Weekend Jaunts

By Timmy Watson in Arts & Entertainment on Mar 3, 2007 2:30PM

Happy Birthday! The City of Chicago will officially celebrate its 170 years today. We've got the official Birthday bash as well as other events to keep you busy this weekend.

• Admission is free today to the Chicago History Museum from 10 a.m. - 2 p.m. for the City of Chicago birthday celebration. The official birthday for the city isn't until March 4 (the date the city was incorporated), but being the social butterflies they are, they wanted to party on a Saturday. If you happen to be one of the special few sharing a birthday with the city, you can receive a special certificate signed by the Mayor. We did a little research, and we share a birthday with Briarcliff, Arkansas. We will be there for our certificate.
• It will be a little chilly this evening, but we are definitely heading somewhere near the lake to catch the lunar eclipse. The lunar eclipse is great, because essentially wherever you are, you can see it. Just find an unobstructed view east, and enjoy the show. The lunar eclipse occurs when the sun, moon and Earth are in a straight line. The moon is expected to be totally immersed in Earth's shadow around 4:45 p.m. This will be a total eclipse, folks, expected to last around an hour and a half.
• Since we will be near the lake anyway, we are going to head over to the Music Box to see An Unreasonable Man, the just-released documentary chronicling and giving insight into the man that is Ralph Nader. The once rock-star consumer advocate now draws contentious debate from both the left and the right; this film looks to shed a little light on a fascinating man.