I have read the posts, eloquently penned by fellow CN Bloggers about the demise of our reign here at ChicagoNow. The latest one was by my friend and fella writer at Planet Michelle, and another by I’ve Got the Hippy Shakes

https://www.chicagonow.com/planet-michelle/2022/08/greed-arrogance-integrity-adieu-chicagonow/

https://www.chicagonow.com/hippy-shakes/2022/08/a-change-is-gonna-come/

Please check out the sidebar on the CN page and read them while you can. Don’t be distracted by the June 29th date on the page. That was the last date that anyone updated these pages and unfortunately that is the way this has gone.

Had I not started my time here with such a perfectly competent “cat herder,” I’m sure I would not have gotten as far with this writing thing at all.

Our original boss-man, Jimmy Greenfield was not only my own personal Perry White, but he was supportive, encouraging and gave me plenty of opportunities to challenge myself with my writing.

We had a blogapalooza every month where Jimmy would throw out a challenge topic and we would have one hour to write and post an appropriately themed blog. The first ones were definitely challenging for a novice, but I learned to look forward to them. Not only did it shake the cobwebs off, but it let me know that I could do something I thought was impossible.

After Perry, I mean Jimmy, left, the support and encouragement left with him. My writing waned for a while, but I do believe it is possible to pick up and begin again.

So, that is what myself and my writing buddies will be doing. We will go off and continue to write, but it will not be here at ChicagoNow and it makes me sad.

Some of us have found a new place to blog and I’m sure some of us are still looking for a new home. At any rate, we are on our own to find our way, direction has not been forthcoming.

This is a new beginning for me and although I don’t know where I will land at the moment, I don’t believe you’ve heard the last of me.

I’m sticking around until the bitter end here, hopefully I will have my new digs before the final curtain falls. Thank you for following me.

The fat lady’s singin’, the swan has his song. Hit the lights on your way out … ’cause baby, we gone.

In 2019, a hedge fund called Alden Global Capital bought out the Tribune Companies.

In the wake of that event – and I do mean wake – several fine national newspapers and at least one legendary radio station ended up eviscerated. Award-winning journalists of skill and long-standing, fine editors and loyal staff were knocked-off like victims in a mob war. Some saw rats early and jumped for the lifeboats, hiring on elsewhere, or starting podcasts, websites or blogs. Some stayed tied to the mast and foundered. None deserved their fate.

Chicago, by God, was a newspaper town. Arguably moreso than New York or the west coast, ink was in our blood. Hardscrabble, dedicated professionals toiled here, from the lowliest copy boy to Pulitzer Prize winners. We were Sandburg and Hecht and Royko. Ebert, Schmich and Zorn. Kass, Kogen, Kupcinet and Condon. Bentley, Telander and Feldman. And of course, the iconic Col. McCormick.

It was a town of tough journalistic mothers who could – and often did – get the story before the rest of them. The cat’s ass, above and below the fold.

Alas, all eras come to an end. The cyber world has effectively lamed print media, rendering it old-school and worse, financially impotent. Even the highest art will fade away without proper stewardship.

Today, exponentially, it’s talent and skill be damned. Money talks and bullshit walks. It’s disgusting to realize that the hedge funders and arbitragers and deeep-pocket investors behind this takeover shit have not one scintilla of regard for the worth, the flesh and bones of its victims. Monetize, baby; all else is the aforementioned “bullshit.”

Yeah, I know that we’re capitalists and that takeovers and mass job-loss have been going on for aeons. Throw a rock and you’ll hit someone who lost a job or jobs in a pogrom. My objection is when the conquerors ham-handedly gobble up businesses they know nothing about. It’s the same as health insurance companies making medical decisions. It’s just WRONG.

Which brings us to little, ol’ ChicagoNow. What started as a Trib side hustle became a vital platform, entertaining and informative, with a talented, diverse group of writers. Some of Our Own went on to write books, form companies, become college instructors, rule the Chicago social and charity scenes, and generally enrich tens of thousands of readers and the world around them. A lot of fine writing has been done here.

Sadly, we scribes who remain at ChicagoNow have it on excellent authority that the site is being shut down.

We don’t know when, as for well over a month now there has been radio silence from on-high, i.e. whomever is running the show, Wizard of Oz-like, behind the curtain. Alden sorely lacks civility; we have no manager and absolutely no one to contact regarding our fate. Even in the cesspool of takeovers, it’s unconscionable.

And so, post by post, most of us are downloading our oeuvre and heading for bylines unknown.

I have known some incredible people in my seven years at ChicagoNow – former community manager extraordinaire Jimmy Greenfield, the incandescent Candace Jordan, our ever-prolific raconteur Howard Moore, controversial political pundit Bob Schneider, and my friends Margaret Laing, Terry Parrilli and Carole Lago. To all others I’ve communed with here, you have my sincere respect and regard.

I’ve no idea where I’m going, but if you Google “Planet Michelle” occasionally, my new digs will show up eventually.

To you who have read the musings of my little monkey brain and came back for more – I thank you. Whenever I felt like I was writing in a bell jar, thinking that there was even one person digging what I was doing made it more than worthwhile.

As my girl Amy Winehouse sang, “We only said goodbye with words.” See you in my next incarnation.

Peace out!

Tonight’s “Public Affairs” show airing on Cable in Lake county, McHenry county and N and NW suburban Cook County features Mark Curran, the GOP nominee for the IL Supreme Court 2nd District seat (See cable listings, below). This show is Part 2 of show host Jeff Berkowitz’s two-part interview with IL S CT candidate Mark Curran (R-Libertyville).

You can also watch 24/7, Part 2 of Berkowitz’s interview with Curran, the former Lake County Sheriff (12 years) and Assistant State’s Attorney (8 years)by clicking here.

The Dems now have a 4-3 majority on the Supreme Court, but if the GOP wins the two open seats (2nd and 3rd Districts, both purple) in November, the GOP will have the majority on the IL Supreme Court for the 1st time in 60 years.

Although Curran could not, due to the Canons of legal ethics, say or discuss how he would rule on any matters that might come before him as a Justice, he did discuss with show host Berkowitz in Part 2 of the interview his gut views and gestalt on detention by the courts of defendants prior to trial, skyrocketing crime, guns, the July 4th Highland Park tragic shooting, the IL Firearms Restraining Order Act, and the actions of prosecutors, Highland Park police and the IL State Police in the run-up to that awful July 4th massacre. 

The half-hour show with Mark Curran airs Tonight at 8:30 pm on Comcast Cable Ch. 17 in the following towns, villages and suburbs:

Algonquin, Barrington Hills, Beach Park, Carpentersville, Cary, Crystal Lake (ch.74), Del Mar Woods, East Dundee, Fox River Grove, Fox River Valley Gardens, Grayslake, Great Lakes Naval, Green Oaks, Gurnee, Hainesville, Holiday Hills, Huntley, Island Lake, Johnsburg, Lakemoor, Lake in the Hills, Lakewood, Lake Bluff, Lake Eleanor, Lake Forest, Libertyville, McCollum Lake, McHenry, Mundelein, North Chicago, Oakwood Hills, Park City, Pingree Grove, Prairie Grove, Round Lake, Round Lake Beach, Round Lake Heights, Round Lake Park, Sleepy Hollow, Spring Grove, South Barrington, Sunnyside, Third Lake, Trout Valley, Volo, Wadsworth, Wauconda, Waukegan, West Dundee, Winthrop Harbor, Wonder Lake, Woodstock and Zion;

Part 2 of Berkowitz’s interview featuring Mark Curran also airs:

–Tonight in 28 Chicago Metro north and northwest suburbs at 8:30 pm, on Comcast Cable:

–Ch. 19 in Buffalo Grove, Elk Grove Village, Hoffman Estates, parts of Inverness, Lincolnwood, Maine Township, Morton Grove, New Trier Township, Niles, Northfield, Northfield Township, Palatine, Rolling Meadows and Wilmette and on–Ch. 35 in Arlington Heights, Bartlett (2nd Dist.), Glenview, Golf, Des Plaines, Hanover Park, Mt. Prospect, Northbrook, Park Ridge, Prospect Heights, Schaumburg, Skokie, Streamwood and Wheeling.

The show also airs in:

In Highland Park (all in the S CT 2nd District), 8:30 pm, Cable Ch 19, tomorrow (Wednesday).

You can also watch 24/7, Part 2 of Berkowitz’s interview with Curran, former IL Assistant Attorney General, by clicking here.

I had a consultation today with Balanced Flow Neuropathy for treatment of peripheral neuropathy. I’ve been experiencing numbness and tingling in both feet for some time and enough is enough.

Actually, my dad put the fire under me to get it checked out. I guess he got tired of me telling him the same thing every time he asks me how I’m doing. I would tell him of course that my feet are numb and he wonders if there is something that can be done about it.

My primary care doctor says the neuropathy stems from my lupus and there’s nothing that can be done. Meanwhile I’m suffering day to day physically and of course when something affects you physically your quality of life is threatened.

The team at Balanced Flow Neuropathy so far are caring and that showed during my consultation. I was so excited as they explained my treatment plan that I was hoping they could start treatment the same day.

One drawback however is I get around by using a rollator walker and while there is an elevator I have to climb up stairs to get to the elevator. It’s going to be a struggle getting my walker up the stairs without help. I’m sure all this will come to pass when I won’t need my walker which is my main goal in addition to walking again normally.

As a player at Purdue and a longtime college football coach, Brock Spack has seen plenty of leaders.

“I’ve been around four Heisman (candidates) that were quarterbacks and that’s a huge position to have a void in,” the Illinois State head coach said Tuesday during Missouri Valley Football Conference media days via Zoom.

The Redbirds’ struggles at quarterback led to a 4-7 record last fall and a 1-3 mark in their abbreviated spring COVID season in 2021.

Enter Minnesota transfer Zack Annexstad, a junior who has been on campus since January.

Annexstad, who started eight games in 2018 for the Gophers, has already made a big impression.

“There’s a lot of great things he does that I like,” Spack said. “The thing I was hoping he’d have, but I really didn’t know, is his leadership. It’s been extraordinary. I haven’t been around a guy like him in a while.

“He took the reins and he’s done a great job,” Spack said. “He’s been an awesome addition.”

Illinois State averaged 124.8 passing yards a game last season, which ranked 115th among 123 FCS teams. According to NCAAsports.com, 89 FCS teams averaged more than 124.8 yards rushing per game a year ago.

Spack hopes a new man under center can revive the Redbirds’ passing game and provide a complement to a rushing attack that boasts sophomore Cole Mueller, who finished just shy of 1,000 yards on the ground last season.

According to Spack, Annexstad has added dimensions such as getting more receivers involved in the passing game, understanding coverages and defensive pressures and knowing where to go with the football in various situations.

“I’m glad he was here this spring,” Spack said. “He’s getting more comfortable in our system.”