We had a splendid weekend spending time with our friend Fiona, who is visiting all the way from Edinburgh, Scotland. Our time included an overnight in Champaign, Ill., where we joined friends to see Mavis Staples, who is carrying on the Staples Singers tradition with a joyous, infectious energy. Our visiting friend got a crash course […]

When Beth and I saw Bonnie Raitt last week at the Chicago Theater, I looked around and had a laugh—it was all 55-65ish people like ourselves, grayer and more, ahem, prosperous-looking than when we all first listened to Bonnie decades ago. But something in the air felt the same (and it wasn’t pot smoke). The […]

A Major League Baseball story has gotten a lot of headlines (inside and outside the sports section), produced a tsunami of social media incontinence, made it easy for sports hate radio hosts to fill time, and generally annoyed me. (Non-sports fans: bear with me—the story touches on multiple hot spots.) Last week, Adam LaRoche, a […]

I’d researched the issues. I’d studied the candidates. It was a primary election, not a general one. Voting yesterday should have been a breeze. And you know what? It was! I voted on my own in the Illinois primary election yesterday! The Help America Vote Act of 2002 mandated that voting systems provide some way […]

I’m exhausted hearing about, reading about, and thinking about the election. But when you stop and think about it, that’s a good thing. I’m engaged. People are engaged. Voter turnout has been strong, although still, in my view, pathetic. (Vote goddammit! Put some skin in the game. Invest. Risk getting burned – or this year […]