Hosted by lululemon athletica, the first annual Mardi Glow Run was more of a community event than a bona fide race, expanding on their weekly group runs and seizing on Fat Tuesday as a fitting time to get some exercise in. It’s always fun to get out on the street with a group of runners, but it’s even more exciting when everyone is decked out in glow bands and gaudy-colored running gear.

Heading from the lululemon at Halsted and Armitage to the 900 North Michigan location, this roughly two-and-a-half-mile run started at six o’clock to notably pleasant weather (around forty degrees with a light wind) and surprisingly accommodating sidewalks (where were all the annoyed pedestrians?). Read the rest of this entry »

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): I invite you to identify all the things in your life that you really don’t need anymore: gadgets that have become outdated, clothes that no longer feel like you, once-exciting music and books and art works that no longer mean what they once did. Don’t stop there. Pinpoint the people who have let you down, the places that lower your vitality, and the activities that have become boring or artificial. Finally, Aries, figure out the traditions that no longer move you, the behavior patterns that no longer serve you, and the compulsive thoughts that have a freaky life of their own. Got all that? Dump at least some of them. Read the rest of this entry »

Photo: John Greenfield

By John Greenfield

As I make my way through the blizzard to the Blue Line’s Logan Square stop, seven pigeons are huddled on Evelyn Longman’s giant eagle sculpture atop the Illinois Centennial Monument. It’s a Thursday afternoon in early January, the streets are lined with slush and cars move at a cautious crawl. A scruffy, bearded guy in a hooded jacket trudges across the street toward me with wet snow blowing into his face. “No, it ain’t shitty out,” he says with a grin. Me, I’m planning to take a pass on this nasty weather and spend the rest of the day in warmth and comfort as I go urban spelunking in the Chicago Pedway, an overlooked layer of Chicago’s transportation system.

The Pedway is downtown’s network of indoor pedestrian pathways, including below-ground tunnels, street-level concourses and overhead skyways, covering about five miles, and connecting more than forty city blocks. Tens of thousands of downtown workers use it every day to traverse the Loop without having to deal with cold, heat, rain, snow or the Loop’s hectic, often dangerous, street traffic. Read the rest of this entry »

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): What do you typically do just before you fall asleep and right after you wake up? Those rituals are important for your mental health. Without exaggeration, you could say they are sacred times when you’re poised in the threshold between the two great dimensions of your life. I’ll ask you to give special care and attention to those transitions in the coming week. As much as possible, avoid watching TV or surfing the Internet right up to the moment you turn off the light, and don’t leap out of bed the instant an alarm clock detonates. The astrological omens suggest you are primed to receive special revelations, even ringing epiphanies, while in those in-between states. Read the rest of this entry »

At race time roughly 850 people had registered for the second annual Cupid’s Chase 5K in Chicago, and it looked like about two-thirds of them showed up at the starting line, braving this shockingly cold morning in the middle of such a moderate winter. With a wind chill dropping the temperature below zero, clumps of adventurous runners stood around grinning sheepishly at each other, alternately heading to the vendor booths for warmth and clustering together outside to soak up as much sun as possible and trade preparation stories.

Running is a sport that is equal parts solo and collective but the cold weather, relatively low registration and smooth organization gave this particular race the agreeable charm of a small-town community event (a small town where the Chicago skyline rises up impressively behind the snow-covered course). Read the rest of this entry »

"The Schoolmaster," Adriaen van Ostade

By Jack Helbig

Everyone agrees that teachers are central to the learning experience. And everyone—teachers, administrators, union officials, school-board members and state legislators—will agree that we should have the best teachers available for our children. But the reality is that the system currently in place to prepare, and more importantly, to credential teachers is gamed against older students.

If you are a returning student, someone with some knowledge and experience in the world—experience that might be important in the classroom—there are institutional roadblocks in place that make it almost impossible to get a teaching certificate.

Ten years ago, I returned to school at forty-three years old to become a teacher. I succeeded, and have been teaching since the fall of 2005. I am not writing this to settle scores, or to whine, “They didn’t let me in.” They did let me in. And I love teaching. Read the rest of this entry »

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): “Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or conquest,” said author George Eliot. I believe the same is true even about intimate bonds that have not been legally consecrated. Each tends to either be a collaboration of equals who are striving for common goals or else a power struggle in which one party seeks to dominate the other. Which of those two models has characterized your romantic history, Aries? Now is an excellent time to begin working to ensure that the partnership model will predominate for the rest of your long life. Read the rest of this entry »

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Sad but true: A lot of people seem to be perpetually in a state of wanting what they don’t have and not wanting what they actually do have. I’m begging you not to be like that in the coming weeks, Aries. Please? I’ll tell you why: More than I’ve seen in a long time, you will have everything going for you if you want precisely what you do have—and are not full of longing for what’s unavailable. Do you think you can manage that brilliant trick? If so, you will be amazed by the sublimity of the peace that will settle over you. Read the rest of this entry »

The Pennsic festival/Photo: Ron Lutz

By Caylie Sadin

“I’m just checking Twitter for updates on the tournament,” a Medieval maiden says. This maiden is a member of the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA), a group dedicated to researching and recreating the arts, skills and traditions of pre-seventeenth-century Europe “as it ought to have been.” In other words, they enjoy the luxuries of indoor plumbing and easy access to the Internet through smart phones hidden in corsets.

At their Twelfth Night event at the Irish American Heritage Center, Katherine von Scholsserwald (Kathryn Westburg in real life) has a whole peasant’s house laid out in one of the rooms. She uses planks to delineate the animals’ sleeping area, the cooking fire, the eating area and the bed. She has bowls made of horn and wood, spoons made of ivory and the few metal belongings a peasant would have had—metal was very expensive. She has drawings of what those houses would look like in Yorkshire circa 1200. She even has leeches, which she is going to show to attendees later in the day at her medieval medicine talk. Read the rest of this entry »

By Rob Brezsny

ARIES (March 21-April 19): The coming week is likely to be abnormally free of worries and frustrations. I’m afraid that means you’re not going to have as much right to complain as you usually do. Can you handle that? Or will you feel bereft when faced with the prospect of having so little to grumble about? Just in case, I’ve compiled a list of fake annoyances for you to draw on. 1. “My iPhone won’t light my cigarette.” 2. “The next tissue in my tissue box doesn’t magically poke out when I take one.” 3. “I want some ice cream, but I overstuffed myself at dinner.” 4. “I ran out of bottled water and now I have to drink from the tap.” 5. “My cat’s Facebook profile gets more friend requests than me.” 6. “When people tell me I should feel grateful for all I have instead of complaining all the time, I feel guilty.” Read the rest of this entry »