Bottles

Posted on June 13, 2022 by admin

Old friends visited on Saturday, as they have for a number of years now, and we ate and drank and talked on the deck. In honor of that stretch of years, I put some of the bottles from past gabfests on one of our deck tables. Every year, I keep examples of the beer and other drinks consumed at the event and tuck them away in my garage.

Looks like we drink a lot, but of course we don’t. Five or six bottles a year adds up after nearly a decade, but it only amounts to one bottle per person or so each year.

These are among this year’s bottles. I sampled them all, in a small glass. I can say that porter isn’t really to my taste, but I’m sure someone likes it. The others I found refreshing, in small samples. That’s the way I am with beer.

Voodoo Ranger is made by New Belgium Brewing, with breweries in Fort Collins, Colorado, and Asheville, North Carolina. “Our Voodoo Ranger family is brewed with trendsetting hop and malt varieties — and served with a side of sarcasm,” the New Belgium web site says. Does sarcasm need a dish, or can it be served in a paper cone?

The Great Lakes Brewing Co. is out of Cleveland. Naming a beer for the Edmund Fitzgerald seems a little odd, but it is a local reference — that was the ore carrier’s destination, at least according to the song:

Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland…

Other sources, perhaps more reliable, say she was headed for Detroit. In any case, that too is on the Great Lakes, and Great Lakes Brewing also makes Eliot Ness Lager, Commodore Perry IPA and Burning River Pale Ale, definitely a Cleveland reference.

Finally, Gumballhead is a brew of 3 Floyds of Munster, Indiana. Gumballhead the Cat is apparently a web comic. If I felt like reading more of them, and I can’t say that I do, I might find out why the cat is carrying a space helmet that says FFF (other pictures have it as a Soviet space helmet, complete with CCCP). Some minor mysteries are better left alone.

Birchwood South Park

Posted on May 9, 2022 by admin

Finally a warm day on Saturday — after a miserable, wet Friday — then cool on Sunday, but warm again on Monday. So warm today, in fact, that the ground was dry enough for me to mow the lawn for the first time this year, and grill brats in the back yard, despite gusting winds.

Bonus: Even after dark this evening, I could sit around the deck comfortably in a t-shirt. So I spent some time outside reading about G-men trying to track down the loose 1933 Double Eagles, as mentioned before.

Last week, before the warm up, it was still pleasant enough on Wednesday to seek out a new place to walk: Birchwood South Park in Palatine.

A good place to see the spring greening.

It took a while, but eventually we realized that the water in the middle of the park wasn’t a permanent feature, but the result of the many recent rains.

Including a flooded baseball/softball field.

This year’s rainy spring is more than just an impression.

“This spring has seen more rainy days than any other spring in the past 63 years,” NBC Chicago reports.

“While a rainy springtime in the city isn’t anything new, this year has seen more perception than average, according to the National Weather Service, the average precipitation in Chicago from March to May is 6.93 inches. This year, we’ve seen 10.31 inches.”

The Leaning Tower of Niles

Posted on May 4, 2022 by admin

We were in Niles, Illinois, on Sunday, which you might call a north-northwest suburb. It’s also a close-in suburb, since it has a border with Chicago along Touhy Ave. at one point.

On the Niles side of that road stands the Leaning Tower of Niles, which was built, unlike the one in Italy, to lean on purpose. I’d seen it before, decades ago, but Yuriko hadn’t. So we took a look.

“In 1932, industrialist and inventor Robert Ilg constructed a recreational park for his employees,” the Encyclopedia of Chicago says. “Although the Ilg Hot Air Electric Ventilating Co., later Ilg Industries, was located in Chicago, Ilg lived in Niles.

“He installed two swimming pools and a water tower which he hid behind a half-size replica of Italy’s Leaning Tower of Pisa. In 1960, the Ilg family turned over part of the park property to the Leaning Tower Young Men’s Christian Association. The tower has since been restored and is a symbol of the community. In 1991, Niles and Pisa became sister cities.”

At one time, you could take tours of the interior, but not now. The tower has bells, since it’s a replica of a campanile, but we didn’t hear them ring. Its restoration, like that of the tower in Pisa, probably means that it’s stable, like the tower in Pisa. Still, it’s a little unnerving, standing near that lean.

It also makes me want to see the original. At twice the height of the one in Niles, that’s got to be impressive. And maybe a little unnerving, too.

Stormy Saturday in the City

Posted on May 1, 2022 by admin

On Saturday I spent much of the day in downtown Chicago, for the first time in more than two years, except for a short transit from Midway to Union Station returning from Savannah. Mostly, I’d just gotten out of the habit. Even though I got rained on sometimes — a drizzle some of the time — I was still glad to walk a dozen or more city blocks, ride the El a couple of times, and see what there was to see.

That morning I drove to a parking garage near O’Hare and took the El the rest of the way into the city. Late in the afternoon, I returned the same way. When I’d entered the subway in the city to board the train, the skies were gray and menacing, but the rain had stopped a few hours earlier.

A half-hour later, when the train emerged from a tunnel to run down the median of the Kennedy Expressway toward O’Hare, sheets of rain were pouring on the highway and tapping the top of the train car. Water streaked the windows. I could see wind moving barely green tree branches and bushes off the side of the road. Suddenly, everyone’s phones buzzed a tornado warning from the National Weather Service.

The car was about half full, so the sound of the alert was distinct, seemingly coming from all directions. You’d think there might have been some comment among the passengers about that, but everyone went on with their business — that is, quietly interacting with their phones.

By the time I got off the train and to the garage, the rain had slacked off. By the time I was about half way home on the roads between O’Hare and my part of the northwest suburbs, not only had it quit raining, but the sun peaked out from behind the clouds. I got home and found no damage or even very many large puddles. The storm had passed pretty quickly, it seems. It rained again later that night, but nothing like the violence of the afternoon storm.

At about 7:30, I looked out into my back yard and noticed a rainbow. Actually, a faint double rainbow.

Actually, a near-full rainbow.

Nice way to end a cold, wet April.

Rocky Glen Waterfall

Posted on April 20, 2022 by admin

When you see a sign like this, it’s good to follow it to the named destination. Especially if you already know something is there.

The last time we tried to visit Rocky Glen Waterfall was last summer. Apparently there’s swimming in the area, because when we got there, parking was scarce, but people in bathing suits were common.

I figured in April, particularly a cool April day, crowding wouldn’t be a problem, and it wasn’t. We arrived in the area in mid-afternoon Easter Saturday.

The waterfall, on Sawmill Creek, is part of Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve in DuPage County. One short trail goes to the waterfall, others snake around near the creek.

The waterfall. Niagara, it ain’t, but it is pleasant.

A nearby sign says that the falling-water feature was built by — of course it was — doughty members of the CCC. They were from a camp in the nearby Fullersburg Woods, V-1668, and its men quarried stone near the current site of the falls, and built other infrastructure along Sawmill Creek.

V for veterans. So not just doughty, but doughboys. That same camp did work at Fullersburg itself.

The creek just downstream from the falls, forming a pond-like spot. Rocky all right.

We followed a path downstream along the creek a quarter-mile or so. The view of the falls from some distance.

A short distance away, ruins of the CCC presence.

Our path doubled back to a short bluff overlooking Sawmill Creek where it makes a bend.

Look at that, I told my family. Besides the size, how is that different from that Instagram- famous river bend in Arizona? My family scoffed at the comparison, mildly, but I stand by it.

Summit Station

Posted on April 19, 2022 by admin

Easter Monday morning.

The rest of the day was as raw a spring day as I can remember, with the air moving around enough to give a good simulation of winter. Good thing a warming trend is poised to begin.

The days before were more pleasant. We were glad to have Ann come to visit for Easter. This time, rather than get a ride with someone she knows, she caught the train that runs between Bloomington-Normal and Chicago. Except I didn’t pick her up in Chicago, which would be at Union Station downtown. Rather, she got off someplace a little smaller.

That’s the station — just a step above a flag stop, looks like — at Summit, Illinois. A curious name for such a flat place, but in any case it’s Amtrak’s last stop before Chicago, and more accessible for suburbanites.

One more note: the Friday evening train was pretty much on time. That isn’t always the case with Amtrak, but when it is, I’m happy to say so.

Thursday Grab Bag

Posted on April 7, 2022 by admin

Sluggish progress toward spring here. But some progress. Plants in a nearby park.

The croci in my own yard have been very slow this year — no blooms even now. I don’t keep an exact track every year, but that seems a couple of weeks late. Some years, I remember seeing their very first green sprouts at the end of February. And of course, croci don’t mind a little snow.

On a bench in the same park. What is that thing?

A Soofa sign. The company web site says it makes electronics for advertising or as part of “smart city” communications. This doesn’t look like that, and it also looks inactive. Since I’d never noticed it before, it could be that it isn’t operational yet.

Or is it? According to a park district web site I couldn’t access fully — but could see a bit of, from my Google search — you can charge devices there. Solar-powered, and the top does resemble a solar panel. Wonder how much juice it has these many cloudy days.

The latest snack food to enter the house: Calbee brand Takoyaki Ball-flavored corn snacks. Though Calbee is Japanese, not a product of Japan, but rather Thailand, where ingredients and labor are no doubt cheaper.

No octopus, which is the main ingredient of actual takoyaki, is listed among the ingredients. Still, it’s flavored to taste like takoyaki, which it does, though the simulation isn’t quite spot-on. A little too sweet, Yuriko said, and I agree. Sweetened for North American tastes? Just how many North Americans are going to buy takoyaki-flavored snacks? But not bad.

Calbee, incidentally, began as a candy company in postwar Japan (1949) and acquired its name in the mid-50s, a portmanteau of “Calcium” and “Vitamin B1.” Soon the company found its way into crispy snack foods, especially wheat crackers. I suppose that was something of a novelty in Japan at the time, compared with rice crackers, which go way back. Calbee’s early confections caught on, and so the food technologists there have been working hard to make new varieties of snacks since then.

I see that the fifth season of Better Call Saul has appeared on Netflix. That’s good. I’ll watch it. Once a week or so, that is. That’s how new TV should be, according to Leviticus, I think, though it doesn’t apply to shows that might have been watched every day after school.

Ruth Macintyre Conservation Area

Posted on April 6, 2022 by admin

Fell asleep to light rain last night. I could open the window a crack to listen to it, for the first time this year. Today was merely cloudy, and yesterday’s warmth has mostly ebbed away.

Walked another northwest suburban conservation area recently, which is called the Ruth Macintyre Neighborhood Conservation Center on the entry sign.

In the park district materials, the place is known as the Ruth Macintyre Conservation Area. That matches the nomenclature of the other three such areas in the district, so I’ll go with it. This area is less wooded than Kay Wojcik, but worth the walk all the same.

Hard to believe these tall grasses and cattails will be green in a matter of weeks, certainly by May. Plenty of birdsong about now, but we didn’t hear any throaty frogs looking to mate, as we have in some other wetlands lately.

The trail was muddy in places. I hadn’t worn my best shoes for that, so it slowed me down. Good thing we weren’t in a hurry.

Ruth Macintyre is a total of 36 acres, the park district says, including a five-acre pond.

“Named for the longtime 8th grade science teacher at Frost Junior High who was active in environmental and conservation concerns and created a 13-acre sanctuary adjacent to the school that ballooned to the 36-acre conservation area,” according to the History of Schaumburg Township blog. “She taught in District 54 schools from 1956-1979. Rededicated on September 24, 1994 from Munao Park to the above-named conservation area.”

Kay Wojcik Conservation Area

Posted on April 5, 2022 by admin

Not every recent day has been wet and chilly here in the northwest suburbs. A few have been dry and chilly. But not so cold that we can’t take walks in places like the Kay Wojcik Conservation Area.

In full, it’s the Kay Wojcik Conservation Area at Oak Hollow, which sounds like a compromise renaming to avoid getting rid of the old name (it was just Oak Hollow CA before 2009). Whatever the name, it’s a pleasant place for a stroll, and one of those parks tucked deep in the suburban fabric, so that few outside the immediate area probably know about it.

Part of the conservation area is a pond.

The park is a 17½-acre remnant of the pre-settlement oak grove, marked by a small network of trails. How it didn’t become farm land and then suburban housing, the park district doesn’t say, but perhaps it was a bit marshy for either of those uses.

After getting home from our walk, I looked up Kathleen “Kay” Wojcik. Now retired, she was a Schaumburg Township clerk and later a member of the Illinois House of Representatives, from 1983 to 2003, and in the Illinois Senate from 2003 to 2005. Hope she’s able to stroll in her namesake park from time to time.

April Snow

Posted on April 4, 2022 by admin

Not long after noon on Saturday, snow came pouring down. Large, fluffy flakes. That went on for a good while, though sometimes it was more like sleet, other times borderline cold drizzle.

It took a while to stick.

But eventually it did.

Been a cold spring most of the time so far this year, with lots of cold precipitation, chilly winds, overcast skies and mud underfoot. But I don’t want to be churlish about what our life-sustaining atmosphere is up to, at least if it isn’t a violent storm. Warmer or warmish spring will come. Saturday’s snow was gone by the end of the day Sunday.

Been There, Seen That

By Dees Stribling

Category Archives: Suburban Chicago