MAGAZINE
December Issue
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IT’S TIME TO BEGIN, BUT NOTICE
Is sagged jeans played out? Candidate for Mayor of Chicago Time Is, What You Make of It Simple Causes Make Good Effects The Spender
SC magazine Providencia Island (Old Providence Island) Album by Cesarut
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Running Mates; 6-7 The Spenders 8-9 Brian Sidler; 10-13/16-20 Top Story Time is, 24-32
What should one wear? 36
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2010 -11 Chicago’s Candidates for Mayor
Danny Davis Rahm Emanuel Carol Mosely Braun James Meeks Gery Chico Robert Halpin
Is this you? Spenders! We work. We play. We purchase so many things that we can and can’t afford. The Christmas Holiday is around the corner. Sales are going discounted at an all time high. There are sales that are going to be 50% - 70% off and there will be sales that are going to be $5 to 20 off. But where is that perfect sale when the cost in nothing. You can think many such prices are going lower than the cost for every item purchase, but in plain sight, it’s not. The only way to save this holiday is to not spend any money. People who use the “Plastic” consider them gods because they can pay that monthly bill. But look at the common Mo and Jo, there on a budget and they can’t spend too much of anything because they have months to feed, bills to pay, and need a car to travel around in. Most people would say, “Stay your ass at home and to the shoppers who have the funds go shop! Many of our rich people have restricted their own money’s to a minimum. They aren’t spending as much as before, but being alert to the confines of their homes. Most of their prosperities have been sold out or foreclosed like many others. Real Estate companies are piled with work, banks have more REO’s that they can handle, and people just broke. The question still remains: Where’s the money coming from?
Let’s put it like this: If you were born in the projects, you know how to adjust and make money work for you; if you were born with a silver spoon in your mouth – you know money is there for you; but if you’re not one of these kinds of people – but has it all or don’t --- that doesn’t mean you go out and bust people in their heads and rob them because you too stupid not to create, establish, and work like any other American. Wake up! Wake up! Get a damm job to support your habit because you’re going to run across an agitated person whose going to really put a foot in your ass…not because of what you were planning to do, or going to do, but that person was mad as hell. Remember this; if you can’t remember anything else, the recession is for the rich. If the rich can’t make a buck then, that person (s) is going relay their frustrations unto the people. To not fall into that trap, upgrade your skills, go back to school, and spend your money wisely. Because while you are spending, the rich will fall on top – while your pockets get smaller and you will still complain about “Would of’s, Should of’s, and Could of’s!” PEACE
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Where It’s At...Part III Television...The Visual Garbage Can A living document that changes... A document dedicated to “ROCK” spirit and attitude! And ROCK! This is where the epicenter of the worldwide movement is friends, it looks small now, but you’re all being cool and signing on...and we see you showing up on our http server with your IP’s and you wouldn’t believe how many more of you are all comin’ through our portal. Cool grooves and way cool enough. And we know that what you’re about to read is a little strong, but with a war going on, now is not the time to just sit there. We’ll see ya at the finish line and bring your friends, then we’re gonna have a party and that’s gonna be a lot of fun...for all of us! Just dig what Brian’s got to say, that’s all. L. Lewis/CEO Worldwide TMA By Brian Sidler - Former Music Writer For Chicago Music Magazine (Chicago, IL 20 October 2007) Let’s talk about an effect here. Let’s call this effect...the law of diminished expectations. What do we mean by that? Well on this particular head, we mean that when one becomes accustomed to something that isn’t so good in terms of our entertainment and information mediums, we tend to dismiss the effect that it has on us and use it anyway. The problem is, a few generations of young people throughout the world who didn’t know life before television, have nothing to compare it to...”it”...being life, by comparison...with television and...without television. So the psychological filter of the people who’ve seen life before television and those that know nothing but life with television, is quite substantially different in terms of perceptive reasoning when processing this information on the fly...or as it’s happening. This “filter” is important. And now, throughout most of the world, it is all but gone. The pre-depression generation, depression generation, post depression generation, WWII war baby generation and the now the early boomer generation of the 20th Century that would know the difference about what life was like without television, are
Born Dontain 2Kleva Williams, 4th January 1973, at Bethany Hospital, Chicago, Illinois, USA,
beginning to fade from prominence in terms of societal political content and direction. Too, the educational standards that prevailed during the educational and formative years of these peoples have been severely diminished by the school systems in most places on the globe. So, the idea that there are things which should be adhered to from a more steady and quasi traditional point of view, seems also, to have been completely voided from societal consciousness. And there, forms the negative...to the detriment of all of us in the English speaking and free world. The vector here is, you can’t tell somebody how to have a bit of class when conducting themselves. You can’t teach it by telling someone what to do. You have it, or you don’t. It’s an instinct. And if you do have “class” you have it as an instinctual absorbed behavior, and that was also likewise...an absorbed behavior...by example, not something spoken, from those that preceded you and that you modeled yourself after by virtue of your admiration for that individual or group of individuals. In other words, it is osmotic. We humans are much like, believe it or not, wolf packs in the wild. That is to say, there is an order of things in human existence. What that order is, is the point in consideration and how that order is disrupted by televised input. Now, the considerable shift in accepting different methods of decorum in public as well as, individual expression in public has been severely eroded. The Baby Boom generation wasn’t right with everything it did. On the lighter side for a minute, isn’t that just so nice of us to admit? But anyway, for that matter every preceding generation had its set of peculiar foibles and faux pas. The Boomers didn’t invent sexual expression in public they expanded it. Its been steadily on the rise since before the Greeks and Romans. However as the population increased as well as the means to communicate on a broader, mass scale, so too did the acceptance of it as part of public life. To wit...the Roaring Twenties in America. The same goes for alcoholism or the use of any intoxicant for that matter. As for rank consumerism and the accompanying acceptable mores of human consumption...the comedian George Carlin said it best on one of his earliest album releases: “If you nail two things together, some schmuck’ll buy it.” To date in fact, his latest venture on HBO employs this theme. It leads off the whole show.
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Television is now meant for one thing and one thing only...marketing conquest and brainwave control of the populations of any particular country, linked to their understanding of their worlds around them and what they should be doing with their time. The question arises in our conscience, are we better off with it? Other than the case of broadcasting an urgent message for the public good and safety, do the other uses of television at this point in time, given the state of communication arts presently, of this medium, compliment our lives or form a basis for depredation? Certainly, one could argue that watching the news everyday no matter how poor the presentation, is important, thereby forming a basis of validity on that single head. How sound is the affirmative to that question? We think...not very. The modern world did quite well with a radio and “listening” to programming rather than “watching” it. Listening is a much more in depth process on some levels. Blind people live by listening and hearing their environment, do they not? What is also very disconcerting is the use of ROCK along with it. Some few years ago, there was a comedy bit performed on Saturday Night Live which used the comedic sensibilities of Will Farrel and the SNL crew, which lampooned a rock band during a recording session and the use of a cowbell rhythm and its appearance as an eminent track integral to the song. It was reminiscent of Spinal Tap. For those of you who have seen this and can recall this bit, we can find no more fitting of an editorial remark than this. For those others we would say to you, that ROCK as being espoused by the entertainment moguls in the fat cat media centers of the world is tired, overworked, underpaid (to the performers of it) and totally void of any of its former luster. We can find two words in summation and most fitting: It Sucks! Along with the use of Rock in the medium there is advertising. This particular subject will be looked at more in depth later, however we would express briefly and again, that advertising, the manner in which it is purveyed, the state of the art in terms of it’s content, and the manner in which it continues to develop likewise...SUCKS!
We are again also reminded of one of our favorite lampoons where, in it, a piece of poster art, a high brow woman holding a bejeweled cigarette holder and caught in profile in sort of an Aubrey Beardsley-ish black and white rendering, is caught in caption saying: “Classic Hollywood: Who invited all these tacky people anyway? Tell us people, is your sex life the only thing that you can focus on (of course we think not) in terms of the meaning of your existence? Is the suggestion by the advertising community worldwide which is, “if you buy this, you will be ultimately more sexy to someone else”, a maxim whereby we should continue to reflect our most worthy considerations? Do these tacky assholes think, that this is going to continue unnoticed? Should the News Organizations of the world receive continued support with its use of this medium as a manner of main sustenance? Should a message of any nature be put forward at any expense, especially at the continued patience of all of US, the audience? Should the advertising moguls of the world be considered as anything but pigs with no imagination? As for the production centers of NYC, Hollywood, London, Paris, et al�is sex and death and the various forms of stories you can weave it into, the only thing that you can imagine to do? We think it all too disgusting for words to ponder. Yet, we must turn our attention towards it for the routing out, of it. Should the tail (literally!) continue to wag the dog? So here’s the next place we’re jumpin’ from: So, when the same principle is applied to the effect that garbage television and radio can have on populations, there are many instances when we can see more or less that this is so. But let’s return to the “law” of diminished expectation. This is a very insidious, silently disquieting residual of the culture we find ourselves unwittingly immersed in. We use the word unwittingly because we have not too much to say about what is purveyed to us along these...ahem... channels. Unless you think that audience response testing units are, or should be the arbiter of what it is that the producers of the worlds television studios shall in fact bring to full bore fruition and force feed us, along with equally rank, manic commercials bent on urging us in any particular mercenary direction the sponsors wish to suggest.
Innovative Designs & Concepts
Alovar Carnelli
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The argument: One could always turn the channel to a different one, right? However, when you have 200 other channels equally as low rent as the one you just turned away from, yet wishing entertainment from the medium (and it could be a much better used medium, looking from the standpoint of singularly, a “medium” as such, it’s excellent for communications) what should you do if you want something of quality, imagine it? Watch the television in your minds eye and turn the electric one off? Perhaps. But how many people have that gift, were it to be called such, to be able to do that? Well, not many...daydreaming is something so few of us have any time to do anymore considering the fact that we’re all scrambling to ease our living strain so we can pay the fat cats (of the government/corporate megaplex for making the guns that allegedly keep us all safe from the bad guys) our taxes on what it is we make. Isn’t that right? Are we missing something? Again, we don’t think so. So, The collective...ummm...that’s US, are being subjected to this garbage daily, when actually, since we’re all involved in the “War On Terror”, we could all use a good vibe. Did they forget the Disney movie Snow White? Ya know, “Whistle While You Work”. After all, if they’re going to treat us like the dwarfs, can’t they think to be at least a bit more tactful than they are? Why do they assault our collective intelligence? Is there ever a time when having enough money in the bank, is in fact enough money to have? We don’t think that anybody can raise the objection that lumping all the fat cats together is not a legit demographic. The politicians - political moguls, and corporation moguls, media moguls, industrial moguls, et al...all cavort and cajole with each other and laugh about their last golf outing, (and what a boojy game that’s become) while their wives gossip about each other, who is wearing what, or the latest crap in whatever the subject of the day is. Does anybody doubt that this demographic, is not in fact a reality. Is this not a true plutocracy? Does anybody doubt that this is not in fact a complete oligarchy, replete with all the players we see in the mass mediums of communication as quote, unquote...the movers and shakers of this world we all seem to be present in? We ask you, who the hell do they think they’re kidding? Well...we don’t think it is unrealistic or unreasonable to consider this as fact, whatsoever! We don’t think you do either. As a mater of course, we think most of you who read this are of the same considerate,
deliberative conclusion. The free-speaking peoples of the world have far more in common than anything our duplicitous diplomats could advise, would divides us. Yes? Let’s continue to break this down. And with your gracious attentions, may we? What is really going on here? The world of commerce includes all of us, right? Whether we are at the head or the tail, right? Everybody (us that are fortunate enough to find jobs, meaningful or un) is contributing to the GWP (Gross World Product) right? Those that are at the top are calling the shots, right? The free market or laissez faire capitalism, is the directive of popular consent for quite some time now, right? It’s the personal right for you to choose how you will battle for independence within this structure, and that is what all the shooting is about, right? Which is to say we’re fighting over different systems of the governance of populations and a particular population’s ability to produce useful commerce which contributes, to the greatest extent possible, the betterment of the GWP. Here’s the questions in terms of the preceding questions: Why shouldn’t there be great music and in general, great entertainment when we need it most; while we’re locked in this struggle, that they (“they” being a term, advisedly used) got us into? Just because they have bad taste and they’ve taught several generations, by now, to have bad taste, should they continue to foster such tactic to enrich themselves? Why, just because it makes them money? Why is money such a God? Do you mean to say that luxuriating ourselves is the end all, be all of existence? Is it not true, that the more aggrandizing any particular culture becomes in terms of its decadence, that it loses it’s power by the same proportions? Has not history taught the collective, from top to bottom, that this particular societal malady always repeats itself? Was the late President George Washington, wrong in proclaiming those statements, (as captioned in Part II The Sellout) to the people of America? Is it any less true now, no matter what country you’re from? Please consider this. Well history does repeat itself, doesn’t it? We’ll not go into the hundreds of examples we don’t think it’s necessary, most who’ll read this get the picture. And it’s a sad statement to make. Why should history repeat itself? In answer to the above question, it repeats itself because the collective seems to have an attention deficit when it is preoccupied with aggrandizing itself.
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The mad rush for material comfort as advertised on the channels of the TV’s around the free world is what spurs rank consumeristic pursuit. The thoughts implanted into the population...” Ya see, your life will be much with this, than without it”...at the behest of the worlds most powerful advertising engines, the corporate megastructure which continue the advocacy for their products. Well that’s commerce, one might say. Sure, it is. However commerce at the expense of higher sensibilities is showing signs of residual abuse. How could anyone not see that? Kids in America, have to be searched for weapons on the way into school? People have to be scrutinized at airports for weapons? Why? The reasons are so compounded and confounding that forensic science has become an art which must be practiced at a skill level, never before thought possible or necessary! How can the rise of violence in the world be accounted for? What, population growth and thereby a scalular proportion is attributable to this fact? Such convenience in terms of an answer can hardly be accurate. What accounting can we make? Is it a collective chemical imbalance? Are the things we eat, the depletion of the oxygen supply and other such factors effecting our collective brain chemistry to the degree that there are just more brain damaged folks to begin with? Where is it coming from? What we are suggesting with all the inquiry we are directly provoking is that this mad rush for consumeristic joy has many of us asleep at the wheel. This is the sublimation we are talking about in part one of this article. This sublimation likewise makes us complacent about, and with...the status quo. The truth is, there are not enough personnel in the engines of progress against this insidious direction to counter it.
Here’s some more questions that have to do with “THE SELLOUT.” How many cars can you drive at the same time? How many sets of golf clubs can you use when you are playing a round? Hey, if you’ve got a bad swing do you think a new set of Pings is going to make a difference? How much food can you eat at one sitting? How many eye pencils, eye shadow, lipsticks, etc. can you use at one time? Does having a diamond make you a better person? Do thin people have a moral leg up on fat people? Does having the latest fashion make you more acceptable. Is having something new better than having something old? How much living space does a family of four really require for a comfortable existence. Is 12,000 square feet of floor space better than, 1800? How much is increased in terms of real life by the increase of that measure? How many pairs of shoes do you need? How many dresses do you need to go out with on any given occasion? What is more important self worth or net worth? Let’s cut to the chase, what is more utilitarian, good looks, or being good? The vanity we are implying inherent in these lines of questions is the bottom line delimiter. We are implying that rank vanity feeds rank consumerism. We are implying that by giving into the advertised notions of what a good life is, as espoused by the commercials we watch, which pay for the terrible programming we are subjected to, contributes to the depredation of the entire collective. So then, we go to houses of worship on certain days of the week depending on your particular leaning or birth religion and the preacher gives you your dose of guilt for having these notions... an hour or two later, goodbye guilt, hello Budweiser. Ya know what? It’s not even necessary that you agree with every conclusion that we have taken the liberty to draw as example for what it is we think. We would suggest however, that there is enough here to find agreement with rather than the counter.
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And when you listen to the theme songs of the programs coming across the world channels. When you hear the kind of beat used in the compositions for commercials. Tell us, doesn’t it sound like Rock, and in many instances excerpts from songs we know and love by themselves, without the product standing in the way? Well people...they’re using the music to conquest the commerce! Quite frankly, something stinks in Denmark and it ain’t FISH! Or is it? My name is Brian Sidler and I write about music, et al.
Happy Holiday’s
SCmagazine IF YOU ALLOW A LEAST ONE PERSON TO HELP ANOTHER THEN, THAT PERSON IS A CATALYST; FOR CREATING A CHAIN REACTION THAT PERSON WOULD HELP ANOTHER AND ANOTHER TO REACH THEIR GOALS ALLOW THIS CHALLENGE TO BE YOUR STEPPING STONE
AMERICAN’S NEED TO WORK GIVE US BACK OUR JOBS!
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at h w , s t i i f e o e m Ti mak u o y We talk to Irma Robinson Interior Designer
I met up with Ms. Irma Robinson
at a network event at the Best Westin Hotel on 11th & Michigan. Ms. Irma is an intelligent, articulate, and beautiful woman. Her green eyes reflect her very peaceful attitude. I asked for an interview because of her many years in the interior design business, her signature creativity and style, and her remarkable family heritage. Sitting down with the extraordinary Irma Robinson, I am intrigued by her work as an interior designer and a public figure. She agreed to meet with me about her life. We met AT her office for this interview along with her sister OLIVE and a hot cup of coco. Irma Robinson has been in business for 35 years working with the best of the best. You can see her latest work at Chicago State University’s library off of 95th & St. Lawrence. IRI was the MBE sub contract for Engineering/Drafting with Wiss, Janney, Elstner Assoc. for the IDOT Piggott/ Tudor Project – Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Robinson subcontracted with the Chicago State project with HAL Associates - for Illinois Capital Development Board and with Wiss, Janney, Elster Associates, Inc. (WJE), in conjunction with IDOT. IRI was told that the project by the president of WJE that this was a simply drafting project, he commented that it’s so simple his “Mother-in-law could do it in bed!”
She asked Dr. Hill if he would furnish us with a coordinating engineer from his office to be in their office to supervise the project, but he refused. IRI commenced to work on the WJE/IDOT project, with two full-time CAD techs and two part-time CAD techs. However, after several weeks, their CAD technicians continuously complained that the nature of the project wasn’t a basic CAD drafting, instead it was an engineering project. The project involved calculations of arc and curves and the CAD technicians with not being able to both things at the same time because they weren’t trained to be structural engineers. During the process of the project, Ms. Robinson communicated with Dr. Hill over and over that they need a full-time engineer in the office from his office to coordinate his project – simply because IRI CAD technicians aren’t structural engineers and they don’t have the experience in calculating bridges. The project involved calculations of arcs and curves. Although, these drafts had over 20 years of experience in drafting, they didn’t have experience in calculating curves and arcs for earthquake structural bridges for IDOT. Dr. Hill refused to assist Ms. Robinson in this area. Therefore, they had no other alternative but to contract with an outside
engineering firm that could provide them with the engineering service requirements for the project. She felt it was her responsibility and commitment as a professional minority contractor to see this project to completion. Therefore, Ms. Robinson contracted with engineering firm of Rubinos and Messia to coordinate the project. They provided her with one full-time senior engineer and one parttime engineer, project manager, PE and two technicians on the project. After the job was completed, Dr. Hill refused to pay IRI for their committed services of $168,000. In 1975, Robinson graduated from Roosevelt University with a Bachelor’s of Art in Interior Design. After graduating from college, she wanted to work. At that time, it was hard for her to find work. Robinson never found work in the area of study she received her degree in. But, when looking in a newspaper there was an advertisement posted in the Industrial Real Estate bulletin for OFFICE RELOCATION. She called for an interview. Robinson didn’t have a resume, but gathered her class work and took them with her to the interview. Basically, she went rogue…by being herself. At that time, Mr. Nardi was relocating his headquarters to Hillside, IL. Nardi was looking for an interior designer. This was Irma Robinson’s first break in the work force.
Upon Robinson accepting the position and completing the task of the move. Nardi took her up under his wing to teach her about business in collaboration with being an interior designer.
HERITAGE:
Earlier, we learned how Irma Robinson pioneered the interior design era and how, she developed the tools in conducting her business to be one of The first order of business was invoices, the established businesses of today. gathering all the invoices and adding them up to create a bill. The second Right now, we jump back in time to order of business was bookkeeping; learn about her family; where she and the third, order of business was comes from and her childhood days. to contact and connect to the person who makes the decisions. The last or- In the 1700s, there was a man by the der of business was closing the deals name John Berelski who jumped ship that were setup, appointed, and merged. and swam to Old Providence Island (OPI). Berelski was a pirate and a From 1975 - 1994, Robinson worked slave trader. He bought slaves and under Mr. Stephen Nardi, she learned sold slaves. He taught slaves how to the methodology and the ethics of busi- read and write because he didn’t like ness to go out on her own as an interior illiterate slaves around him. He himdesigner. self was running from the government because of his piracy days. He In 1985, Robinson was certified with the met woman by the name of Robinson city of Chicago. and married her and had children. She teamed with Perkins & Will & HAL But the piece of the pie is this, Berel& Associates (for the Terminal 5 proj- ski took her name. ect) Worked with the Chicago Public Schools So Berelski is now, Robinson. (CPS)-1998 Worked with Becon Van Liones, Gibson The slaves built OPI. When OPI Electric, Prime Real Estate, Internation- was built, it was separatism, only al Harvest, O’Hara – Terminal 5, Per- 100 slaves were there, many of the kins & will, CORN PRODUCTS, and towns were called Free Town, Sugar many other prestige’s companies Cane Town, Coconut Town, Bally Town, Main Town, Sweet Water Bay, Ms. Robinson’s formed her own com- Smooth Water Bay, Old Town, etc. pany and called it IRMA ROBINSON, and the island was about 3 miles by 7 INC (IRI). Interior Designer Space miles long. OPI was made up of setPlanning, Inc. tlers from England who settled and
transported cotton. Most of the properties that were built didn’t have electricity back then. Many had lanterns and through the years electricity came about thru engineering status quo. John Berelski aka John Robinson was the Great Great Grandfather to Irma Robinson. John Berelski aka Robinson is the father of Fredrick W. Robinson. Fredrick W. Robinson’s son is Luis Carlos Robinson. Luis Carlos Robinson is the father of Irma Robinson Luis Carlos had five daughters and one of the daughters name was Irma Robinson. Since there was no electricity way back when, television was unheard of - TV came about in the later years. Also, she took a bath once a week. Her mother sent her to Panama for school because the schooling on the island didn’t GO BEYONE EIGHT GRADE. The water was cool and clear.
When electricity came about, it was used scarcely. Sometimes you get it and sometimes you don’t. The Columbia government ran it.
Irma Robinson and her sister Olive
In 1960, she came to the states. She wanted to meet Al Capone, but she didn’t realize that when looking at TV - they were actors playing a roll. For instance, she used to watch the “Untouchables”, she thought the club scenes were the same setup like the clubs that were in Chicago. She thought America was perfect like the television show. She thought that the style of clothing was the same as well. Also, in the 60s, Colombia came in changing the American names on Island to Spanish names. Now, the Island isn’t Old Providence Island - it’s now called ISLA DE Providencia, San Andres, & St Catalina. In the movie, Valentine Massacre – She thought Chicago was off the chain – for 6 months she lived on East 63rd Street next to the lake. 1963, she lived with roommates on Marina Drive on the north side 1966, she lived at 1400 Lake Shore Drive. While living at that address there were rules 1) no boyfriends in the bedroom, and 2) no over nighters. She was the enforcer when it came down to enforcing the boyfriends and overnight LAWS because once someone mess up – they would have been kicked out of the house. She worked at Abbott Laboratory. She was a Filing Commodity Carder. Basically, a File Commodity Carder is an individual who pulls numbers.
The End
Welcome to Welcome Inn Manor Mell Monroe at his Welcome Inn Manor located in Chicago’s Bronzeville neighborhood, member McCormick Chamber of Commerce. Executive recruiter Mell Monroe has spent close to $300,000 rehabbing his historic home, with an eye toward converting it into a bed-and-breakfast. Built in the 1890s for furniture manufacturer Solomon Karpen, the three-story Romanesque Queen Anne, with its ornate woodwork, intricately carved fireplaces and eclectic mix of artwork, is a warm refuge on a cold winter day. And if Chicago had landed the 2016 Olympic Games, the inn would have been strategically located about a mile from the main sporting venues in Washington Park. King Cole’s Quarters Our Tribute to Nat King Cole: 2 Fireplaces, Jacuzzi, Massage Shower, Reading & Meditation Area
The Bronzeville red-brick mansion shares its corner with two boarded-up apartment buildings, and Monroe and his wife, education administrator Angela Higginbotham, are having second thoughts about whether the neighborhood is ready for an upscale inn.”My instinct is, ‘Let’s take it slow,’ “ Monroe said. The couple’s hesitation is in many ways emblematic of the wariness that has settled over Chicago in this recession, particularly since the deflating defeat of its Olympic bid on Oct. 2. The Welcome Inn Manor on Michigan Avenue is proudly owned and operated by Mell and Angela Monroe. As owners of the up-scale Bed & Breakfast (B&B), their the aesthetic tastes and expectations of the discerning, affluent traveler looking for a higher standard of attractiveness, personal accommodation, and unique amenities.
The Welcome Inn Manor is within walking or biking distance to several of Chicago’s most popular attractions including: The DuSable Museum of African American History, the Southside Community Arts Center, Chicago Defender Newspaper, McCormick Convention Center,Cellular Field- Home of the Chicago White Sox, and the University of Chicago with the Court Theater, Smart and Oriental Galleries. The Bronzeville community is also home to philanthropist Julius Rosenwald and the Illinois Institute of Technology. Also, the home of President Barack Obama is within one mile of our historic Bronzeville Community. There is easy access to 20 other Chicago neighborhoods via bus, train and Lakeshore Drive.
The Bronzeville neighborhood has an abundance of daytime activities and is close to lakefront beaches, boating marinas, and the grand mansion lined parkways of Martin Luther King Drive and Drexel Blvd. Mell and Angie will offer their favorite picks for BYOB restaurants with outstanding food at reasonable prices and numerous other entertainment and site-seeing options including a ½ day trip to over a dozen Southwest Michigan wineries. The Welcome Inn Manor is located just 12 minutes from the Chicago Loop, Michigan avenues “One Magnificent Mile” boasting high-end designer shops, and walking distance to many train and bus stops. Why a B & B? There are several factors differentiating a B&B lodging experience and the Welcome Inn Manor from conventional hotels. The overwhelming advantage is personalized service, an individualized decor, the comfort and access to a beautifully appointed historic home, friendly proprietors who can provide guests with personal insight—and make them feel right at home. A B&B is the overall delivery of an “experience” rather than just “a room for the night” lodge. Guests typically seem to enjoy the warmth and freedom of staying overnight in an actual home and many want to learn the (real) history about Chicago’s beginnings. Many visitors seeking romance take pleasure in the enlightening and insightful experience of weekend getaway- and indeed a B&B is unlike the stuffiness of hotel institutions. Research indicates that less than 10% of the population has ever stayed overnight at a Bed and Breakfast home. Travelers are more curious than ever to do something different when traveling to large, overwhelming urban cities. By contrast, a B&B is typically off the beaten path of conventional tourism. Good innkeepers work hard to insure that the environment is friendly,
accessible and warm. B&B’s are very popular in the New England and Western United States and also throughout Europe. B&B popularity has increased in Chicago and growing in the double digits because travelers and locals are looking for the kind of uniqueness that historic homes seem to offer. Mell and Angie are naturals at being completely at your service and they are committed to making visitors feel right at home.
Overnight guests will be offered to participate on numerous outings and unique tours away from the premise during their visit to Chicago.
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Overnight Guest Tours & Outings Architectural Historic Home Tours Wine Tasting & Fruit Picking- Michigan Fine Art and Theatre Tours BYOB Restaurant Tours Walking, Biking and Boating Tours Jazz/Blues Music and Comedy Tours
Overnight Lodging Accomodations for guests while visiting Chicago are: • • • • • • • • • • • •
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Should we wear anything, just because? All over the world you hear about people still walking around with their pants sagged. Most people including myself are getting absolutely tired of it. You see their pants nearly dropped to the ground – hands holding them up with a belt on them. What’s the point? We understand the commitment for fashion, but it comes to point that things need to change. How in the world are you going to gain respect – when you don’t take pride in dressing the correct the way? Now, I’m not talking about dressing like a conservative, but dress in a manner that when people see you…they won’t maneuver to left or right of you, but dead on. There’s too much censoring going on in the world as it is. It’s time to lay down your own laws and that is to better yourself groom fully, fashionably, and create a certain pizzazz about your character. What we see on TV isn’t the character you want to play, like the movie “Boyz n the Hood”. The portrayal here was the gym socks and slippers. It was a time and still is - that people was wearing gym socks and house slippers outside and around school. When riding the bus, people used to make jokes and crack the hell up. Now days, it’s gotten even worse. The persons who have gone to college and still in school have made it their business or better yet the trend to wear the “Pajamas Bottoms with gym shoes, boots, and stilettos…” and wearing nightwear as being a cocktail dress. Now, that’s old school. WTF! People all I’m saying is that, we need to walk five steps forward and not ten steps backwards because all we’re doing is setting a bad example for ourselves and the little ones. Children look up to anyone who is older, wiser, and who are sporadically different. That’s good - but on the downside, they do take a greater interest in mimicking. Casmier Tyler Perspective