Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Things got a little, ahem, hairy today over at Boing Boing:
My Bloglines aggregator captured the RSS feed's original typo, but the post's title has been corrected on the actual website. However, if you look at the post's URL, it's still:
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/10/31/chicago-pubic-radio.html.
(Sorry; I have a soft spot for Beavis-and-Butthead-type humor. If you think that's bad, consider the fact that I recall once making the same typo on an undergrad term paper - which the professor thankfully ignored or missed. - Ed.)
Thursday, October 25, 2007
We're big fans of cemeteries (great places to visit, wouldn't want to live there), and we recently discovered Graceland (at Clark and Irving Park) just reopened after a major cleanup following August's violent tree-felling storms. While it's not as large or old as our old fave, Rosehill, it's much, much creepier for some reason. We took a short trip there this past weekend, and had the strange feeling we were being followed, even though no one was around whenever we looked behind us...probably just a trick of the acoustics, as the "L" tracks adjoin Graceland's east wall and the wind seems to play odd tricks.
It doesn't help matters that one of the first monuments that greets you is the tomb of Henry Graves, one of Chicago's first settlers from Ashtabula, OH. (read Henry Graves' obituary from the September 1st, 1907 edition of the New York Times) Nothing wrong with Graves' grave, except that it's fronted by the spectacularly eerie Lorado Taft sculpture*, "Eternal Silence" (above) - an amalgam of Destiny from Neil Gaiman's Sandman, Dickens' Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come, and the Grim Reaper sans scythe. A cursory bit of research confirms that yes, the statue does indeed represent Death.
Lovely.
Graceland Cemetery is reputed to be one of Illinois' most haunted, but normally I don't place too much stock in that. However I do have a rather freaky story. We were followed - slowly - for several minutes...by a white balloon.
The balloon eventually blew over to the razor wire separating the train tracks from the "cheap seats" and died a violent death. Click the YouTube links, and watch the carnage for yourself. I wish I could say that no balloons were harmed in the making of this video, but I'd be lying.
* If you don't think "Eternal Silence" is creepy, consider the fact the figure stands about 9 feet tall. RuPaul's got nothin' on old E.S.
Labels: chicago, history, photo
Friday, October 19, 2007
Lovely goat models courtesy of Spieker's Pumpkin Farm, Rt. 57 in Random Lake, WI.
- Division Kent - Plein Sud
- The Crüxshadows - Marilyn, My Bitterness V2.0
- London After Midnight - Trick Or Treat
- Soulive - Never Know
- Philip Glass - Reting's Eyes
- Beck - Cellphone's Dead (Jamie Lindell Limited Minutes Remix)
- Infected Mushroom - In Front of Me
- William Ackerman - Garage Planet
- Thievery Corporation - Tomorrow
- Cannonball Adderley Quintet - Music, Y'all
Labels: friday random ten, WI
via videosift.com
After all, what's an eternity in hellfire compared to good healthy dose of fiber? A little Australian theological silliness.
Sharp-eyed 80's music fans will note a cameo by Australian Shadow Minister for the Environment Peter Garrett, who takes an apple from the snake at about 2:08. You may remember him as the gangly bald leader of Midnight Oil. [via Neatorama]
Labels: humor, religion, video
Monday, October 15, 2007
Farkleberries offers our heartiest congratulations to the University of Chicago's Prof. Roger Myerson on winning this year's Nobel Prize in Economics, jointly with Prof. Eric Maskin and Prof. Leonid Hurwicz. 
My apologies for the slightly blurry photo taken at this morning's press conference at Mandel Hall, but it was the best I could do without flash. From left: Prof. James Heckman (won the Nobel Prize in Economics 2000), Prof. Roger Myerson, Prof. Gary Becker (1992), and Prof. Robert Lucas (1995). Missing is Prof. Robert Fogel, who won the prize in 1993.
Strange to come to work with news crews waiting outside the Prof's door, awaiting the newly announced laureate's arrival. Even stranger is the fact the University's Department of Economics now has five - count them, five - current Nobel prize winners (not counting professors passed on, or emeriti). Five laureates out of 38 active faculty members means...13.2 percent of our department has won the Nobel Prize. That's just kind of...extraordinary.
Chicago What Radio?
