Attention Bjorn Skurj

[Beltmann]

Roger Ebert reminiscing about the newspaper life. Here's a taste:

 

At about 8 p.m. on New Year's Day of 1967, only two lights on the floor were burning--mine, and Royko's. It was too early for the graveyard shift to come in. Royko walked over to see who else was working. A historic snowstorm was beginning. He asked me how I was getting home. I said I'd take the train. He said he had his old man's Checker car and would drop me at a train station. He had to make a stop at a 24-hour drugstore right where the L crossed North Avenue.

 

The pharmacist was backed up. "Come on, kid," Royko said. "Let's have a drink at the eye-opener place." It was a bar under the tracks so cramped the bartender could serve everyone without leaving his stool. "Two blackberry brandies and short beers," he said. He told me, "Blackberry brandy is good for hangovers. You never get charged for a beer chaser." I sipped the brandy, and a warm place began to glow in my stomach. I had been in Chicago four months and I was sitting under the L tracks with Mike Royko in an eye-opener place. A Blackhawks game was playing on WGN radio. The team scored, and again, and again. This at last was life.

 

"The Blackhawks are really hot tonight," I observed to Royko.

 

He studied me. "Where you from, kid? Downstate?"

 

"Urbana," I said.

 

"Ever seen a hockey game?"

 

"No."

 

"That's what I thought, you asshole. "Those are the game highlights."

[bjorn_skurj]

Thanks!

[TCP]

That made me laugh out loud!

[Gobias Industries]

Haha, good stuff.

[John Smith]

Ryoko was awesome. Loved his work.

[NightOfJoy]

Ryoko was awesome. Loved his work.

 

When I was 13, I stole a placard from a Tribune newspaper box that featured his face and name.....and put it on my bedroom wall.

 

Was it nerdly to do that? Hell ya.

 

Was I wrong to think of him as my hero? Hell no.

 

I wish I still had that thing....

[Preferred B]

I took a music class in college with Royko's ... niece? She was (is?) a local musician.

 

That story was great.

[Central Scrutinizer]

Roger Ebert reminiscing about the newspaper life. Here's a taste:

I had heard that story before, but it is classic. Sounds like they were at the Billy Goat. I still have my last issue of the Chicago Daily News with his column on the cover. "So long, Chicago."

 

I started in newspapers as a kid in 1979 and have over the years worked from soup to nuts. The industry has changed dramatically and in few ways for the better. Collecting information has technically gotten a lot easier.

 

However, news gathering and reporting have gotten infinitely harder, but few people seem to notice.