Moved!

This blog has been rolled into my main site over at www.aliverson.com. I've moved all the posts over, and I'll be shutting this URL down shortly. Feel free to subscribe to my RSS feed over there, or just visit read my blog over there, as I still plan to talk a lot about Rogers Park.

Thanks for reading!

Bill Morton on Joe Moore

I really liked Bill Morton's take on Joe Moore's past statements and opportunities to make things better in our 'hood. Like Bill, I'm relatively new to Rogers Park, only having moved here in 2006. Like Bill, it's taken me some time to decide what I agree with and what I don't agree with. Separate the truth from the bullshit, etc.

The Boys and Girls Club Fiasco is probably the first thing where it clicked for me that Joe Moore is being clearly, observably deceptive. There was obviously back room dealing going on regarding the Gale Park Community Center, and I'm glad to see so much light being shined upon it.

I would imagine Joe is .... less than pleased.

Parking?

Anybody know of any parking spaces available for rent? Near Sheridan and Pratt? We're losing our for-pay parking space at the end of the month. The building we're renting from says they need the spaces for tenants.

I'll probably walk up and down the streets around there making calls over the next few days.

Grifter Alert

This guy is still around and still going strong. I exchanged words with him at Sheridan and Pratt this morning at about 9:30 am. I'll try to grab a picture next time I see him.

Stan Properties / SPSuites @ 1137 W. Pratt

A friend of mine came to visit a few weeks ago. We thought it would be fun to set him up at 1137 West Pratt – which is very near to home. We had previously stumbled across the fact that they run part of the building as a hotel, having run into the occasional college student or international traveler on the street asking us where they go to check in.

Investigation turned up a web site with more information and online booking. It was a bit of a risk, not knowing what the building was like inside, but we decided to go for it. The location was perfect, and it was significantly cheaper than a hotel room.

I booked a room online and let my friend know. The first snag was, I booked it for the wrong long weekend. I called Stan Proprties and talked to a very helpful woman named Cera, who helped me update the dates to the right ones. She was supposed to call me back and tell me when it was complete, but did not. I did receive an email from their automated system indicating that the date was updated per my request.

Then, the day before he arrived, I noticed that the date was off by one day. He was arriving on Friday, but the “hotel” reservation started on Saturday. This was partially my fault; I simply had told Cera to move the dates up a week, and I didn't double check the dates. If I had, I would've more quickly found that the date was only adjusted by six days, not seven.

I figured this out on Thursday evening, just before bed, so, first thing Friday morning, I called Bogdan at Stan Properties. He wasn't sure if anything could be done. I said I'd be willing to pay extra to upgrade to a more expensive suite, if it would help things. He told me he would figure out what could be done and call me back. That was about 9:40 in the morning. At about 1:30 in the afternoon, I called back. Bogdan indicated that it would be no problem to check in today instead. I asked if I should call back around 4 pm (check-in time) to get the keys, and he said yes.

So, I called back just after 4pm. A different person answered. (Sadly, I didn't write her name down, though I ended up talking to her a half-dozen times that day.) She said the room hadn't been cleaned yet, and that she'll find out where the cleaners are and let me know. I said that was fine, because they were doing me a favor changing the reservation, and my friend wasn't in yet.

While I was standing outside the building – I saw the setup for obtaining the keys. They have 3 or 4 “realtor-style” key-holding padlocks attached to the front gate. These are the kind of thing a real estate agent would use to get into your house to show it to prospective buyers. They give you the code for your key box, and inside you find your keys.

It seems pretty straight forward. But, like I said, we've run across people trying to “check in” here in the past, and those people have always been confused. I think if I didn't live nearby, and already know how this worked, I'd likely be really confused. Case in point, while I was there, I saw a woman sitting there with luggage, looking forlorn. She was visiting from Ireland, with her fiance, and had a reservation here. They didn't see the key boxes and didn't know what to do. Her fiance was off somewhere figuring out what to do, so I called Stan Properties back and helped her get her key out of the box and get into the building. She was very grateful. I certainly don't blame her for not easily understanding how this process works – it's very uncommon. Visitors expecting a typical “hotel style” process will find that it is anything but.

The woman from Stan Properties informed me that the cleaning people were downtown, and it now being rush hour, it'd probably take them a couple hours to get up to Rogers Park and get the room cleaned up. Knowing Chicago traffic, that seemed truthful. I hadn't yet picked my friend up from Union Staiton, and even afterward, we were just going to hang out and then have dinner, so there was no real rush to check in.

After I picked him up and we grabbed a cab back up to the neighborhood, we dropped his stuff off at our apartment, and went out for dinner and drinks.

I was disappointed that the woman from Stan Properties, who promised me with absolute certainty that she would call me back when we could check in, never called me back. They're now zero for three on returning phone calls. I realize people are busy, stuff is happening, but this is a problem. It takes no effort to return a phone call and say “hey, still working on it, sorry for the delay.” I do this myself, via phone or email, when working on a particularly tricky and urgent problem for a client.

Anyway, I called Stan Properties back just after 8:00 pm to find out where we're at with getting the keys to a clean suite. The call was received by an answering services, who took down all my information, and assured me that they'd page somebody. They did, and that person called me back about fifteen minutes later. It turns out that nobody had come to clean the room and drop off keys. They paged somebody else, who came up there to clean the room. A couple more phone calls later, they said it would be very soon now, and we'd be all set.

We stopped in a neighborhood bar for an after dinner drink while we waited. After we were done there, nearing 10:00 pm, we decided to give them one more try before giving up and checking my friend into the Hilton Garden in Evanston instead. I walked over to the gate just as somebody was fiddling with the key boxes on the front gate. He was the Stan Properties employee setting up the room, and he had keys for us. Finally, all set.

We grab my friend's luggage and take it on over. The lobby of 1137 Pratt is nice and clean. After a bit of confusion, we find the elevator. (It looks to be about an eight floor building; it better have an elevator. My friend is older and stairs would kill him.) The elevator is very, very old, and missing a couple of buttons, but it gets the job done. We exit on his floor and note that the hallways are very small, and a bit beat up. Definitely could use some sanding and patching, plus a new coat of paint.

The room itself was actually very nice. It was a very small studio. Very small. It had a twin bed. (Or was that a double? It was pretty small, so I'm thinking it's a twin bed.) But just about everything in the room is brand new. It has a perfectly serviceable little bathroom, and kitchenette. It had a flat screen TV and ethernet cable for internet. Everything is clean and nice.

My friend couldn't get the TV or ethernet to work. He rarely watches TV, and he has a Sprint EVDO modem for internet, so these weren't really issues. Nothing worth complaining about. (And it's hard to say if there is an issue with the TV, or if it's just too complicated to wrangle.)

The stay itself was uneventful. No problems with electricity, heat, water, any of that. There were no loud noises, nothing disturbed him, nothing made him feel unsafe. It worked well for my friend to stay so near, and he got a good night's rest at the end of each day of adventuring. It did just what a tourist needs a hotel room to do -- give one a quite place to relax when not exploring the city.

Kate and I are always trying to get friends to visit – so this was a bit of a “test run” to see if we'd be comfortable with other friends, or my parents, staying here. Was it a successful run? I'm not entirely sure. I'm a bit irked about the company not returning various phone calls throughout the process. That, plus it taking until nearly 10 pm to get the keys, makes me worry that they might be the kind of people to just “tell you what you want to hear” to get you off the phone, even if it's something they can't do anything about. I hope that's not the case.

This really could be a deal killer. Thankfully, I have my platinum card. Sometimes stuff happens and you just have to throw the credit card at it to make it go away. Eating (or disputing) one hotel charge while having to spend more on a last minute different, more expensive hotel charge, is something I can do in an emergency. Hell, that's why the good lord invented the platinum card. So if I were stuck, if this ended up not working out, it would have been irritating, but not the end of the world. I wonder, though, about other people that stay here, that don't have a backup plan, don't know the neighborhood, don't know where else to look for a hotel. That would not be a good situation to be stuck in.

And the building hallways and elevator need some TLC. The building age isn't really a problem; I live in a similarly aged building, and my place in Minneapolis was even older (having been built in the 1880s). So, I'm not put off by the potential limitations of an old building. But at some point you can't just add more coats of paint to something; it actually needs to be sanded and patched. (And elevator buttons replaced.) It reminded me a bit of the hotel I stayed in when I last visited New York for work. (A little old, a little beat up, bring your cell phone with in the elevator just in case, but everything ended up working out just fine.)

Also, a lot of the communication issues were driven by me originally booking the suite for the wrong dates. If I booked it correctly to begin with, and they had been able to work through their normal schedule, to get the room ready by 4:00 pm the day of check in, would any of this been an issue?

The room itself was fine. The location was great. The price was a bargain compared to usual hotel prices here in the Windy City. And it was probably a lot nicer than the Super 8 on Sheridan Road.

So, depending on who next comes to visit, we may try this again. It's worth giving another shot, and if everything comes together, the process and property would work out fine. We shall see.

Liquor License for RoPa? Yes, Please!

We received this notice in the mail a couple weeks ago regarding RoPa, the new restaurant going in where Cafe Suron used to be. (I should have posted it sooner but I am a travelin' fool lately.) My take is: Yes, we want RoPa to have a liquor license. I would most definitely enjoy a glass of wine or a cocktail with some delicious Mediterranean food. BYOBs are a pain in the rear, as bringing a bottle of wine along requires planning and forethought that I lack.

Date: 5/23/2008

The following is information on a liquor license application which has been submitted to the Chicago Department of Business Affairs and Licensing:

Date of Application: 5/23/2008
Name of Applicant: TAS ENTERTAINMENT, L
Address of Applicant: (not posted by me)
Business Address: 1146 W PRATT BLVD
License Type/Description: Incidental

If for any reason you have an objection to the City granting this license, submit your specific written complaints or comments to:

MaryLou Eisenhauer, Acting Director
Department of Business Affairs and Licensing Local Liquor Control Commission
121 N. LaSalle, Room 805
Chicago, Illinois 60602

Pursuant to section 4-60-050 of the Chicago Municipal code, the city is required to send public notice of a new package goods, tavern, or incidental license application to all legal voters within 250 feet of the proposed location. All objections must be received by the Department of Business Affairs and Licensing/Local Liquor Control Commission within 40 days of the date of the application shown above. If received by the 40th day, your comments will be taken into consideration by the Mayor's License Commission before any decision is rendered on the issuance of the license. In the event a hearing is commenced in this matter, you may be required to provide testimony in person to support your complaint or comment.

Poetry Reading at Quimby's Books

My friend Paula Cisewski will be in town on June 23rd to read at Quimby's Books at 1854 W North. For more information, click here.

AT&T Wireless Internet Coverage

Turns out AT&T's 3G wireless broadband service doesn't work that well here in Rogers Park. I tried it at my home, my office, and Ennui, and if I can get any sort of stable connection, it's much slower than comparable service from Sprint. Read more about it over on my gadget blog.

Greetings from the Chicago Office

Well, I got the office space situation under control. A couple of false starts later, and I am now with my own office, located right near the corner of Sheridan and Lunt. Great little area, though I have to admit, I prefer Starbucks' hot chocolate to Ennui's. But, Ennui has good food, and the proximity to the office can't be beat.

I got the keys to the office space on Thursday, and have spent much of the time since then moving in furniture and making trips to the hardware store and Ikea. To move some random furniture that wouldn't fit in my car, I rented a hand truck from Clark-Devon Hardware. Worked out perfectly. It had a strap to hold furniture on, and an extra set of wheels to make rolling it the few blocks (through the alleys) pretty easy. Not a bad way to go, and I got a pretty good workout.

For internet, I have a Sprint wireless broadband modem. Latency when connecting to Google-hosted services (Gmail, Blogger, etc.) today has just been awful. Quite a few timeouts and etc. Not sure what I'm going to do about that. I'd hate to have to break down and get DSL or something, when I've already got the Sprint modem.

Office Space Hunt

I've been on the hunt for office space in our fair neighborhood lately. I had an office downtown, which was in a neat location, but it was an interior office with no windows, very tiny, and not all that cheap. I figured that up 'round these parts it'd be easier to find something at a reasonable price that was much nicer. Also, I like Rogers Park, like the idea of supporting it more, and like walking around the neighborhood. We frequent neighborhood stores, restaurants, and bars often. The area just feels like home.

In my hunt, I've looked at a few different spaces. I have a strong lead on one place that, if everything works out, I'll go for. It's right by the coffee shop Ennui, which would be nice for my morning coffee and snack needs.

I talked to another guy at another space on Morse. He showed me the space, I liked it, but didn't want to make a rash decision, so I thought on it overnight. In the mean time, he had even called me and offered to drop the price. Great! Definitely was within my budget. So I called him back the next day to agree to make a deal, and I received a strange, "Uhhh, I'm not sure if I can rent it now," reply from the guy. He indicated that somebody else had called him and is negotiating to lease the entire space. Could I wait a week and see if that falls through? If we had that discussion in person, he would've seen me roll my eyes. Tell ya what, I'm gonna keep looking. If you still have space next week, you feel free to ping me and offer it up. Strangely, that same day, he put up a new ad on Craigslist, asking for more money. Maybe he had second thoughts about what he offered the space to me for?

Anyway, that space was right by where people keep busting out windows these past few days. And I was fonder of the next space I looked at.

Anybody have any other leads on office space in RP? Need a one man space, maybe internet, maybe phone (or depending on the space I can use my sprint card and cell phone). I work for an Internet company and just need a quiet place to work. Ennui and Starbucks work for short periods, but not for the long haul.

Congress Hotel Zoning Change Rejected

Over here, Chicagoist reports on the Congress Hotel's request for a zoning variance to add additional floors. The Chicago Plan Commission denied the request.

I used to stay there quite a bit, long before I moved to Chicago (and long before the strike). It was a neat old hotel, if a bit worn around the edges. It was affordable, and was in a great location. It was a lot of fun to stay there, and it was neat to see all the amazing architectural details in that age of building (two buildings, actually, if I remember correctly).

After I started hearing about the strike, a few years ago, and reading up on it, I was bummed out to learn that the hotel owners really seemed to be sticking it to their union employees. I don't necessarily consider myself pro-union, but the hotel doesn't seem to be playing fair and what they've offered their employees (wage cuts?) is lame. So, I supported the strike by never again staying at the Congress.

The hotel has left these employees on strike for more than five years. I think the hotel has suffered, and it's sad to hear tales about the hotel getting more and more run down over time. Sad.

Something definitely needs to change. Allowing the current owners to expand the hotel doesn't seem like the right answer, and I'm glad their request was rejected.

Tas Restaurant Update

Tas, the new restaurant going in the Cafe Suron space, received a positive nod from alderman Joe Moore this week.

It's not quite accurate to say Joe approved a liquor license for Tas, since it's not his call, but in an email blast today, he does indicate that he's OK with it and will support an incidental liquor license.

According to Joe Moore, the new owner, Aykut Sinanoglu, brings 22 years of experience in the food and hospitality industry, having most recently served as the corporate manger for the Chicago-based da Vinci Restaurant Group, overseeing its six restaurants.

Neither my girlfriend or I were able to find any other info on Mr. Sinanoglu's previous involvement in the restaurant industry, but now that we know about the connection to da Vinci Restaurant Group, perhaps more info can be found.

The restaurant, at 1146 W. Pratt, intends to be open seven days a week from 5 p.m. until 10 or 11 p.m, as well as serving brunch on weekends. The owner hopes to open this spring.

Blago Broke It

"Blago Broke It" is what I'll be saying next week, when all the buses go away.

OK, not *all* the buses, just the ones I use to get downtown, to go out to eat, to get to the Metra, etc.

All because Blago (A) waited until the last minute, and (B) decided to bung it all up by adding in this "seniors get free rides" stuff that nobody asked for and nobody wants.

Thanks, Governor Press Release.

Transit: Free Rides are a Bad Idea

As mentioned over here. I'm in full agreement; free fares for seniors are an awful idea. If implemented, it'll be ripe for abuse. People will steal cards, you'll never know exactly who's allowed to use one by looking at somebody, etc.

I'm not against reduced fares, but I do think it's a distraction, a ploy by Blago to try to require it as a condition of proper CTA funding. (Note that I don't think of this as a "bailout" -- that would imply the CTA screwed up. They didn't. It's Blago and the legislature who are falling down on the job, here.)

Downtown Adventure: Wildfire

Kate and I went downtown for dinner last night. We went to Wildfire, which is a chain of steak restaurants. I'm familiar with them, as I'm from Minneapolis, and there is one located there, out in the suburbs near where I used to work.

We've been to this one before, and enjoyed it. Last night was really good, too. The service was excellent, and it was easy to find a bottle of wine that I recognized and knew we'd like.

I had the horseradish crusted filet mignon, which was wrapped in bacon and topped with a sort-of baked horseradish crust. The crust was excellent. Yummy, flavored of horseradish, but not overpowering. It came with creamy horseradish on the side, if you wanted it spicier. (I ended up using most of it on my potatoes instead.)

Kate had a trio of filet slices, each with a different crust. One bearnaise, one mushroom, and one blue cheese. I think she liked the mushroom one the best. She found the bearnaise one, in particular, to be a bit overwhelming flavored with too much tarragon.

Overall, we were mostly happy with our experience. And, it's a fair bit cheaper than some of the other fancy steak places in town. However, I do think you get what you pay for. If you're looking for the absolute best cut of meat -- this is not the place for it. Both Kate and I were surprised to have found a bit of gristle and/or marbling in what was supposed to be high end filet mignon.

If you're not the snobbiest of steak snobs, and you like the idea of a blue cheese or horseradish crust on your steak, it's worth a try. We'd likely go back, though this definitely doesn't count as our fanciest steak adventure.

On the Awesome Level of Discourse...

...in our blogland community.

As I mentioned previously, Craig Gernhardt asks"Has Joe Moore created a hate in Rogers Park towards military personal?" No word from Joe on whether or not he has stopped beating his wife. However, in the mean time, I'm sure if a gnat farts in the Amazon rain forest, Craig will help us to understand how it's the fault of the local political machine.

As a follow up, Thomas Westgard takes Craig to task for publishing the Grodner police report with the names and personal information of witnesses left intact. Makes sense. Until the bit where Tom calls Craig "an irresponsible drunk."

I took issue with that in comments, and was rewarded with this from Tom: "Oh, now I think I understand your point, Al. You're saying that I should have gone after Craig on the point about the witnesses, but the attack on his drinking habits was gratuitous."

Tom agrees. "That might be true," he says, but then he goes on to call me a "lackey" because I dared to raise the issue. As he seems to have misused the word, I'm not quite sure what he actually meant.

Tom and Craig have a strange, synergistic relationship.

On another note, maybe I should try to ride the #96 bus one last time before it disappears in the doomsday scenario. I moved here from Minneapolis, which is a very, very small town as far as public transit is concerned. They don't have anything like the El, Metra, or the amazingly broad and wide bus coverage that we are lucky to have here in Chicago. I love it, as it has meant that I've had to drive barely once every few weeks, instead of daily, like I did in Minneapolis. And here we are, to the point where Illinois is about to throw away big chunks of the Chicago transit system. It's just amazing and sad. Mass transit is one of the things that makes the Chicago area special, and apparently not enough people realize it.

Cafe Suron Space; Liquor License

The space currently occupied by Cafe Suron will soon be replaced by a restaurant called Tas. The new owner, Aykut Sinanoglu, is looking for community support for a liquor license.

Joe Moore has called a community meeting to be held at Cafe Suron on Monday, January 7th, at 7:00 pm. Time permitting, I think I'll make it over there and listen in.

I'm undecided as to whether or not I'd like to see this place have a liquor license. I could be for it, as it always bummed us out that Suron was a BYOB. But it depends on how well the place is run, and I have no info on the new owner.

We liked Cafe Suron -- but -- we haven't been there for more than a year, because the service has just been unbelievably, astoundingly awful on every visit. Great food, but we got tired of waiting an hour for it and having wait staff feed us bologna about the food being up "any second now."

Military Hating Lawyer Keys Marines Car

Found this on a number of blogs, and it's worth linking to: Rogers Park lawyer Jay R. Grodner thought it would be keen to key Marine Sgt Mike McNulty's car. Over a bad parking job or not, hard to say, but if you believe what you read (and I do), sounds like Grodner ran off at the mouth with anti-military sentiment. Amazingly, McNulty stayed calm -- instead of beating the snot out of the guy, he called the cops and got him arrested. Good for him!

I'm not for the war in Iraq, but I do support people in uniform. They've got tough jobs, and they deserve our respect. This couldn't have been more un-called for.

There's a tinfoil hat aspect to the coverage from Craig Gernhardt's "Broken Heart" blog -- Craig manages to make the post about Joe Moore:

One of our Anti-war Alderman's constituents damages a military man's vehicle. This should really be interesting. Jay Grodner, living in a ward under the control of Joe Moore, a known anti-military politician, defaces a military mans vehicle. Is this what all military personal can expect when venturing into Joe Moore country? Has Joe Moore created a hate in Rogers Park towards military personal?

Multiple people replied with comments recommending sanity; restraint; this is bad on its own even though it has nothing to do with Joe Moore. "We have quite enough to lay at Moore's doorstep if we stick strictly to the truth, so let's stick to the truth, and to rational arguments," said one commenter. "How on earth does this have anything to do with Joe Moore?" asks another. "Because he got himself involve in the anti-war rhetoric," responds Craig.

Craig goes on to take another commenter to task for not using his full name. The commenter, Dave Lowitzki, clarifies who he is, and is accused by Craig of being a "shill for Joe More on this blog." He manages to slam Dave for having a college education, among other things. He tells Dave to go similarly reprimand the Second City Cop blog since they covered the story as well (strange, considering they made no mention of Joe Moore).

Craig responded to my questioning by pointing out that Joe Moore has tried to shut Craig's blog down before, and that he hasn't been sued by Joe yet (?). I was then invited to take my "punk ass" elsewhere. Heh.

I like Craig's blog. It's very insightful -- sometimes. The problem is, everything he writes about seems to have to be filtered through his personal vendettas. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Pulling Joe Moore into the picture here makes for a poor fit, and then defending it at all costs makes Craig look like he's gone off the deep end.

I don't know a ton about Joe Moore, but from what I do know, I'm not a huge fan. I'd like to learn more about the politics of our neighborhood, to be better informed. This is why I read the blogs. But, when people go off the rails, reaching for conspiracies that don't exist, it makes it hard to trust what they say; it makes it hard to tell fact from fiction.

Craig takes it really personal when somebody challenges something he says. I'm counting the seconds until either he deletes that post, my comments, or bans me from the blog.