GapersBlock.com - The Party Line
 

November 6, 2009 (Vol 6, #45)

In This Issue:
• Weekend Traffic: What's Happening This Weekend and Beyond
• Little-Known Facts About Chicago: City Plates
• In Other News: The Best from Our Topical Blogs
• The Party Line: Wisconsin Wonderland
• Sausage Links: Sampler Platter
• Administrivia: Fine Print, Etc.
 

Weekend Traffic
SCHOOL DAZE. Gorilla Tango's Mrs. Gruber's Ding Dong School is in session tonight and Saturday.
MOVIE TIME! The Golem is playing (for free!) at the Cultural Center tonight-with live accompaniment.
FOOD ON STAGE. Chef, author and TV personality Anthony Bourdain makes an appearance in Waukegan tonight.
MUPPETS! The Gene Siskel Film Center brings back "Muppet History 201" Saturday and Sunday.
PUDDING ON THE IMPROV. Oscar nominee Michael Shannon does a guest spot at ATC Improv tonight.
FOR THE DRINKER IN YOU. The Festival of Wood and Barrel-Aged Beer takes place tomorrow in the West Loop.
CHILI FOR THE CHILLIN'. Half-Acre Brewery hosts a benefit chili cook-off this Saturday. There's prizes!
GET ON THE SOFA. The sixteenth annual sculpture, objects & functional art exihibition is at Navy Pier this entire weekend.
SOUR DRINKS, HAPPY FACES. Lush Wine and Spirits holds an experimental dinner with New Belgium brewery on Sunday night.
...and so much more. Check out the full listings on Gapers Block.

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Little-Known Facts About Chicago
Chicago issued license plates before Illinois did -- from 1904 to 1906. It stopped when the state began issuing plates in 1907. Interestingly, Chicago's plates were brass medallions, while Illinois' plates for the first couple years were made of leather, wood or sheet metal, with letters and numbers purchased at hardware stores.

In Other News

Too dazed post-Halloween to keep up with GB? Here's some of what you missed.

A/C, our arts & culture section: Messiah Equiano in the spotlight; Innervation Dance brings innovation; Tabatha took over Orbit; we got some nice cash (thanks!); Steve at the Movies reviews Men Who Stare at Goats, a Christmas Carol, The Fourth Kind, Precious and (Untitled).

The GB Book Club, our literary section:
Our 2010 reading list is announced; Great Books and short stories; we make sure you know about the local meetup group for NaNoWriMo participants; Open Books needs your love.

Drive-Thru, our food & drink section:
Molly gives us the scoop on where to find Alan's Spaghetti; LoKal opens; and we Kiss the Cook.

Mechanics, our politics section:
Talking about TIFs; we look back to Election Night 2008; updates on labor problems in the city; and petition mania!

Tailgate, our sports section:
The Chicago Fire gets doused; Lance Briggs has the hobbies of a nine-year-old; the Cubs' Ted Lilly goes under the knife; the Sox make some trades.

The Party Line
Wisconsin Wonderland

(From the Party Line boiler room's old but ever-relevant lyric archive, in commemoration of the peculiarly sunny but cold days that still somehow aren't quite so cold as to annoy, in fact there is that pleasantness about them that we only experience for a brief moment in this uniquely Midwestern season, which is not to say that autumn is not celebrated the world around, but rather that the chilly, straight-road, crisp-apple flavor of it here in our prairie is something only we locals understand, isn't it, which raises a minor question of why a Chicagoan is paeanizing our autumn with a cheesehead poem, but some things simply defy explanation, and quite frankly The Bean inspires no very strong autumny feelings, and we think football tailgating is stupid, and no offense to all those cheeseheads out there...)

Wisconsin Wonderland
Autumn world, subdued and mellow
Green to brown and brown to yellow
Now the fields are falling fallow
In God's country

Lone mare in a meadow plays
Stamps her hoof, content to graze
Sun peers at her through a maze
Of bleak, gray clouds

Bitter winds the branches tease
Through the graying, fragile trees
Parched, as if some dread disease
Would make them sleep

Now, with silos overtaxed
Summer waned, autumn waxed
And exhausted fields relaxed
And died for a while

--Peter Zelchenko, 1992

Sausage Links

• The Gasometers of Vienna.

• Beibei, I knead you.

Both sites are occasionally NSFW, just FYI. YMMV. OMGBBQ.

Administrivia
This is the Party Line, a weekly email from GapersBlock.com, a Chicago-centric website. The Party Line newsletter is edited by Andrew Huff; the column is by Peter Zelchenko. Pete's opinions are his own and don't necessarily reflect those of Gapers Block or the rest of its staff (although sometimes they do). They got a name for the winners in the world, I want a name when I lose. We're always looking for new events, ideas and Jeff "Skunk" Baxter. Send your ideas to inbox@gapersblock.com.

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