We had a great Thanksgiving, entertaining a neigborhood friend with several lamb chops, Greek smashed potatoes, and green beans. Speaking of Greek: omicron. It’s worrisome. Or it’s not worrisome. It’s tiresome, for sure. And covid’s not going anywhere. At least we don’t have a dickhead president calling it the African virus. Thank goodness for small […]

Heidi Stevens, a Chicago Tribune Columnist (among other things) had this to say on Facebook about last week’s Rittenhouse verdict: “This country keeps finding new and endless ways to break your heart.” Ain’t it the sad truth. I have nothing to say about that matter that hasn’t been written. Like everything in today’s United States, […]

After Gus was born back in 1986, Beth was at sea. (I was hanging onto a life preserver.) Barely a year after learning her sight loss was permanent, she was faced with helping to raise a newborn with an extremely rare genetic condition. Gus was a complete enigma, with little data about life expectancy or […]

Editing an alt-weekly newspaper in Champaign-Urbana some 20 years ago taught me a ton. I already knew journalism was difficult work. What I didn’t understand was how critical good local journalism is to any community. And how difficult it is to do local community—focused journalism when you’re a local. When I took the helm,  the […]

I’ve missed a couple Mondays recently, and for that, I apologize. The first was owed to exhaustion. On October 10 I left for Tarrytown, New York, the start of a weeklong effort to put on…gulp…an in-person conference. The non-profit I work for—Phius—puts on an annual conference and after a virtual shindig last year, we gathered […]