I was sad to learn of the passing of Dennis Wolkowicz, the creator of the Silent Summer Film Festival which I’ve written about here before. Known professionally as Jay Warren, he came up with the idea of presenting silent films to a Chicago audience the way they were meant to be seen: on a big …
South Loop Sunset
I finally got around to fixing the domain settings for the site. It seems that when the domain registry was moved from Google to Squarespace, some of my domains weren’t being forwarded as they should. As long as I was in here, I figured I might as well pop in and let the internet know …
xfinity Xfi Gateway Streaming App Fix
I know the title is unwieldy, but I want to make sure this post is searchable. :). I also posted this on xfinity’s customer support forums. Like most people during the pandemic, we relied heavily on our internet connection. Both Lisa and I have been working from home, and thankfully Comcast/xfinity had been reliable through …
Phil’s Tavern
Since we moved to the West Loop, the long-boarded-up Phil’s Tavern has been a reminder of this neighborhood’s past as Chicago’s Skid Row. While other buildings have been re-habbed or torn down to be replaced by brand-new residences and retail, the one-story building with its shuttered bar and the still-open Herzog Store Fixture stood at …
Activate!
Welcome to mid-2021. A lot of water has passed under the bridge, to coin a phrase. I finally got around to updating the engine of this site as one of my final COVID-era projects. I was hesitant to push the button out of fear that the rusty WordPress installation would fall apart as soon as …
HP Stream Mini Desktop 200-010: An Inexpensive But Effective Media Machine
Sometimes, technology actually solves a problem. In this case, we have the HP Stream Mini Desktop 200-010, a $179 computer with the footprint that’s smaller than the average carryout box, yet delivers the goods as promised. I made my switch to being a full-time Mac user over 10 years ago, yet I still have a …
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OSX Mavericks “Slash and Burn” Guide
I recently bought a brand-new MacBook Pro Retina 13″ to replace my five-year-old 15″ MacBook Pro. When I turned on the new computer I dutifully ran Migration Assistant and copied all my old stuff over to the new computer. That migration included stuff that went back to my first Mac, the iBook I bought in …
Ode to the Suet-Filled Spongecake Crisco Logs
As I write this, the snack-cake eating world is in a panic over the demise of Hostess, the company that makes, among other things, Twinkies. There have been runs on the products, and people all over Facebook and Twitter are lamenting their downfall. (I’ve been more of a Ho-Ho kind of guy, but I left …
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Presto-Change-o
We bought a new canopy for our gazebo, and take a look at the effect it has on the color of everything on our patio. These photos were taken within 30 minutes of each other, and I didn’t do any Photoshop wizardry on them. Nice effect, I think. (For those of you who came here …
The Ever-Changing World of Chicago Radio
It took about a year for the plug to be pulled on an ambitious (or some would say ridiculous) project: FM News 101.1. As of today, you will hear music on 101.1 FM instead of talk. The CEO of the station’s owner cited “lack of audience engagement” as one of the reasons: that’s doubletalk for …