Events

From WBEZ's Chicago History blog: Chicago had actually started building two subways, with another tunnel following Milwaukee-Lake-Dearborn. Then the war came, and construction materials became scarce. The second subway would not be completed until 1951. But on this glorious Saturday morning--October 16, 1943--the city was ready for a party. Starting at 9:15, ten special trains were dispatched from ten different outer terminals along the "L" system. They carried various dignitaries to a rendevouz in the...

The American Idol 2010 runner-up Crystal Bowersox played City Winery Chicago last night: Another: Anna Rose opened for her; I was impressed: Tough shooting conditions. I forgot my seats were right against the stage. I wound up shooting everything with a 50/1.8, trying to get around the enormous monitor just to my right. It sounded great, though.

Via Sullivan, Reuters' John Judis points out Thursday's deadline doesn't matter: The best way to look at this, I think, is that there’s a spectrum of default severities. At one end, you have the outright repudiation of sovereign debt, a la Ecuador in 2008; at the other end, you have the sequester, which involves telling a large number of government employees that the resources which were promised them will not, in fact, arrive. Both of them involve the government going back on its promises, but some...

Two clients, both alike in dignity, yadda yadda yadda...so no time to read these yet: The shutdown (Ted Cruz is an ass) The shutdown (Ted Cruz is a ridiculous ass) The shutdown (Ted Cruz and all his friends are asses) Lake Shore Drive gets 3400 meters longer this week More about the American-US Airways merger, partially involving that ass Ted Cruz's home state Hello, "Read Later" button...

My first order of business upon returning from watching the marathon was to get this guy out of my apartment: That appears to be a silver-haired bat, one of the most common species, but one usually found in more forested areas. He got into my apartment because, after taking the screens out last week for the window washers, I didn't feel a crushing need to put them back in. (I do now.) I didn't hurt the little dude. I opened the bottom half of the window and then encouraged the bat to go through it with...

This is one of the best parts of living in Lincoln Park: After watching one group of runners go up Stockton Drive, I can catch them going the other way down Clark. Even Parker gets into the action—sort of: We had perfect running weather today, 12°C with light winds and plenty of sun. Kenyan Dennis Kimetto set a new course record at 2:03:45, which is just about 3 minutes per kilometer.

Really interesting analysis from No More Mr Nice Blog. Key grafs: The Republican Party at this point in time is entirely made up of Punishers who think they are entitled to treat the government--and especially the government of Barack Obama--as waiters who need to be shown their place. This should surprise no one. At heart the entire Republican Party is made up of winners and losers and they are united in just one thing: they think that money is the only way to tell who is who. If you have money, you...

Links, the posting of which does not constitute endorsement: Christian delusions are driving the GOP insane Engagement rings are barbaric Create an air gap to keep your stuff secure Azerbaijan releases election results before polls open Government shutdown causing needless lab animal deaths Back to the mines. Sarah Jarosz tonight.

If you wondered how often people actually ride Divvy bikes, everyone's Divvy online trip summary page has the answer. They put the trip ID right on the page. My first Divvy trip, on September 18th, was #522105; this morning's was #732089. Assuming they use an ID field that auto-increments by 1 for each ride, that means Divvy users rode about 210,000 times in the past 22 days, or about 9,500 times a day (on average). That rate gives them nearly 3.5 million rides over the next 12 months. Compare that with...

I've got about an hour to prepare for a Meet-Up I'm presenting. While I'm doing that, you read these: Sarah Lawrence College professor Nicholaus Mills compares Ted Cruz to Huey Long; Zack Beauchamp at ThinkProgress says racism caused the shutdown (but more broadly than you think); Mimi Cowan has put up a history of the Chicago fire, which started 140 years ago yesterday; and David Auerbach at Slate explains why the ACA website sucks, but not as badly as you think, and probably not for much longer. OK...