Chicago - A message from the station manager

The Week in WTF

By David Rutter

1. Walter Payton, WTF?
Thus even our designated gods have ugly warts, which no one much discusses when they are alive because that gets in the way of fawning adulation.
He was a great football player. But we could not allow that to be enough. We must also make him spiritual and noble on the theory that being athletically gifted also confers superior humanness. Fool’s gold. He was not more flawed than many are, but we – and he – could not accept a truth that interrupted the profitable and comfortable illusion. Sports demands a spirit-bending cynicism.

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Posted on September 30, 2011

Cal’s Liquors Vintage Neon Sign

By ChiTownView

“Located on the south end of the loop at Wells and Van Buren lies Cal’s Liquors & Bar. It’s a swell joint; it was in Playboy’s survey of great American bars, Lady Gaga stopped by, the food’s tasty and they have a cool neon sign. Stop in bar and if you don’t have time hit the liquor store.
“Check out our Neon Chicago playlist for more clips of these fast vanishing works of art.”

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Posted on September 28, 2011

Chicagoetry: Dead Daisies

By J.J. Tindall

DEAD DAISIES
I wish.
I wish my hair
was like the leaves
of a tree, wait,
like a copse
of oak and elm.

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Posted on September 26, 2011

The Joseph Rosenberg Fountain

By ChiTownView

“Near the south end of Chicago’s Grant Park stands this beautiful little 120-year-old fountain. It was a bequest from Joseph Rosenberg a one-time Chicagoan who went west and made his fortune. He never forgot his childhood as a newsboy in the area always going thirsty because there were no fountains.”

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Posted on September 19, 2011

The Week in WTF

By David Rutter

1. Sentencing Blago, WTF?
We doubt this will be the ex-gov’s sentence though we can always hope, and we also doubt prosecutors even proposed it to the judge. But gosh, it sure is fun to scare the ever-lovin’ clown pants off Blago, isn’t it? Who said federal prosecutors don’t have a riotous sense of humor.

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Posted on September 16, 2011

Ten Years Gone

By J.J. Tindall

TEN YEARS GONE
Again: For CDR Dan F. Shanower, USN, who was my friend.
I.
You linger in my mind, an art-deco
showplace
built in 1921,
recently restored to its original
cathedral-like glory,
where Frank Sinatra
used to play
seven shows a day.
You permeate my grief, designed by
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill,
completed in 1973
and still
the tallest building in America.
They actually evacuated it
after you were killed
at the Pentagon.

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Posted on September 9, 2011

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