Pretty Pretty Chicago Skyline

Skyline as I walked downtown. Nice day!

Hoo, Packed Around Wrigley...

Baseball game between two colleges -- still the place was packed!

Street-Walking

So nice! Someplace where I can do my business! Wish they had these on every block :-)

Old Friends :-)

Shooting the breeze with an old pal of mine... 🙂

35th Anniversary -- Berlin Wall Comes Down

35th Anniversary Berlin Wall Comes Down (11/9/1989) -- Actually the Wall didn't come down but rather (and just as well) it opened up. East Germans, formerly prevented from going over (or going pretty much anywhere) were finally allowed to go. We on the free side (i.e. West Berlin) cheered their crossing.

A Few More Details:
I was there, had been there since '84 and knew what it was like to have a police state just a block or two away. I was working construction in those days. I had finished up and had taken a nap. When I woke up one of the people living in the house told me the extraordinary news that while I was asleep, the Wall had come down.

Of course, the person exaggerated. The Wall which surrounded the entire western half of the city hadn't come down. Rather an opening had been made at Checkpoint Charlie and also at the Brandenburg Gate where people from East Berlin -- the 'Ossies' -- could cross over. What followed were three days of absolute euphoria as tens of thousands of East Germans came over, swamping the local public transportation, waiting in long lines in front of banks to pick up their "Begrüßungsgeld" (i.e. welcome money) of 100 DM with which they bought items absolutely unavailable in their part of the city such as cassette radios and bags of oranges.

The downfall of that Wall and the regime it represented was the most positive experience of my young adult life.

Today's Found Item : Street Vehicle

Wow, today's found item : street vehicle! It was just lying on the sidewalk -- couldn't pass it up. I've got everything!

SunTimes Article on Lack of Librarians at Chicago Public Schools

Surprising and not-to-mention disturbing article about the lack of librarians in the Chicago Public School system: 'CTU Pushes for Libraries, Librarians in Every CPS School'. We get the count in the subtitle: '... just 107 librarians for more than 500 schools'.

Lemme do some math: So we're talking about almost four fifths of Chicago's public schools without access to research help? Disturbing!