Belt Chic, is a generation defined by alienation, so the alienated urban core suits our temperament perfectly. The Millennials of course have a very different attitude towards cities.

I don’t see any signs of the older generations getting through the grieving process and moving on. This makes me think that for us to fully embrace a true urban policy, even in city government itself, it is going to take generational turnover. The baby boomers are already starting to age, but they’ll be with us a lot longer. Alas, they have historically been the most suburban generation, and not shy about imposing their values, so I suspect we’ll be dealing with that legacy for a while. Still, as time goes on, we’ll have more and more people seeing the city with fresh eyes, and only knowing it when there’s reason for hope and optimism. That by itself will be a building force for change and new directions over time, until the true changing of the guard arrives.

Well let's not misunderstand here that the Village and Urbanophile are read by different audiences and Village is read mostly by a Black audience. I can only assume who reads the Urbanophile, but I'm certain there will be agreement or disagreement over the point Aaron Renn @ Urbanophile is attempting to convey.

iPad 2 coming March 2

I got my eye on one of these. Hopefully the first generation of iPad will come down in price as there will be a second generation:

The company sent out a media invite for an event March 2 in San Francisco. If you have been keeping up with all things Apple lately, you know this is 99.9 percent likely the unveiling of iPad 2 which is rumored to be thinner and feature dual cameras for videochatting. And by now you've figured out the double meaning behind the No. 2 in the invite.

Depending on who you believe, this iPad could also have double the resolution, a high speed connection to another device or make pancakes. And while an announcement is all but a lock, we don't know when the actual iPad will ship.

As someone who has been blogging about Apple for several years, I can tell you that while you should be excited, the pancakes are definitely out. Definitely expect a thinner device - all of Apple's offerings pretty much shrink in size between iterations - and the cameras are a lock. You are going to see Aunt Penelope's goiter in so much detail.

Of course, there's at least a strong likelihood that the new iPad is just one announcement. New laptops are expected, along with a new technology to rival USB 3.0. Should be an interesting day.

I can also look at those iPad alternatives that are out there as well. Hopefully cheaper if I buy them brand new.

Retailers tap into iPad, hoping device will help you buy

Click for iPad website

Talk about the future being now. It used to be old style tubes for TVs on storefront displays now it's an iPad being considered for use in storefronts:

Since Apple Inc. unveiled the iPad in April, a spate of retailers including Burberry, Puma, Things Remembered, Converse and Nordstrom, to name just a few, have rolled out tests of tablet computers at select stores around the country. The move is all part of retailers' response to how consumers are shopping everywhere — online, on their smart phones and in the stores.

Retailers are using iPads as mobile catalogs so sales clerks and shoppers can browse inventory not available on store shelves. They are fastening the tablets to counters so shoppers can design their own products. They are arming sales associates with the electronic clipboards to gathering customer data. And they are testing the device's potential as a portable cash register.

"It is taking retail outside the four walls to where the customers are," said Sandeep Bhanote, CEO of Global Bay Mobile Technologies, a South Plainfield, N.J.-based mobile retail software firm. "You're talking about changing the way you do business. That's what this is all about."

Make Up For Ever, a unit of French luxury conglomerate LVMH, was among the first retailers to give the technology a try. The cosmetic company set up iPad stations in October at its boutiques inside Sephora stores in New York's Soho neighborhood, Costa Mesa, Calif., and Las Vegas.

The iPad is fixed to a gondola and allows shoppers to update their Facebook pages, tweet about their shopping experience and access face charts for browsing makeup combinations. Eventually customers will be able to upload a digital photo of their own faces for a virtual makeover.

Now if Border's had begun using the iPad or at the very least had an online presence to really utilize the iPad or similar tablet devices. Who knows they may be in better shape instead of having to close 30% their stores amidst bankruptcy.

All the same this underscored the conclusion I have about the iPad. It's a luxury item and is being treated as such. A cool device at home that could also have commercial or academic uses in the real world. It's very cool that one could fork up a lot of cash to be able to use such a device at home.

VIDEO: "Battle of Maxia" - Picard Manoeuvre

This CGI animation is of the unseen Battle of Maxia and it's aftermath. This was an engagement of Capt. Jean Luc Picard's previous assignment, USS Stargazer against an unknown adversary. In the Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) epsiode "The Battle" we found out that Capt. Picard - who later became Captain of the USS Enterprise - had actually fought a Ferengi vessel. As it turns out this Ferengi commander who's son had actually commanded that destroyed ship Picard had fought has designs of revenge and years late gave Picard a gift...the Stargazer.

Why am I typing this out? Because The "Battle" was an awesome episode!

Would've liked to have seen this episode of Jeopardy!

Yeah a computer was a contestant on an episode of the long running game show Jeopardy! story from AP:

The computer brained its human competition in Game 1 of the Man vs. Machine competition on "Jeopardy!" but bombed on the final answer where the correct question was: What is Chicago?

That Final Jeopardy answer: "Its largest airport is named for a World War II hero; its second largest, for a World War II battle."

Both champs Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter knew the right response was Chicago.

Watson, their IBM supercomputer nemesis, guessed doubtfully, "What is Toronto?????" It didn't matter. He had shrewdly wagered only $947.

On the 30-question game board, Jennings and Rutter managed only five correct responses between them during the Double Jeopardy round that aired Tuesday. They ended the first game of the two-game face-off with paltry earnings of $4,800 and $10,400 respectively.

Yeah why didn't I see that show whenever it aired?

Another Roseland neighborhood picture

On Sunday, Unknown Chicago over at ChicagoNOW offered another street quiz and I instantly recognized this picture. The give away was the marquee for the long demolished State Theater you see in the background. This picture is looking north along South Michigan Avenue in 1934.

The land where the State stood is now a parking lot for a nearby post office most of the buildings in this pic are long demolished replaced by a Walgreen's on the west side of the street and a currency exchange on the west side of the street. Of course street car service had been eliminated by the CTA in the late 1950s.

I also had to look up the Parkway Theater which you see in the foreground on the east side of the street. If Englewood was noted for the many theaters that were operating near 63rd & Halsted, the Roseland neighborhood had their own treasures of which only one, the Roseland Theater, still stands today.

In any event in the post where I would've had to identify the various scenes; there were two that were identifiable without a doubt. The first two pictures in the gallery especially the pic above. The post that offered the answers gave me an education as to where those other scenes were located.

Who knew Hyde Park had a Reagan connection?

832 E. 57th St.

ALSO note that this home was the subject of a post over at Unknown Chicago, a ChicagoNow blog.

So Hyde Park can now claim two Presidents although one of them spent only a brief time in this area of my city. Brought to the fore thanks to this Sun-Times article:

Locked up, abandoned and forgotten, the vacant six-flat standing at the northeast corner of 57th and Maryland has no plaques or statues and few clues to its history.

Now, the little-known childhood home of Ronald Reagan in Hyde Park could soon be torn down by the University of Chicago, which has quietly plotted its demolition, the Sun-Times has learned.

The plan has made unlikely allies of conservatives who consider Reagan an icon and liberal Hyde Parkers who say the university’s secrecy is typical of how it has treated its neighbors for decades.

It puts the school that provided the intellectual force behind “Reaganomics” in the awkward spot of attempting to destroy what was until the election of Barack Obama the only home in Chicago where a president has lived.

This is what the need for preservation is about:

Hyde Park Historical Society board member Jack Spicer, also the president of all-volunteer Preservation Chicago, said the Reagan six-flat — just a mile south of President Obama’s Kenwood home — is the finest remaining example of what was once a solid working and middle-class black neighborhood. Destroying it would create “a medical canyon” that separates the hospital from the city and risks deepening long-standing wounds in university-resident relations, he said.

“Whatever you think of Reagan — once the building’s gone, it’s gone forever,” he added.

Landmarks Illinois president Jim Peters also said that he would like to see the block preserved. Reagan’s home is protected by a zoning giving critics 90 days to object if and when the university announces a plan to destroy it, he said.

Further headaches could come from conservatives keen to name everything from aircraft carriers to schools in Reagan’s honor.

How did they find this place?

Park Ridge resident Tom Roeser, 82, discovered the link in the early 1980s when he pressed Reagan for details of the home during a visit to the White House. Reagan couldn’t remember the address, but passed on a message: “My father was picked up often as a common drunk — the police records should have that fact.”

Records confirmed that John R. Reagan was arrested by Chicago Police for drunkenness in 1915, giving the 57th Street address, said Roeser, a former op-ed columnist for the Sun-Times and a former Quaker Oats vice president.

You never know what place or places have an historical connection.

VIDEO: Chicago Blizzard 1967 in Historic Pullman

This video takes you closer to my part of town. The Pullman neighborhood famous for originally being a planned community before it became just another Chicago neighborhood. Here's a description:

On January 27, 1967, a massive blizzard hit Chicago. In Historic Pullman, Al & Marilyn Quiroz picked up their shovels and cameras to capture the event.

Found via Lee Bey, where he has a couple of other videos from both 1967 and 1979.

VIDEO: Chicago Blizzard 1979

Found this on the CapFax in their morning videos post with a wintery theme of course there are some summer scenes from the Illinois State Fair last year. Description from YouTube:

"Chairs" by Nick Despota, John Mabey, and Bob Snyder. During the 1979 Chicago Blizzard, people saved shoveled parking spaces with chairs.

If you want to know what I see this morning in my neighborhood two cars on the street have been PWNED and so has thegarage looking from the backyard. :(

OH YEAH, as an added bonus check out this spoof of a 1979 mayoral campaign ad. In 1979, Jane Byrne became the first female Mayor of Chicago defeating incumbent Michael Bilandic. I've got to check out this website MediaBurn.

Since we're supposed to have a serious snow storm the next two days...

Let's check out how Chicago did snow removal back in 1907 according to Unknown Chicago. Streetcars did the plowing and manual laborers shoveled what the streetcars couldn't plow. Backbreaking work I can only imagine, especially if you had to do this around the city.

No, this is the Sony bloggie camera I'd like to get...

Strike that post from last weekend. I had intended to write about my preference for opitical zoom and that other bloggie camera model had digital zoom instead. Digital zoom isn't good because that type merely crops digitally the area that is to be shot. And that can only result in further pixelation and the video image will not have clarity.

Thus I have settled on model: MHS-CM5/V. This has optical zoom up to 5X and 40 X digital zoom. By contrast my Sony MiniDV camcorder has 40X optical with a 2000 Digital zoom. Also like with the Sanyo Xacti I can also treat this camera as if it's a digital camera as well.

Well still this option isn't perfect. I want a camera that could be used somewhat inconspicuously and this camera may not foot this bill. One can't just look in a viewfinder to make a shot and one must flip open the viewscreen to make a shot. The bad thing is with the other tiny digital camcorders out there doesn't have the type of zoom I would really like.

You know it's possible for me to take on the following scenarios. To start buy this camcorder because I went to a Sony Style store in Skokie, IL this week to see if they sold this camera. As it happens it's only display and could be had for $150. Also this week my travels took me to a TigerDirect store on Elston and saw that this same camera costs $180. Wow more bang for my buck at Sony, interesting.

So let's say I did buy it? I would still want a Flip, Kodak Mini, or a Kodak Playsport that could be used for my purposes inconspicuosly. It would be worth it if either of those cameras could be had for a reasonable price.

Still got some thinking on this and some budgeting. Then again since I'm hardpressed to find this bloggie it might be time to make a purchase before this model won't be found in stores any longer.

It appears I'm not the only one tracking these signs...

Well other than me or John Ruberry @ Marathon Pundit. There's Tom Mannis @ Chicago News Bench who was in the Loop outside of the Harold Washington Library took a picture of this American Recovery Act sign yesterday. It's right in the median on State Street. He says that there appeared to be no work done at this location

American Recovery Act sign on the South Side

I'm pretty sure Marathon Pundit is still tracking these Recovery Act signs around the nation if not only in the Chicago area. This sign was on a trailer near 95th & Michigan on Tuesday morning and I believe the work there involved the utilities. Didn't exactly get all the information for what was being done here.

Unknown Chicago: Super Bears

While the Chicago Bears lost their bid to go to the Super Bowl this year, we can always reminisce about their only Super Bowl victory 25 years ago today. The NFC Title game got good in the 2nd half, but ultimately the Bears came up short against teir arch-rival Green Bay Packers. Read more about what happened on this day over at Unknown Chicago!

Marathon Pundit: Packers win NFC championship

Marathon Pundit: Packers win NFC championship

I think I want a Sony Bloggie Camera

Pictured is a model the Sony MHS-PM5 bloggie HD Video Camera which I have seen in the stores over the Christmas Holidays. That is the one I really would like to get. At the Sony Website a different model of the bloggie camera is shown and I really don't want that model.


Last year, I was looking at a small camcorder such as the Flip, but ultimately I just decided the Flip wasn't a good fit. Mainly because I didn't want to just have to move the footage off of the storage on the camera itself. The Flip camera from what I have seen offers no means to save any footage onto a separate memory card.


If I only had at the very least 2 hrs recording time on a Flip, I could also have some more recording time if I used a separate memory card. At that surely, there are memory cards of different sizes which would offer me variable recording time. Perhaps similar to what I could get on a MiniDV tape.


That is what I have in mind. Also I do like the design of the Sanyo Xacti cameras but some of the models I like are overpriced. Even worse those model cameras are not readily available as so far I have only found them at Radio Shack stores.

In honor of the Chicago Bears....

In their drive to make it to the Super Bowl this year here is a video that shows us the history of their homestand, Soldier Field. I also hear it's mistakenly referred to by some locals as Soldier's Field. Courtesy of NBC Chicago via Curbed.

The Bears will take on their arch-rival Green Bay Packers for the NFC Title on Sunday, January 23 at 3:30 PM at Soldier Field. Also it's the first time in 69 years that the Bears and Packers will meet in a playoff. I'm so watching!

You can watch a video about that here! :P

Bloggers quitting what they call a demanding task with few rewards

This Crain's story started off with Jim Harbison who blogged about art and design and found that the people he showcased got all the rewards and he got very little so he quit.

There are about 31 million blogs in the United States, a number expected to swell to 34 million by the end of this year. But Mr. Harbison is part of a small but growing trend of blog quitters. Last year, the number of blogging teens and adults ages 18 to 33 declined, in the first reported drop in blogging, according to Pew Research Center data.

Some have simply switched to another blog-like medium, say, Twitter or Facebook. Others have faced unpleasant facts about blogging. It's cheap to do but usually doesn't pay. Having a platform may be fun at first, but building a following takes much more work than simply typing and posting.

And millions of them go virtually unnoticed, despite the occasional breakout sensation like the humorous “Stuff White People Like” and the Julia Child-inspired “The Julie/Julia Project.”

When “people see these, they say, ‘I can do that—it will be easy,' “ says Raanan Bar-Cohen, vice-president of media services at San Francisco-based WordPress, which hosts 16.5 million blogs. “If you're looking for fame and fortune, blogging has as good a chance as any medium,” he adds.

But new bloggers misunderstand what the venture is really all about. “The best bloggers are good at highlighting, snipping and curating,” Mr. Bar-Cohen says. All that draws “the feedback that is as or more important than the actual posts.”

You know as long as there is information out there to share, there is no reason for me to quit. I have no family yet and I have the time to blog. I also would use Twitter to supplement my posting and people have been know to Retweet my posts. Also while do have a Facebook account I prefer to keep that for more private purposes for right now than anything else. As you see I do have some FB widgets that show which posts are being shared or liked by FB users.

All the same, while I wish this blog could get more traffic or even comments it's not that big of a deal to me. It has taken off at moments and even better I have been seen on much bigger blogs than this one. Still this blogging thing is still considered a hobby and if the hobby can be more useful then there's my satisfaction right there.

Unknown Chicago: The Blizzard of 1979 (1-14-1979)

Traffic snarl from Unknown Chicago

Believe it or not in one of my albums there are plenty of pictures of my parents cleaning snow from this blizzard. Thanks to the Unknown Chicago blog I know more about this blizzard. Politically this snowstorm meant the different between incumbent Mayor Michael Bilandic and the eventual Mayor Jane Byrne. There is a comparison between two snowstorms approximately 12 years apart the 1967 & then 1979. I found this quote telling:

Okay--so in 1979, the city had three days to clean up.  And by Tuesday, everything was back to normal.

No, it wasn't.  As soon as the snow started coming down, Mayor Michael Bilandic was all over TV, talking about the heroic job his administration was doing in this weather emergency.  But the public could see he was wrong.  The snow was not getting cleared.

The City That Works wasn't working.  Mike Royko, the newspaper columnist, put the blame squarely on the mayor.  According to Royko, city crews didn't know how to deal with the snow because their skills were too specialized--specialized in cranking out votes at election time.  That was the real job of Chicago payrollers.

Bilandic was running for re-election.  He was being challenged in the Democrat primary by Jane Byrne.  Now Byrne began hammering Bilandic about snow removal.  In one of her commercials, she was filmed with snowflakes falling around her.

Byrne's message connected with the voters.  Six weeks after the blizzard, she beat Bilandic in the primary, then went on to win the general election.

In 1979 Chicago's Democratic Machine didn't serve the city very well. Royko earned his pay back then, that line in bold was priceless. Needless to say though the Machine couldn't save Bilandic back in 1979 as he didn't serve his own full term as mayor.

115th & Michigan back in 1934...

And at this intersection the only building that remains is the one with the drugs sign on the northeast corner. That building is still there. I never thought I would see such an old picture from the Roseland neighborhood courtesy of Unknown Chicago. That other nice building on the southeast corner, well that building was torn down, the property is currently vacant.

As a bonus check out my post about Englewood at The Sixth Ward. Also using historical photographs from Unknown Chicago.