appetite 4-21-05
Spring means warmer weather and flowering trees. But for me, the harbinger of spring is asparagus, that delicious edible member of the lily family that usually bursts forth from the cool ground this month. Sangamon County is a great source of asparagus, with plenty of farmers selling their produce at the downtown farmers’ market and…
flicks 4-21-05
Mickey Rourke is back, and he’s uglier than ever. It’s great to see his triumphant return as the hulking Marv in Sin City, even if you can’t really see him under the mounds of makeup. Rourke became the golden boy of 1980s cinema, and he was carving out a career as the next great rebel…
excursions 4-21-05
Learning about the human body may conjure bad memories of impenetrably thick textbooks, anatomy charts with words too big to pronounce, and a creepy skeleton hanging in the corner of a classroom. Forget all that. A museum exhibit now showing in Chicago offers a unique opportunity to more readily understand and appreciate the vast complexities…
One time, at Mars camp
Here’s a little-known fact about life on Mars: It smells. And not of jasmine and lavender, either. It smells of socks and urine and onions and armpits. I know this because today is my last day of a two-week stay on the closest approximation to a Martian habitat that exists on Earth — the Mars…
art seen 4-21-05
Over the past decade, Robert Sill began noticing a trend that disturbed him: Gallery spaces had grown, and large-scale works tended to dominate shows. But bigger isn’t always better, and Sill, a curator at the Illinois State Museum, decided that it was time for something different. The result is think small!, an exhibit featuring an…
gardening 4-21-05
Three annual flowers and three vegetables were chosen as the 2005 All-America Selections winners. The mission of AAS is “to promote new garden seed varieties with superior garden performance judged in impartial trials in North America.” AAS is the oldest, most established international testing organization in North America. First, the flowers: ¥ The bright colors…
The silencer
Joy, consternation, and for some, outright shock is reverberating among Catholics worldwide at the first sight of their new pope in his red robes, Benedict XVI. The most conservative regard the German Joseph Ratzinger as their champion, with his influential rock-hard stands against gay unions, cloning and the ordination of women, and against any dismantling…
In theaters this week. . .
The Amityville Horror [R] Demonic forces terrorize a family after they move into a home that was the site of a mass murder. ShowPlace West, ShowPlace East Beauty Shop [PG-13] Gina (Queen Latifah) relocates to Atlanta, opens a salon, and hires a motley crew of stylists to cater to an eccentric clientele. ShowPlace East Fever…
The next BIG thing
When Liz Nichols first heard about alpacas three years ago, she weighed the potential income against the money she was making from the corn and soybean crops she raised on a spare three acres of her seven-acre farm just west of Bloomington. But while visiting an alpaca farm, Nichols set aside numbers and, she says,…
Chocolate Abe
Marla Brotherton already was well known for her specialty chocolates when she and her husband, Greg, opened In Good Taste, their candy shop in Taylorville. But the couple’s creations never included anything as unusual as the Brothertons’ recent tribute to Abraham Lincoln, a life-size chocolate bust of our nation’s 16th president. The idea came in…
sound patrol 4-21-05
It’s a shame that Martha Wainwright is blessed with such hypeworthy DNA. There are many other interesting, even important things to say about the Brooklyn-based, Montreal-reared singer/songwriter, but her genes won’t cooperate. Demanding obeisance, they elbow their way into the listening experience and prevent us from hearing things we might have noticed if we didn’t…
quick takes 4-21-05
TALK ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL ART Dr. Judith Everson, retired UIS professor, will discuss the work of Scottish environmental artist Andy Goldsworthy at a brown-bag lunch at noon on Friday, April 22, at the Springfield Art Association. The presentation, which coincides with Earth Day, examines Goldworthy’s use of natural materials in his short-lived creations and permanent installations.…
Why is Illinois so stingy to its oldsters?
I now have to travel the 30-or-so miles to Girard to take flowers to my friend Elizabeth Brown, who’s living at the Pleasant Hill Village nursing home. She was organist at our church for many years, and though she likes the care she’s getting and the facility in which she lives, she always talks about…
now playing 4-21-05
>What’s the point of having a two-night music fest for someone just turning 2 years old? First, the kid doesn’t get a real choice in who performs, so the selection is left to the parents. Second, the whippersnapper won’t be there because the shows begin after his bedtime. Third, who cares what the fest is…
letters 4-21-05
Letters policy We welcome letters, but please include your full name, address and a daytime telephone number. We edit all letters for libel, length and clarity. Send letters to: Letters, Illinois Times. P.O. Box 5256. Springfield, Illinois 62705. Fax: (217) 753-3958. E-mail: editor@illinoistimes.com A PHARMACIST’S OBLIGATION David Smith, senior policy analyst for the Illinois Family…
common sense 4-21-05
Well, well. George W. Bush is getting a political comeuppance — and it’s coming from conservatives. At issue is his enthusiasm for the liberty-busting USA Patriot Act, a little shop of autocratic horrors that the Bush administration rammed through Congress under cover of the 9/11 terrorist attack. Several of its most intrusive, anti-democratic provisions expire…
music notes 4-21-05
Fans of contemporary rock and metal should be thrilled about this Low as I Friday night show at Viele’s Planet (126 E. Jefferson St., 525-9029). The local group recently toured briefly with platinum-selling act Saliva. Now with the major label band on hiatus, drummer Paul Crosby formed Solace for Now with old buddies and bandmates…
Fast track
Springfield Alderman Frank McNeil says he plans to ask the Illinois Labor Relations board to fast-track its decision regarding a citizen police review board, in light of another complaint filed last week against three Springfield Police Department detectives. Defense attorney Bruce Locher signed an affidavit April 13 accusing Detectives Paul Carpenter, Jim Graham, and Steve…
Jacqueline Jackson 4-21-05
kinquote poem # 3 a friend says your poems aren’t profound my dad tells of the city chap who waited by the fence thinking he’d surely gain some weathered wisdom from the grizzled tiller of the soil the farmer paused to turn his team the stranger asked what do you think about when you plow…
Soap opera
There’s no violation of state law if a toxic-waste landfill — or even a nuclear-waste dump, for that matter — is partly owned by one of the governor’s in-laws. There’s no problem with the law if a member of the governor’s family owns stock in a regulated monopoly such as Commonwealth Edison or SBC. A…
