Still talking trash
Untitled Document Ward 2 Ald. Gail Simpson is tired of dealing with garbage. Her east-side ward experiences some of the city’s biggest problems with fly dumping and abandoned trash piles, so the issue became a top priority during her campaign for City Council. Although Simpson and other members of the council haven’t found answers to…
Melancholy man
Untitled Document Starbucks references have become an indie cliché, a form of slackerist shorthand whereby privileged whites rag on the economic class that spawned them. To invoke the Starbucks brand in a record review is to dismiss the music under consideration as yuppie pabulum: It goes down easily enough, but therein lies the problem. Starbucks…
On this they agree…
Untitled Document After more than three years of legal wrangling, attorneys for the city of Springfield have finally found an issue on which they see eye to eye with Courtney Cox, the Benton lawyer who has filed a fistful of race-discrimination lawsuits on behalf of several former city employees: They don’t want letters of admonishment…
Uniquely Springfield
Untitled Document A couple of years ago I went to Washington, D.C., for a short vacation. Actually, I wasn’t in the District proper; I was in some burb less than five miles but more than 40 minutes from there. To be honest, I don’t even remember the name of the town I stayed in. As…
Bigger is bigger, not always better
Untitled Document I was recently in Chicago, playing a bar show on Friday with Micah Walk, a coffeehouse open mic on Sunday, and a theater-group spot on Monday and Tuesday. In the middle, on Saturday, I attended the famed Chicago Blues Festival — you know, the one they call the largest outdoor blues festival in…
Letters to the Editor
Untitled Document We welcome letters. Please include your full name, address, and telephone number. We edit all letters. Send them to Letters, Illinois Times, P.O. Box 5256, Springfield, IL 62705; fax 217-753-3958; e-mail editor@illinoistimes.com. AVOID A RUSH TO JUDGMENTThe Historic Westside Neighborhood Association shares everyone’s concern about traffic safety and will support reasonable, prudent solutions…
Birds in decline
Untitled Document The Illinois Audubon Society is calling for the conservation of the state’s most common birds in the wake of a national report revealing an alarming decline in their populations. Species such as the field sparrow, short-eared owl, and eastern meadowlark top the list of Illinois birds of concern; conservationists say that nearly 99…
Solidarity vigil
Untitled Document Stop torture now. Restore habeas corpus. Scrap the military tribunals. Springfield peace activists say they won’t give up until those in power are persuaded to answer these crucial demands. Local justice groups will sponsor a solidarity vigil and rally at the Capitol steps, 4:45-5:45 p.m. Tuesday, June 26, to urge the repeal of…
Fab Four on film
Untitled Document Forty years ago the Beatles changed music for the second time with the release of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, and it still tops lists as the greatest album ever recorded. I would choose The White Album as their greatest, but Sgt. Pepper is nothing to scoff at. The Beatles, in their…
Organic wine
Untitled Document What’s behind the trend toward more organic wines? The recent surge of interest in organic foods has indeed not escaped the wine business. According to the Organic Trade Association, an industry group representing producers and distributors of organic foods, U.S. sales of wines made with organic grapes reached $80 million in 2005, a…
Newsweeklies at 30, devoted to journalism
Untitled Document The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies gathered for its 30th annual convention last week in the Left Coast city of Portland, a booming place that prides itself on its light-rail transportation system, green buildings, and progressive politics. It sometimes calls itself the People’s Republic of Portland, boasts that it never voted for Bush I…
Water, water, everywhere — and lots of drops to drink
Untitled Document “Would you like bottled water or tap water?” the server asks. That question, routine in upscale big-city restaurants these days, never fails to make me uncomfortable. If I say I just want tap water, do I seem cheap? As if I wouldn’t be able to pay the check if I ordered bottled water?…
Our horticulture miracle
Untitled Document Most of us enjoy a surprise, and for gardeners a horticultural miracle is especially exciting. Last week eight inmates moved a giant agave plant — 6 feet wide, 6 feet tall, and bearing a 25-foot flower stalk — to the University of Illinois master gardeners’ demonstration gardens. The container-grown plant, which is getting…
The shaft
Untitled Document Bill Warner never knew how close he came to dying. After clocking out at the Mount Olive, Ill., waterworks around midnight, he decided to walk home by way of the Union Miners Cemetery. Entering the graveyard, he ambled past the tombstones, pausing to gaze from afar at the silhouette of a shrouded monument.…
Room with a view
Untitled Document In this adaptation of a Stephen King short story, horror writer Mike Enslin (John Cusack) takes it upon himself to visit haunted locales and expose them as frauds. His enthusiasm for doing this probably has something to do with the death of his young daughter (Jasmine Jessica Anthony), a tragedy that’s left him…
Al alone
Untitled Document While the Springfield City Council focuses on selecting the next police chief, rank-and-file members of the Springfield Police Department are embroiled in a controversy that hits closer to home: who will run the patrol officers’ union. Sgt. Al Jones, elected president of the Policemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association Unit 5 in August 2006,…
Zen and the art of making burgers
Untitled Document A good hamburger is hard to find but shouldn’t be. It’s one of the easiest things to make, but most cooks want to make it complicated. All a burger needs to taste lip-smacking are salt, pepper, olive oil, and mindful restraint. A few notes on those four ingredients: Salt and pepper — Use…
People’s Poetry
Untitled Document musicpoem # 4a saturday morn I was maybeeleven I sat in the echoingauditorium of whitewater’snormal school my violin casealongside me I’d be on that stagein a few hours my fiddle tuckedunder my chin my damp hand onthe fingerboard my bow pray notricocheting with nervousness asI played my prepared piece beforethe impassive judges the…
Hope springs
Untitled Document Presidential candidates don’t think it’s too early to start planning for the 2008 election — and neither does the Illinois Green Party. As the legislature sputters, trying to pass a budget, address electric-rate relief, and beat back efforts by Gov. Rod Blagojevich to pass a massive new health-care initiative — all in the…
A sick policy
Untitled Document If your bosses ever say that you should be working like a beaver — take ’em up on it. Even the most eager beavers only work about five hours a day, mostly at a fairly leisurely pace, and they take frequent vacations from work. Oh, and another thing: You’ll never see beavers working…
Judgment for the defense
Untitled Document In a court hearing lasting less than half an hour and attended by only one spectator, the lawsuit filed by the woman at the center of one of Springfield’s biggest scandals ended Tuesday. “Jane Doe” was just 18 when she was raped by two men who came to her apartment in the middle…
The many colors of Springfield
Untitled Document The world was made for “you and me,” says Missy DeMarco, who recently completed the fifth grade at St. Agnes School. “It doesn’t matter what race you are,” says Larissa Mulch, who just finished the fourth grade at Harvard Park. So — what the heck? — why not show “kindness to everyone,” advises…
Hot dogs
Untitled Document Illinois Humane hosts the Hogs for Dogs dice run for the second year in a row on Saturday, June 16. Money raised at the run “goes directly to animal care costs,” says Jane McBride, president of Illinois Humane. Aside from helping animals, this year’s dice run features a drawing for a 2007 Harley-Davidson…
