Chicago

Third Coast FilmLESS Festival Part II

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I know it’s 10 days late, but other deadlines—having to do with my academic or professional lives!—hung over my head until now. So here’s a final review of other select pieces from the 2010 FilmLESS festival for radio arts, in downtown Chicago.

Tupperware, by David Nelson and Nikki Silva, aired in 1981 on All Things Considered. (I hear this piece was the debut of the now-infamous “Kitchen Sisters” duo.) The only thing that hinted this was made in 1981 was a bit of sound quality degradation. Otherwise, it was an avant-garde piece if I’ve ever heard it, about the fanaticism and just plain weirdness in the way this product is sold. I can’t believe something with this kind of production was on All Things Considered. Voices drifted in and out of one another, overlapping. There was no narrator. It bordered on noise at some points, but it was relevant—Tupperware parties are noisy things, apparently.

Si Se Puede, by Dan Collison and Elizabeth Meister, aired on Latino USA in 2009. This ran longer than the others, at 22 minutes, but it was worth it. The piece chronicled the fight of 300 workers at Republic Window and Door to obtain what their contracts outlined once the plant closed. Republic had no choice but to deny them things like continued health insurance because Bank of America wouldn’t extend credit to the company.

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Third Coast FilmLESS festival part I

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The Third Coast FilmLESS festival, sponsored largely by Chicago Public radio, just can’t fit into Twitter posts. Been there, tried that.

So here’s my rundown of my favorite segments so far:

1. Lucy and the Bike Girl, by Hillary Frank, aired in 2007 on This American Life. It’s the story of Lucy, who has cystic fibrosis, making her very susceptible to germs. Every day she sees this girl in red pigtails ride a bike by her house, and when she finds a picture of this same girl on an internet message board for CF, she chats her up. They become awesome friends, better than Lucy’s in-person friends. But she doesn’t tell her she lives right down the street, because they might be tempted to meet. …Lucy’s tempted, though, despite the bike girl’s having a type of bacteria that could kill Lucy.

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Pyramid schemes help to alleviate Chicago unemployment

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So my second satire piece was published today on The Daily Blank. Once again, I’ll repost the entire article here because their license allows it. But check ’em out some time—whether you live in Chicago or not, there’s something there for you.

 

Pyramid schemes help to alleviate Chicago unemployment

Bars, movie theaters, grocery stores, pyramid schemes. Some businesses tend to weather economic downturns particularly well—but it’s pyramid schemes that take more Chicagoans out of poverty and into prosperity, a new study finds.

According to a study that preferred to be unnamed for fear of retribution—pyramid schemes have been known to viciously pursue litigation—Chicagoans are beginning work with these types of companies at ever-increasing rates.

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First Daily Blank piece

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vendetta masks

Masks that supposedly resemble the visage of Guy Fawkes, make popular in the movie V for Vendetta. (Photo from The Daily Blank)

Today I was published at The Daily Blank, Chicago’s only satire site that focuses on local issues.

For your enjoyment I’ll paste the entire article below, because their licensing allows it. Enjoy! …And I have one more piece in the queue, so look out.

Daley to ‘pull an Obama’ to fund CPS

In two about-face moves Tuesday, Chicagoans banded together to stand up to the Daley administration, and the Mayor decided to listen to the majority voice of the people.

Following a protest, Mayor Richard M. Daley issued an edict that every corporate executive who had received preferential treatment under the TIF program would voluntarily cut his or her income by 90 percent.

The mayor did not say what the consequences would be if said executives disobeyed, except that “the shit will hit the fan,” he told the throngs of cheering lower-middle-class people before him.

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Restaurant dreams

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Hazelnut and Chard Ravioli Salad, conceived, prepared and photographed by Heidi Swanson of 101cookbooks.com.

I owe it to you to explain why most of the past couple weeks’ posts spoke only of food. (By the way, my menus are compiled at the end of this post.) I have been thinking of starting an underground restaurant.

I had read an article years back about people who love to cook inviting others to their homes for dinner. And charging them. It’s more personal than a restaurant, but it also provides some semblance of an income for the cook, who’d be putting a lot of time into the preparation.

I revisited this idea when I recently sought work in a restaurant and found the old catch-22. That is to say, I haven’t been able to get a back-of-house job because I haven’t already done it for several years. So I figured I’d take matters into my own hands.

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Clout City

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Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley speaks at a celebration for a building’s LEED certification. (Creative Commons-licensed photo from the Flickr account of the Center for Neighborhood Technology)

Move over, Tribune, there’s another watchdog in town. No one seems to follow the mayor’s corruption (yes, I said it) more intently than Mick Dumke of the Reader.

If you haven’t already read the cover story he wrote with Ben Joravsky, Chicagoans, it’ll blow your mind. And get you hooked on Dumke’s blog. And give you a reason to object when your friends say “I vote for Daley ’cause I don’t know why I wouldn’t…”

I wish I had done work like this at the two papers I’ve written for in years past. No regrets, though. After reading this article and archives of the blog “Clout City,” I’ve armed myself for next time: with source gumption and due persistence.

Maybe someday I’ll do my part to help edge representative democracy back into Chicago.