I work about 2 blocks from Sears Tower, and typical of a lifelong Chicago resident, I have been up to the Observation Deck on the 103rd floor of the building twice in my 49 years: both times with friends from out of town.
In an attempt to bring more visitors to the deck, the new owners of the building have erected several ledges made of see-through glass on all sides, which gives you the effect of being suspended in the air, over 1,300 feet above the ground.
As a large man, I don’t trust most ladders that suspend me 5 feet above the kitchen floor, much less being suspended over ½ mile over the pavement and certain death.
Call me a coward, but no thanks!

Former lightweight boxing champion Alexis Arguello was found dead in his home the other day with a gun shot in the chest. Arguello was one of the best fighters I’ve ever seen, and like another of my heroes, Bjorn Borg, he meticulously and systematically dismantled opponents.
Everyone remembers Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini mostly for the death of Duk Ku Kim in the ring, but Mancini was being pushed too quickly too soon, and Mancini was pitted against Arguello. Arguello beat Mancini mercilessly, and I thought that Arguello was going to kill Mancini that night.
But through it all, Arguello was one of the most gentlemanly of fighters. He didn’t do the chest-bumping, crap-talking, like the other fighters. He seemed like he was going to work, picking up a paycheck.
But boy could he fight! In 1999, a panel of experts assembled by The AP voted Arguello the best junior lightweight and sixth-best lightweight of the 20th century. He never lost at 130 pounds, and his popularity in his own country was so great that he carried the flag for Nicaragua at the Beijing Olympics. It wasn’t enough. Arguello reportedly suffered from depression and there are many reports that the boxer’s death may have been suicide.
After 2 bruising fights with Aaron Pryor, Arguello retired, returned, got beat up, and retired again. He Arguello retired in 1995 with a record of 82-8 with 65 knockouts and was a champion in three weight divisions.
After retirement, Arguello fought against the Sandinista government in the 1980s when it seized his property and bank account (a natural thing to do in my opinion), but he later joined the party and was elected mayor of Nicaragua’s capital last year.
He was a great fighter.

Maybe it’s the “dumbing down” of America, but the second Transformers film raked in the second most money in a five day opening week: $201.1 million, second only to a much better film “The Dark Knight.” All this occurred DESPITE almost universally bad reviews.
What does this mean? Are Americans too stupid to recognize a bad film? I would say yes except for the terrible showing of “Land of the Lost” just a few weeks ago. Maybe kids just like the machines beating on one another like one huge video game.
The truly sad part is that director Michael Bay, the worst film director currently working, can, once again, sit on his laurels, not try to improve or make better movies, just by saying “look how much my movies make.” This is reportedly his attitude when particularly upset by his films’ bad press.
Last week, Bay was quoted that he would not be doing “Transformers 3” or any more action films because of the bad reviews. But Bay can once again sit on his burgeoning wallet and ignore the reviews, and with his track record, certainly some producer (like Transformers executive producer Steven Spielberg – a much better filmmaker, but not as good as he thinks he is) will find some mindless action extravaganza and offer Bay a truckload of money to direct.
Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ve seen the last of Michael Bay or the Transformers.

I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know who Michael Jackson was. It was certainly before the age of 9, when the Jackson 5 put out their first single. To those of us who are around the same age (Jackson was a little less than 1½ years older than I), he was the local kid with unparalleled talent. His music was all over the radio; we kids played it incessantly; and all of the little girls loved him (which was OK, girls were still yucky).
So, I was stunned when I heard he died, but at the same time, I wasn’t. I didn’t find out until I arrived at my guitar lesson about 8:30 PM and one of the other students suggested that we not play any British Pop like we usually do, and play some Michael Jackson songs. Perplexed, I asked why and he told me that he died.
Locally, we had the three celebrity deaths: television journalist John Calloway, Charlie’s Angel and pin up girl Farrah Fawcett, and now Jackson. The most press coverage goes to Jackson, due to his star power and the suddenness of his death. But, to many of us, Jackson’s death, while sad, is not surprising.
Michael Jackson, to many black people of my age group, was like your VERY weird cousin; you appreciate him, but you just hope he doesn’t do something else bizarre. Yes, he suffered from an abusive relationship with his father, and along with the incredible fame, all of the Jackson kids have turned out warped, and Michael, arguably the most talented and richest of the family took the weird level past 11 to somewhere near 23 (on a 1-10 scale).
As a musical artist, Jackson lost his relevance many years ago. As the Chicago Sun-Times rock writer Jim DeRogadis corrected wrote, as popular as “Thriller” was (the most popular selling album in history), 1979’s “Off The Wall” was the superior achievement and his finest music. By the time he released “Bad” in 1987, Jackson was an overplayed superstar who had nothing left to surprise us with anymore. In many ways, the success of Thriller was a positive to his bank account; but was to be a bane to his recording career as Jackson constantly tried to outdo Thriller, which was impossible. Thriller was a once-in-a-lifetime, lightning-in-a-bottle type of event.
It’s all being reprinted today: the success, the plastic surgeries, the dalliances with children, the strange marriages (including to Lisa Marie Presley, Elvis’ only child); his own children; living in Bahrain; the money problems. Even in death, Jackson will remain in the news: liquidating his reported $1 billion in assets to repay nearly $500 million in debt.
Now, the next side of the freak show begins: the fight over assets, the fight over the kids, the people I feel for the most. Their Jackson grandparents are old, and besides, they screwed up their own kids. The other brothers and sisters are weird in their own ways. Will Jackson’s ex-wife Debbie Rowe, the mother of two of the three kids, come out of the woodwork? Is any grab for the children in their best interests, or just an attempt at what remains of Jackson’s money?
More important, how many non-related children will come out now and say that Jackson took unlawful liberties with them? Will Paul McCartney and Yoko Ono make another attempt to buy the Beatles’ song rights? Will Jackson be buried and people start visiting like Jim Morrison, or will he be created and his ashes spread someplace, or stored somewhere? Or will his death create another bizarre story: like being frozen like Ted Williams?

There are television shows that you watch because they are good. Some you watch because they are well written. Others because the show is a geek show – the broadcast version of a train wreck – you don’t want to look; you’re embarrassed to look; but you have to look. “The Jerry Springer Show” is one of those train wrecks. “Jon and Kate Plus 8” is another one.
Long time visitors know that my knowledge of this show is solely because of The Indignant Wife and The Indignant Elder Daughter, who would watch this before going to sleep. Because I like spending time with them on occasion, I would hang out and watch too. My impressions were twofold: first, I was amazed with having eight children, all very young. The Indignant Oldest child is 4-years-old and is a diva in training; The Indignant Baby is 8-months old and still not sleeping through the night. I can’t deal with the 2 kids I have; if I had six more, I’d be checking into the insane asylum.
My second impression, as I wrote in an earlier piece, was what a shrew the wife was. She would put her husband down on the air to a point that was well beyond normal bitching. Jon was a world-traveled man with an education; Kate was older then he, but had never left her hometown until he came along.
First they had twins, and with the magic of fertility drugs, they had six more at once. Some smart television executive decided that coping with eight children would make for interesting television (I was bored), so the phenomenon that was “Jon and Kate” was born.
Until last night, when the couple’s highly publicized “big announcement” was, expectedly, that they would divorce. Of course, since Jon quit his job to be a full time dad and reality show participant, and Kate had no job, the couple had chosen to keep on doing the show with the kids staying in the house, but the parents rotating in and out. However, the show has reportedly gone “on hiatus” in light of the divorce.
Personally, I give less than a damn about either of the adults; I just wish that the kids will be alright: physically, mentally and emotionally. That is the one thing that I have learned about being a parent – empathy for the children who never got a say in whether they wanted to be born.
But I also want to give a cheer to Jon who finally grew a pair of balls and stood up to that vicious woman he married. “I don’t hate Kate but I have to do what’s best for me and my kids,” Jon said on last night’s show. “I was too passive. I just let her rule the roost. Now I finally stood up on my own two feet and I’m proud of myself.”
I’m proud of you too. Now go away.

As with anyone who has made a difference in one field or another, the final scorecard is a mix of wins and losses, and the announcement that Major League Baseball Players’ Union boss Donald Fehr’s quarter century in charge of the players’ association would be coming to an end was definitely a period of wins and losses. He presided over a strike that canceled the World Series (a loss), but engineered record player salaries (a win, at least to the players), and eventually 14 years of labor peace (another win). But Fehr’s legacy will, like many of the players of his 25 years in charge, be forever linked to performance enhancing drugs.
Fehr, who turns 61 next month, announced his retirement, to begin no later than the end of March. The union transition will be as smooth as the transition between Marvin Miller and Fehr’s, with the current boss recommending that his successor be union general counsel Michael Weiner, the No. 3 official and his longtime heir apparent. The move is subject to approval by the union’s executive board and possible ratification by all players.
Part of Fehr’s interest in retiring is that the current labor agreement expires in December 2011
The problem with Fehr has been his unwavering support for the players in light of the drug scandal. He has been a roadblock to testing arguing for the players’ privacy and rights, but not understanding that 1) some of that privacy is waived when players enter this very public game; 2) players are paid very well in return for this; 3) players are, for good or ill, considered role models; 4) due to the sport’s anti-trust exemption, baseball is more beholden to the wishes of the U.S. Congress; and 5) these substances are bad for the player’s overall health, and if you, as a union, are for the long term well-being of a player, his/her health should be included, not just the multi-million contracts.
As a fan and active observer of baseball for almost half a century, I have had a very ambivalent attitude for Don “Have No” Fehr. As noted above, he has done good things for the players and some bad things. This is amplified for the sport, never have the players union or the owners ever considered the fans as they entered their Thunderdome-like negotiations over how to split the multi-billion dollar pie. And that’s the problem with the leaders of both sides, negotiating with only their interests considered – never the underlying constituency, the fans. Which is why both sides were so happy to allow the steroidal Mark MacGwire and Sammy Sosa to hit drug enhanced homers – because it brought people back to the ballparks when the owners and union had come very close to screwing the golden goose to death (much like the oil companies and banks today).
So, as a fan, I won’t miss you Donald. I only wish you could take Commissioner Selig with you. He’s as culpable as you are but keeps trying to sell the fans a bill of goods that he had no knowledge and therefore, no responsibility. Bud, remember what Harry Truman had on his desk: “the Buck Stops Here.” Bud, you were in charge, take the responsibility. Then leave.

A couple of days ago, before news came to light that Sammy Sosa had tested positive for performance enhancing drugs in 2003, Chicago Tribune Editor Dan McGrath wrote a piece on June 14th, three days before the Sosa news saying that it was time to offer a blanket amnesty for all baseball players who took steroids, HGH, or masking agents.
Mr. McGrath says; “In the absence of guidelines from MLB and/or the Hall (of Fame) itself, here’s a modest proposal: blanket amnesty for players from the Steroid Era, defined any way you wish; say, from settlement of the 1981 strike to the present. Come forward, acknowledge what you took, disclose where you got it, explain what you were seeking to achieve, etc. No penalties. Your records will stand, and you’ll be eligible for the Hall just like Maddux and Biggio and Frank Thomas and all the other “clean” guys.
All in the interest of cleaning up the game. Maybe it resolves the Hall of Fame issue. Maybe it removes the cloud of suspicion from anybody who goes deep these days, from big bopper Ryan Howard to 175-pound Ryan Theriot, who found himself addressing ludicrous steroid questions after hitting three home runs in a week earlier this season.”
These are all good points and I’ll add one more: although the Players’ Union is as much to blame as anyone for the “head in the sand” approach to drugs during the 1990s and 2000s, they were rightly scared that the “confidential” testing would become public, and over time, it has. First Alex Rodriguez, now Sammy Sosa.
But, to Mr. McGrath’s point, we may never know who did what, and rather than have these “allegations” appear every several months, keeping the point in the press, let’s get it out there, but with restrictions. First, I believe that the blanket amnesty should end in 2004 or 2005, whenever drug testing could be said to be in effect and at least partially valuable. Second, all players would have to list everything they took, when, and from whom they received the performance enhancing drugs from. Any player whose list is later proven to have been incomplete or not forthcoming would be subject to suspension if still active, and forfeit any chance at induction to the Hall of Fame if retired.
Finally, as I have proposed for a long time, all players should be eligible for the Hall of Fame. How many “juiced” pitchers did Sammy Sosa hit homers off of? How many juiced pitchers did Rafael Palmeiro face?
However, any player who admits to use of these substances inducted into the Hall of Fame, MUST have it stated on their plaque, for all to see, for all time. Yes, they would be full members of the Hall with all rights and privileges, and if the “clean” members of the Hall alumni snub them, that’s between the members of that exclusive club.
It is time to put the past behind us. Yes, it tarnishes the game, but the game is already tarnished, and fans are still coming out to the parks in droves. The casual fan doesn’t give a damn; and many of us care too much. Let’s get all of the dirty laundry out in the open, now, all at once, face the music of public shame, deal with the Hall of Fame appropriately, and put it to bed.