little blog on the prairie

The Illini Puppies are back in the news. The litter’s breeder has produced a poster of the cuties and is selling it online for $14.99. It seems that everyone in C-U is making money off the Illini’s run to the national championship game …

If your school principal shows up in the parking lot soon with a new Mitsubishi Endeavor — here’s why. The Pantagraph has reported that “the Central Illinois Mitsubishi Task Force will allow governments and qualifying businesses to purchase four types of 2005 Mitsubishi vehicles — the Galant, the Eclipse Coupe, the Endeavor sports utility vehicle, and the Eclipse Spyder — at discounts ranging from nearly $3,900 to more than $5,200.” The program is available to entities in 18 counties, including Champaign, Piatt and Ford (sorry, Douglas).

Th task force was created to help boost local sales. Mitsubishi operates a plant in Normal, its only North American facility, which has struggled recently. Last year, the plant laid off 1,100 workers; the company blamed slumping car sales for the cut. The plant began producing the Eclipse this month.

Unfortunately, the discount isn’t available to regular Joe Schmoes.

That the editors of Chicagoist, one of my favorite blogs about my hometown, have never been to Peotone. In a post about the state submitting a controversial plan to develop a one-runway airport there, Chicagoist calls Peotone – a rural town with a little more than 3,000 people (less than Mahomet) — a “far southern suburb.” If Peotone is considered a Chicago suburb, what does that make Champaign?

Check out Champaign American, Red Granger, It’s Matt’s World, and Veiled Conceit. The first three are local. Veiled Conceit is a snarky blog about everyone’s favorite Sunday newspaper section, the New York Times Weddings announcements.

After getting a PR windfall earlier this month after it Gov. Rod put up a Papa Del’s pizza as part of his bet with the North Carolina governor over the Illini-Tar Heels NCAA championship game, the Champaign landmark got a hard-luck dose of bad press on last night’s WCIA news when it lost its reputation as family-friendly.

WCIA interviewed a woman who said she was kicked out of Papa Del’s earlier this week for bringing in outside food. The woman went to PD’s for lunch, and had taken her 15-month-old son. Only, he’s lactose intolerant and can’t eat pizza. So she had brought with her a McDonald’s hamburger for him to eat. The Papa Del’s owner stood by his staff’s decision to boot the woman, and said it was a health violation, but clarified that baby food would be allowed.

The funniest thing about this interview was how it was filmed with a McDonald’s in the background. (If anyone knows anymore about this story, or if I heard it inaccurately, please post!)

The big news today is that Champaign-Urbana did not win back the rights to hold the state boys’ basketball tournaments at the Assembly Hall. Peoria can keep puffing out its chest, because the tourneys will remain at Carver Arena for another five years. While the vote by the IHSA board was hardly surprising — given that the Peoria business community, in particular Caterpillar, was throwing money at it by the bushels — what is so funny about the whole thing is how Peoria is so desperate to declare its superiority. Not necessarily over Champaign, but over anyone.

I can’t get over how the Peoria Journal-Star has completely lost its journalistic objectivity in the coverage of this event. Its consistent editorialization of news stories has been laugh-out-loud funny. From Greg Stewart today:

“After a decade of indifference, that community put together a bid package spearheaded by the university’s athletic department.” Nice turn of phrase, but hardly accurate.

From Stewart and Steve Tarter on Sunday: “Ten years ago, the IHSA moved the state finals here for a number of reasons, most importantly a lack of community support in Champaign and price gouging by local merchants.” Perhaps including would have been a more accurate and less inflammatory term.

In every story they have written on the topic, the Journal-Star attributed Champaign-Urbana’s “renewed” interest in the tournament to comments made by Illinois coach Bruce Weber that having the tournament in Champaign would help the Illini’s recruiting. Today’s Chicago Tribune and AP stories mention Weber, but do not credit Champaign-Urbana’s bid solely to the power of Bruce Almighty.

My father would rather go to the dentist than give his car to a valet parker. He lives in the Chicago area, where valet parking isn’t so much a luxury as a necessity. He’s never had to give his car to a valet parker in Champaign-Urbana, because there was never any valet parking service around, at least not for a public place.

Not for long. As reported in Sunday’s News-Gazette, C-U’s newest upscale steakhouse, Jim Gould Restaurant, will start offering the service sometime after it opens on May 4. The restaurant is located in the 1 Main complex in downtown Champaign, long documented as a parking-challenged area. But the area has been booming regardless of its parking problems.

The introduction of valet parking into the Champaign-Urbana marketplace is certainly a milestone, of what kind I’m not exactly sure, but a milestone nonetheless. Now that the valet floodgates are soon to open, who knows where it will lead. Valet parking at Assembly Hall? Marketplace Mall? Custard Cup? Illini Union?

Sting. Ebertfest. Boneyard Arts Festival.

For the latter two, there’s always next year. But Sting hasn’t been here in 17 years, but he promised to be back sooner this time.

UPDATE: Ebertfest had an official live blog. Hat tip to Kiyoshi Martinez, who blogged the event himself.

This story about the new SuperValu distribution center caught my eye today. The long and short of it is that the company is building a $25 million facility right here in Champaign “designed to provide “higher quality, wider variety and faster delivery of produce” to its retail customers in eight surrounding states.

I’m a grocery store snob (and proud of it) of the first degree, and I’m a staunch produce critic (frankly, the Urbana Farmer’s Market and others can’t start soon enough for me). I wonder if this new facility will have an impact locally, besides creating new jobs. Besides going the farmer’s market route — an option limited to the summer months — I struggle to find a consistent source of quality produce in this market. One can only hope that having this facility in our backyards will force our local groceries to upgrade the quality and freshness of our food supply.

There’s a new blogger on the block chronicling the life and times of our very own Congressman Tim Johnson. The Tim Johnson Watch debuted just last week. Blogosphere pal Illinipundit will be overjoyed.