Chicago, IL

A woman was grabbed in Lincoln Park last night at 3:15 a.m. The woman screamed and was able to get away. The police are unsure if this incident is related to two previous sexual assaults that took place in nearby Lakeview.

Here are the details of the two previous incidents:

On Sunday, a woman in her mid-20s was sexually assaulted and struck in the head around 4:30 a.m. as she tried to return to her apartment building in the 3700 block of North Lakewood.

That attack followed the attempted sexual assault of another woman July 23 in the 500 block of West Briar Place. That victim, also in her mid-20s, was headed home when a man threw her to the ground around 2 a.m

source

Chicago, sexual assaults, lakeview, Lincoln Park

Elizabeth Edwards spoke at the Blogher conference in Chicago on Saturday. During the discussion, she was asked to elaborate on a previous comment that quoted her as saying that her husband, John Edwards, is better for women’s issues than Hillary Clinton. The video below shows her response.

Chicago, Elizabeth Edwards, John Edwards, Blogher07, Blogher, Hillary Clinton

This has not been a good week for Chicago’s downtown Macy’s store, which was, until last fall, the flagship store of Marshall Field’s department store. Sales have not been great since the conversion and there have been rumors that Macy’s might be sold to an investment group.

On Monday, the Chicago Department of Public Health temporarily closed the basement level food court, citing multiple violations, including an infestation of fruit flies. It has since been allowed to reopen.

On Wednesday night, a man fell to his death inside the store. He fell from one of the levels of the store’s internal balcony.

It seems like Macy’s has had to handle more than its share of problems lately. Perhaps the ghost of Marshall Field is exacting revenge? If they are superstitious, perhaps they should consider changing the name back to Marshall Field’s.

Marshall Field’s, Macy’s, balcony, death, fruit fly, food court, chicago department of health

The annual bridal gown event at the State Street branch of Filene’s Basement will take place tomorrow, July 27th. The event, which has been made famous on sitcoms, involves a mad rush to find a great designer dress at a significant discount. Women pull wedding dresses off the racks and try them on right in the aisleways, trying to find “the one.” It is a chaotic and exciting time which has been called “The Running of the Brides.”

When I went to the event two years ago, I decided to miss all of the crazy hoopla. I waited until about 11:00 a.m. to go to the store. While there were not as many people there, they still had hundreds and hundreds of dresses, which had all been nicely put back on the racks by the employees. There were still women changing in the aisles, something I certainly was not going to do. I went to the dressing room and tried on several dresses there. I am not sure why the women were changing in the aisles when the dressing room was empty. Maybe for the experience?

Here are the details of this year’s event:

Friday July 27, 2007
Filene’s Basement
1 N. State St., Chicago
Doors open at 8:00 a.m. (lines will form long before that)
Kiss FM will be there staring at 7:00 a.m.
The event runs until store closing
Dresses are $249, $499 or $699

For more on the event, go to Filene’s Basement’s official site here.

If you are looking for some new books to read, you may want to check out the annual book fair at the Newberry Library. Here is what the Library has to say about the event:

Feed your bibliomania at the Newberry’s annual Book Fair! More than 100,000 donated books have been sorted into 60 categories for your browsing convenience. With many books priced under $2, it’s easy to replenish your home library’s holdings on subjects ranging from antiques to zoology.

Here are the details:
Thursday, July 26, 2007, from 12:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Friday, July 27, 2007, from 12:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Saturday, July 28, 2007, from 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM
Sunday, July 29, 2007, from 10:00 AM - 6:00 PM

Admission is free. For more information, check out the Newberry Library website here. The Library is located at 60 W. Walton in Chicago.

Chicago, Newberry Library, Newberry Library Book Fair, book fair

A fun summer activity to do with the family is to head to a Chicago Bandits game in Lisle, Illinois. The Chicago Bandits are a professional women’s softball team, which is part of the National Pro Fastpitch league. Although the team has had some trouble this season and currently finds itself in the unfamiliar position of being in sixth place, they still provide a great night of entertainment.

The team has a lot of great players, the most famous being Jennie Finch, who won the gold medal with the United States Olympic team in 2004.

Compared with other professional sports, the tickets to see the Chicago Bandits are very inexpensive and a family of four can attend a game for only $40 total. If you attend on a Sunday, kids 14 and under can get grandstand seats for only $5, when accompanied by their parents.

The Chicago Bandits games are played on the softball field of Benedictine University. For information and directions, click here. For ticket information, click here.

Chicago Bandits, Chicago, national professional fastpitch, professional softball, softball, Benedictine University

As I mentioned back in April, the annual BlogHer conference will be held in Chicago starting this Friday. The event will bring in female bloggers from all throughout the country to speak on a wide variety of topics including identity issues, photography, crafts (with panel speaker comedienne Amy Sedaris), tax implications of blogging for pay (from taxgirl), and technical labs to teach you design and other relevant skills. There really is something for every blogger. The conference is open to everyone, men and women alike, and the organizers state that last year the attendees were 25% male. Online registration is still available. You have the option of registering for a single day or for the whole weekend.

Check out this link to see all of the great speakers and panel topics that are available. The closing keynote speaker will be Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Presidential candidate John Edwards.

Chicago, Blogher, Elizabeth Edwards, Amy Sedaris, taxes, blogging, chicago conference, John Edwards

It what the city of Chicago has labeled a “one-of-a-kind experience,” visitors can participate in an immersion weekend, which includes a hotel stay, along with a behind the scenes look at a particular aspect of Chicago culture. Unfortunately several of them have passed already, but there are three left:

CHICAGO THEATER IMMERSION WEEKEND - THE COLOR PURPLE
Friday, August 10-Sunday, August 12, 2007

CHICAGO WORLD’S FAIRS IMMERSION WEEKEND
Friday, August 31-Sunday, September 2, 2007

CHICAGO THEATER IMMERSION WEEKEND - JERSEY BOYS
Friday, November 9-Sunday, November 11, 2007

According to the city of Chicago site:

Immersion weekends fuse the best of Chicago’s diverse hotels with the city’s arts and culture to bring the visitor distinctive presentations, behind the scenes experiences, and VIP access to events, activities and special guests.

For more information or to book your immersion weekend, visit the Chicago Immersion website here.

Chicago, Chicago immersion weekend, Chicago theater, The Color Purple, Jersey Boys, Chicago World’s Fair

This weekend, the southside Chicago neighborhood of Bridgeport will host the Southside Arts and Musical Festival. The event will run Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 p.m. to 10:00 pm at 35th & Halsted. It will benefit the Valentine Boys and Girls Club.

The organizers of the event, describe it this way:

The Southside Arts and Music Festival is a true celebration of Chicago. The event offers the best of everything that Chicagoan’s love: a wide selection of food offered by some of the south side’s oldest and most popular restaurants, a lineup of the very best of Chicago’s local classic rock and blues bands culminating in national musical headliners each night, and a wide selection of merchandise offered by upscale arts and crafts vendors and local area businesses.

There is quite a wide variety of performers including Motown-inspired Hitsville U.S.A, funk band Lubriphonic, the Jesse White Tumblers, and voodoo blues performer Lonnie Brooks. For a complete list of performers, including their performance day and time, visit the official site here.

Chicago, Southside Arts and Music Festival, Bridgeport, Chicago festival, Happiness Club , Anne Harris, Hitsville U.S.A., Jesse White Tumblers, Linsey Alexander, Lubriphonic, English Beat, Bernard Alcorn, Alpha & The Princes of Futa, Gizzae, Jesse White Tumblers, Funkadesi, Lonnie Brooks, Chicago music, music

If I weren’t going to be glued to my television set watching So You Think You Can Dance tonight, I would be heading down to the Hidden Shamrock Pub on Halsted and Diversey. Why? Because Your Little Ponies are playing. I had an awesome run-in with this up-and-coming Rock-Comedy Group at the Acme Art Works improv night a couple of weeks ago, and they blew me away. They are two very talented musicians busting out very hip comedic songs, such as “Pangea,” and “Dude.” You can listen to some of their songs HERE.
If you can’t make it to their weekly Wednesday night gig at The Hidden Shamrock Pub, but you want to support them, you should make sure to attend the release of their third CD at Silvie’s Lounge (1902 W. Irving Park) on Friday July 27th.
Man, maybe I’ll just record SYTYCD. Who knows…

Your Little Ponies, Musical Comedy, Chicago, The Hidden Shamrock Pub

If you are looking for something fun to do this Friday that will also help a good cause, consider attending The annual “Caring for Kids Day” at Alcocks sports bar in Chicago. They label the event “one huge gigantic street fest” and it will benefit LaRabida Children’s Hospital. As these photos from last year show, last year’s event included live music and a dunk tank!

Here are the details:
Friday July 20th
10:30 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.
411 S. Wells
312-922-1778
Event will take place outside the back door the bar.

This weekend is the Old St. Pat’s annual block party, which is described as the “world’s largest block party.” The event will take place Friday and Saturday as a fundraiser for Old St. Pat’s church, Chicago’s oldest public building.

Here is what the organizers have to say about the goal of this year’s event:

The Block Party proceeds support the on-going campus expansion. The campus expansion will ensure that the important outreach missions we share such as the Education Center, the Outreach Group, CARA Job Placement and Mentoring Program, Career Transitions Center of Chicago and Global Alliance for Africa will be able to call Old St. Pat’s home for decades to come.

In addition to great food and drink, there are several musical performances during the two day event. Here is the line-up:

Friday, July 20
WXRT Main Stage

* Michael McDermott (5:15–6:30)
* Back Door Slam (7:00–8:00)
* Rusted Root (8:30–10:30)

South Stage

* Weber Band (5:30–9:45)

Bud Light Beer Garden

* DJ music from Fig Media

Saturday, July 21
WXRT Main Stage

* Catchpenny (5:30–7:00)
* Jon McLaughlin (7:30–8:30)
* Big Head Todd and the Monsters (9:00–10:30)

South Stage

* Heligoats (5:30–6:30)
* Hello Dave (7:00–10:00)

Bud Light Beer Garden

* DJ music from Fig Media

The gates to the event are located at Madison and Des Plaines and open at 5:00 pm. both days. The event will run until approximately 10:30 p.m. each night. Cost is $35 in advance, $40 at the door. Tickets can be purchased online at the official website here.

This year’s Chicago Marathon, which will take place on Sunday October 7th, will mark the 30th anniversary of the event. For spectators, 83 days away probably sounds a bit early to be talking about an event. For those participating, like myself, it seems pretty close. So, to help my fellow runners, I want to share this video that I found on the Chicago Marathon website.

It was taken from a car who drove the entire length of the course prior to the start of last year’s event. It really gives you a great look at everything you will be passing throughout the 26.2 mile event and gives you a good representation of just how low you will be running. Although the video is of last year’s course, the course does not change all that much from year to year, so it should be pretty close. The 2007 official course map is not yet available. To check out this great video, click here.

Chicago, Chicago marathon, 26.2, marathon, running, marathon video, Chicago marathon video

Are you looking for something fun to do with your kids this weekend? The Southside Community Outreach Coalition is hosting the K.I.D.S Zone Festival on Saturday from 10am-4pm. The festival will consist of games and entertainment for the family and community.

Here are the details:
Halsted Street from 6700-6800 S.
10am-4pm
773-874-4901

Chicago, KIDS Zone Festival, Southside Community Outreach Coalition

Friday July 13th, the Charter One Pavilion on Northerly Island in Chicago will be host to the “World’s Largest Pajama Party,” brought to you by Victoria’s Secret. A similar event last year in New York city drew 3,000 people. The event will feature DJ AM and a live performance from Fergie.

You can obtain a ticket at www.vspink.com. The doors open at 6:00 p.m and admission will be limited. For more information, visit Victoria’s Secret’s website.

Victoria’s Secret, Fergie, DJ AM, pajama party, world’s largest pajama party, PINK, Chicago, Charter One Pavilion, Northerly Island