respublica

A look back at old Chicago

I came across this photo by Andrew Morang and it brought back a huge memory emotion from my early days growing up on the south side of Chicago.

We did not live in apartments with all these back steps and landings, but drove by them many times. I actually have a memory of one of my aunts living in a smaller version of this. You could see these housings on the West Side from the Eisenhower expressway and from other highways on the southside. 

It was that era's social media of its day.

I call baloney on this study

There's always some new health study and no matter how weak the conclusion is there is always a news outlet which will report it. Today KSDK in St. Louis headlines a report which concludes that drinking one bottle of wine a week poses the same cancer risk as smoking ten cigarettes for women.

This is just ridiculous and sends a needlessly frightening message to women who might have a glass of wine during the week. I know I do and one bottle of wine is almost nothing for a week. A standard bottle is 750 ML which would add up to about 5 glasses of wine. And the study concluded only a 1 percent increase in the cancer risk for drinking one bottle of wine per week. This is not even close to any margin of error in studies.

But there are also studies which show the health risks in the water we drink (and the container we drink it from), the food we eat, the air we breathe, the cars we drive and on and on. Each study contradicts other studies.

The real danger in drinking one bottle of wine a week is if you drink that one bottle in one sitting especially if you have to drive home.

But they just had to report this website clicks. Every other wine study shows strong health benefits to moderate wine drinking. Let's face it, nothing is good for us anymore so just live your life and don't click these links.

Baseball trivia

Since yesterday was opening day in major league baseball, here is a "On This Day" piece of baseball history. If you are old enough to remember when Charles O. Finley owned the Oakland A's, you might remember this idea of his which went no where. He was full of interesting/crazy ideas back then.

On March 29, 1973 Finley had his team experiment with an orange baseball during a spring training game. The thought was that an orange ball would make it easier for the batter to see it and for the fans to follow the path of the ball. Even umpires were in favor of it. But it didn't catch on, some say it would have if it hadn't been Finley who came up with the idea. In the end MLB said the orange ball made seeing the seams harder for batters and so said no to it.

A lazy person's question

Every now and then when the news has reports which mention Brexit and include interviews about something connected with it, I wonder what exactly Brexit is. Stories seem to take all kinds of twists and turns. But I've been too lazy to really look into since it has to do with Great Britain and things concerned with that country are often mysterious to me. But this morning I actually looked up "what is Brexit".

It's so simple I could have done this a long time ago, or paid more attention to what is going on in the world.

Brexit, for those who are like me, is "Brexit is the term used to refer to the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union (EU) and is a shortened version of British Exit.

Opening Day food

Lots of MLB ballparks like to tempt fans with new food offerings when a new season rolls around. The Minnesota Twins now have a sandwich they call The Broomstick.

This is a two foot long hot dog named for player Nelson Cruz who I guess hit in the clean-up spot. This is filled and topped with chili, nacho cheese, jalapenos, and grilled onions. At least this would last for more than half an inning.

Now the Cardinals have a Budweiser Burger Bar somewhere in the stadium, burgers infused with budweiser, and one of the new burgers is topped with toasted ravioli. Frankly, this does not look all that appealing.

Morning traffic report

This notice from Y98's traffic reporter, Lance Hildebrand, had me pondering just what the heck this was all about. Seeing as it was in Collinsville I was pretty interested. He said, "Along westbound 55/70 near HWY 159 near Collinsville, a report of a person laying in the grass near the highway."

Also an update:

Mattresses 36

Ladders 27

Collinsville in the News

This is a terrific news spot from Channel 5, KSDK, in St. Louis on downtown Collinsville. It features a number of things that go on during the year, but zeros in on all the places to eat downtown (Uptown) right now. They mention Kruta Bakery too and that means the reporters really did a great job. And this story doesn't even get into all the good places to eat in town beyond the downtown. There are at least 5 Mexican restaurants, all good, a Greek American, an Irish pub with good food across from Kruta's, fine dining at Porter's Steak House, and on and on.

We always say when we're over there that the downtown now looks terrific and the places to eat are all so good, it's hard to decide where to go. Here is the KSDK video report.

A trucker protest?!

Today truckers will be holding what they call a "slow roll" on I-55 from Cape Girardeau to the TA gas station in Troy Illinois. They will be traveling below the speed limit, but what that will be is not noted in the stories. The top speed on interstates is either 65 or 70 depending on where you are and the slowest allowed speed is 40.

Their reason for this to protest issues they face on the job such as overcrowding at rest stops and lack of training for drivers.

Here's the thing that bothers me about this. Trucks are now way too big and they travel way too fast. We do a lot of driving on interstates, back and forth from Missouri to Illinois, up to Chicago, out to Washington DC, Kansas City, Indiana etc. We share the road with trucks all the time and seeing one bearing down on us in the rear view window is something to behold. And, when they pass us, the length of the truck is unbelievable, not to mention the height. The sheer size of these trucks makes it difficult to stop quickly or control during strong winds.

If I were going to be part of a protest, I'd be asking for trucking companies to downsize the trucks. Seriously. Yes training is of utmost importance, a person just can't step up into these giant trucks without it, but we're at the point when big isn't the be all and end all.

Planting potatoes

I'm hoping to get going on potato planting today and tomorrow. Over the weekend I bought some potato sets at the Collinsville Rural King and now I have to determine the best way to go about it. We have a big garden bed next to Sieck Hall which is by our house and they'll go in there. Last week I put in about 100 onion sets and I think that job will seem easy compared to doing potatoes correctly. I've been reading google links and although most advice is similar, there are also differences and most take involve digging, fertilizing the dirt, setting the potatoes in the correct way, and then covering with dirt and/or straw. Done right, there should be a good crop to give to the student food bank.

A few years ago we tried doing potatoes with the black mesh bags which mean filling with soil, placing the potato sets inside and covering them. When ready, we just dumped out the bags and voila, potatoes. That was fun and easy. However, students from Wash U and Fontbonne took most of them on their way through the campus. We're done with that nonsense.

Last night as I walked into a dinner for students who will be soon be getting their vicarage assignments for next year, one of our students handed me an envelope and asked me to give it to Dale, but wait until this morning.

So this morning he opened the envelope and inside was a very nice, and surprising, note. He wrote "On this day 30 years ago, you gave your very first sermon as the Speaker for the Lutheran Hour. I had the unique privilege of reading every single sermon you ever gave as Speaker. I enjoyed them very much. Anyway, enjoy this brief trip down memory lane!"

How nice is that? March 26, 1989!