Sunday, April 30, 2023

Requiem for a once wonderful Chicago restaurant. Twin Anchors is Now Dead to me…


Chicago—As a young adult in the late 1960’s I lived in Chicago’s trendy, Old Town Neighborhood.  Just a few blocks West of me on Sedgwick at Eugenie Streets stood a neighborhood bar and restaurant, Twin Anchors.  I was told they served up the best BBQ ribs anywhere.  Yes, they did!  It was a cozy place where young professionals gathered after work.  Many people found their spouses there.  As a Chicago cop it was a great choice to bring my dates.  (Back then women were nearly all, meat eaters unlike today.)

It was a marvelous place to dine especially for their BBQ pork ribs.  Cooking ribs is a real art.  Most people try hard and wind up with a greasy mess.   Fortunately for those pretenders a decent sauce can cover up a culinary disaster, but heartburn is sure to `follow.  Twin Anchors made tasty ribs that weren’t greasy or too heavy.  Their ribs were heavenly. 


While you were waiting, your server would bring you two slices of tasty black bread with butter.  You of course could begin with salad.  For a side, a baked potato was the favorite.  


The place was so popular parking was always a challenge.  The servers were prompt and friendly.  


I moved away from Chicago to open my detective agencies in Arizona and California.  I’d return to the Windy City often and visit the best restaurants of anywhere on the globe.  I was last at Twin Anchors (with a boss I had as a teenager) before the China Virus was unleashed upon the world.  It was just as I remembered.  


At the end of April of this year I returned with a lady friend I dated and took there many years ago.  She was living in the Southwestern suburbs and the geography made returning to Twin Anchors all but impossible for her but she was excited to have dinner with me there after two decades.


When crooner, Frank Sinatra came to Chicago and wanted ribs, he knew to go to Twin Anchors.  You could sit in the actual seat where he sat, and perhaps even farted if you so desire.  Also, the delightful, Bonnie Hunt movie, Return to Me was filmed there.  They rearranged the place into an italian restaurant for the film


What’s changed since my last visit you ask? A lot!  It’s now a dining failure loaded with lamest excuses, ever.  


A host seated us at a table he claimed was Sinatra’s favorite.  However in the past I was told it was the large center booth at the bar area. Why the unnecessary subterfuge? 


Our server came took our order telling us they didn’t get their delivery of potatoes that day.  I guess they’d also claim if we asked that all of the local grocery stores had the same problem.  


While we waited, no black bread or any whatsoever came to our table.  Their excuse? The bakery they bought it from has gone out of business more than a year earlier.  Chicago must have run out of all their bakeries too!  Again, the lamest of excuses. 


I ordered baked beans as a substitute for the baked potato.  It had some slimy mystery ingredient that tasted strange.  I skipped it. 


As for the ribs themselves, we both ordered half slabs but they were unusually small.  The ribs and sauce were very good but left us hungry for more.  Our complaints fell on deaf ears.  This was and will be our last visit to Twin Anchors. 


What happened to this place? My first thought was the place has new and very incompetent owners.  Or perhaps the owners retired or passed away leaving it to their children that hate the business.  Whatever happened it has been fatal,  Twin Anchors, may you, Rest in Peace. 







Wednesday, April 19, 2023

The Second Chicago Fire

 


The Second Chicago Fire. 

Chicago, IL -There is no possibility that Chicago can survive as a place to visit, live or work for civilized people.  We have a group of politicians that absolutely hate police and white people.  They actually want our city to be in the dangerous state of chaos.  

These politicians were elected by ignorant, woke, left-wing, useful idiots we used to call Lakefront Liberals.  Unfortunately they are influenced and brainwashed by local media.  Like Rome, Chicago is now burning. 


We already saw the commercial tenants of the once elegant Water Tower Place flee turning over their keys to the lenders.  We lost lost our iconic and gorgeous stores, terribly tarnishing the Magnificent Mile.

I used to live in and own a condo at Marina City.  The 900 apartments there were always 100% occupied, however not anymore.  The John Hancock building has also lost its luster as property values decline with every election.

At some point soon, the media organizations that are located in the violent affected areas are simply going to have to move away in order to protect their employees.  Some media organizations have enabled and facilitated so called, “Civil Rights” activists like the faux, Father Pfleger and others in their quest to extort form Chicago’s businesses and taxpayers. 


The high profile TV station storefronts along with their highly identifiable live trucks are now inviting targets for the force of dangerous thugs Chicago’s politicians have long favored over taxpayers.  Even the microphone identification flags endanger news crews today.  Cops are asked to risk their lives and careers should they dare to do their jobs.  How can we expect cops to protect news crews? They’ve been turned into a force of immovable  scarecrows by our politicians.  


Chicago’s media has given City Hall a pass on their massive corruption for decades now.  The days of exposing crime and corruption like the infamous and award winning, Mirage Tavern  story run by George Bliss of the Chicago Tribune ended long ago. They weren’t shy then about reporting on Operation Graylord and Operation Gambit.  Investigative journalism in today’s Chicago is on life support or dead. 


The only glimmer of hope is if they actually reboot and become serious about reporting what’s really happening instead of protecting the clowns of City Hall.  We have some high profile pending corruption trials like that of, world class fixer, Eddie Burke whose wife Ann is Chief Justice of the Illinois Supreme Court (how cozy is that!).  


TV news has forgotten that redundantly proven mantra, “If it Bleeds, it Leads!” If they’re sincere about keeping local news alive the must make serious changes.  The news directors and editors must leave the beds of their political friends at City Hall, The County Board and Springfield instead returning to journalism.   Real journalists do not need the cooperation of politicians or their appointed bureaucrats to gather and report news.


Chicago Reporters have lost all trust of the cops in the trenches or the decent citizens otherwise willing to risk their livelihoods providing needed tips to expose scandals and other tawdry happenings that our population needs to know.  


The media could actually save the Windy City, but only if they will do their job.  The police must be trained to once again do their job without obstruction from City Hall. 


Civilization can’t advance without strong media and law enforcement.  


George Orwell said it best, “Journalism is printing something that someone does not want printed. Everything else is public relations.” He also pointed out, that people sleep peacefully in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.