Photo by Deltaspy The Sun-Times takes a look at "elimination communication," a technique some parents are using to toilet train their very young children. Perhaps you read about it. In the New York Times. In 2005. [S-T, NYT.] Police are investigating the human remains discovered in Downers Grove but so far can't establish age, race, or how long ago the man died. [Trib] Alinea won Restaurants & Institutions magazine’s Ivy Award, which is a......

It was pretty much inevitable that discussions about the NIU shooting would turn to gun control. And turn they have. A group of NIU parents are calling for tighter gun control laws, as is Rep Edward Acevedo (D-Chicago). Mayor Daley asked "Why do we love guns in America?," and Neil Steinberg complains that "the prospect of any kind of meaningful gun control in this country is as impossible a dream as perpetual motion." There's a......

mmmmarshall captures the new Chicago winter wonderland: Millennium Park With Mega Tuesday looming, Oprah readies to hit the campaign trail again for Barack Obama, along with Caroline Kennedy. It looks as though Obama Girl's fifteen minutes of fame aren't up yet. Neil Steinberg and Eric Zorn give us a modern recasting of the Ballad of John Henry. A double dose of Drew: while attorney Joel Brodsky says recent photos acquired may show Stacy Peterson......

You shouldn't need tooooo many awesome things today--most people are off work, gift giving is on the horizon and such--but that doesn't mean your day couldn't use at least a little perking up. Seek and ye shall receive, readers. If you're going to post a self-indulgent shot of yourself every day, at least have the courtesy to fashion bizarre masks and headdresses for yourself to keep it interesting. (Our favorite: July 18. Not sure......

Who doesn't love the Onion? God knows we do, and hey — even Neil Steinberg sort of likes it. And that guy knows funny! Anyway, there are two big reasons to love the Onion even more: First and foremost, their Google map layer — go ahead and play around with it, above — is twenty kinds of amazing. And the company announced today that they're moving their HQ here. Well, business HQ. While the......

It's all Peterson, all the time these days. Drew Peterson was on the Today show again this morning, this time with his lawyer, who effectively prevented Peterson from saying anything of substance (couldn't prevent him from looking creepy, though). Last night, Peterson invited ABC 7 reporter Sarah Schulte into his house, and Wife #1 was on Good Morning America today, too. Really taking the cake, though, is the Sun-Times. They've rolled out a whole Stacy......

Let's all give a warm welcome to our newest commenter, Mr. Neil Steinberg! A 16-year-old spotted her rapist at Dunkin Donuts and called the police, who promptly arrested him. A flight from here to New York was searched following a bomb threat, and the FBI is investigating non-specific, "third-hand" threats that al-Qaida is planning on attacking Chicago malls during holiday shopping time. Doomsday, Daley, CTA, Springfield...this is pretty much a Mad Libs at this......

Looks like Neil Steinberg and a video team at the Sun-Times had one really effing long day a few weeks ago, when he filmed at least 14 "Today's Chuckle" segments, apparently in a row. Judging from the clock you can see in some of the bits, it looks like they were at it for several hours. We can't permalink the page, but here's a grab: And holy balls, we haven't seen a G3 in a......

You've probably heard the news: J.K. Rowling outed Dumbeldore. Instead of shock and awe, we, along with Neil Steinberg, feel more of a yawn. She outed the oldest character, way too old for us to think about in a sexual way, and the revelation has no bearing on the books at all. It's not as if we're going to read them again and say "By Jove! Everything makes sense now!" and some mystery of the......

Folks sure are feeling God-y today. Both Neil Steinberg and Harold Henderson are both dipping their column toes in the divine waters. "That must be one hell of a galaxy that God's been busy constructing, somewhere far, far away, because He's sure careless when it comes to keeping tabs on his flock 'round these parts. If the Lord were on the ball, earthwise, then 24-year-olds would not kill themselves," Steinberg writes, in reference to Jim......

This whole CWM history deal is something of a learning process. Well, hopefully it is for you, Constant Reader, as well as for us. For example, we were well aware of the incredible and ever-swelling numbers of Chicago history books, with their tremendous photographic accompaniment. Hell, we practically have the Dewey Decimal reference number for the "HIST-CHICAGO" section at Sulzer memorized. (It's F548 something something.) So when we were doing a little research at the......

Our spring rush has netted a fresh new class of pledges for our interview beat: Keidra Chaney, a self-described pop-culture nut, joins us from Lincoln Square, by way of Englewood, West Pullman, and Wisconsin. When she's not interviewing people like the folks at the A+D Gallery for Chicagoist, she works at DePaul, and she freelances for magazines like Venus Zine, Bitch, Friction, and Colorlines. Karl Klockars is also a Chicagoland native, growing up in the......

Neil Steinberg, Sun-Times columist...

All kinds of nonsense has happened politically, so lets take a look back at the week so far: In case you live in a cave and missed the biggest news story so far this week, the FBI arrested 20th Ward Alderman Arenda Troutman on charges that she took bribes. “Well, the thing is, most alderman, most politicians are hos.” Lynn Sweet continues to think she's a blogger. We like her better when she dishes on......

Several months ago, you surely heard the story of Elvira Arellano, the illegal Mexican immigrant hunkered down in a West Side church in an attempt to avoid deportation. As hers is no longer a top story on the major news networks, maybe you thought this problem had been resolved. Perhaps Arellano had unexpectedly decided to comply, or maybe the feds had decided this was one battle not worth fighting. In fact, Arellano is still holed......

The developer who owns the site of the old Cooper Lamp Factory in Logan Square, overlooking the Kennedy, has an idea for what to do with the massive building, empty since the factory closed last summer. The Baum Realty Group submitted a zoning proposal to the city that would convert the building into a "live-work" space, in which people who have a business license can live there and work from the property. Our first thought......

With apologies to Eric Zorn if it weren’t for Phil Rosenthal’s media columns and “The Boondocks” Chicagoist’s Bridgeport correspondent would have no concrete reasoning for actually reading the Tribune. However, when someone (um, Scott Smith) clues us to an article like this from Tuesday’s edition of the World’s Greatest Newspaper (an aside to Neil Steinberg: that’s the Tribune’s slogan) and asks us if we can work a local angle into this we’re happy to oblige,......

Chicagoist knows how hard writing a regular column can be. It was hard writing about something new every week in our high school paper. Student Council doings only went so far. But today, Sun Times columnists Michael Sneed and Neil Steinberg tossed out the one-two punches. First, Sneed outed the gently simmering conflict between former Lipinski's Bill and his now-Congressman son Daniel, and 23rd Ward Alderman Mike Zalewski. Former-Rep. Bill was rumored to have promised......