Good morning, Chicago.
For those preparing to celebrate Thanksgiving with family, friends and festive food, the Illinois Department of Public Health has released tips for staying healthy and safe during the holiday.
The department’s guidance outlines two main threats that could put a damper on holiday festivities: food poisoning and airborne viruses.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day.
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Joe Biden begins final White House holiday season with turkey pardons for ‘Peach’ and ‘Blossom’
President Joe Biden kicked off his final holiday season at the White House on Monday by issuing the traditional reprieve to two turkeys who will bypass the Thanksgiving table to live out their days in southern Minnesota.
CTA’s holiday fleet to begin spreading cheer this week
Chicago scrooges who take public transportation may be unable to avoid holiday cheer in the coming weeks.
CTA’s decked-out holiday bus is hitting the road Tuesday, and its dazzling holiday train will start ferrying customers across the city on Friday.
Birth control and abortion pill requests have surged since Donald Trump won the election
Hours after Donald Trump was elected president for the second time, Dr. Clayton Alfonso had two messages from patients seeking to replace their IUDs. Over the next few days, three women inquired about getting their tubes tied. All of them said the election was the reason they were making these choices now.
Requests for long-term birth control and permanent sterilizations have surged across the nation since the election, doctors told The Associated Press. And companies that sell emergency contraception and abortion pills say they’re seeing significant spikes in requests from people who are stockpiling the medications.
Out-of-the-blue request from Madigan sparked new direction in corruption probe, ex-Ald. Solis testifies
An alleged West Loop scheme was just one facet of a blockbuster six hours of testimony Monday from Chicago Ald. Daniel Solis, the prosecution’s star witness in Michael Madigan’s federal corruption trial. Solis spent his first full day on the witness stand taking the jury through his own legal and personal issues and his unprecedented decision to flip and go undercover for the feds.
Bears reach deal on Arlington Heights property taxes, but team insists new stadium in Chicago is team’s focus
As the Chicago Bears continue to face massive hurdles in Springfield over plans to build a domed stadium next to Soldier Field, the team said Monday it has reached an agreement over property taxes for the 326 acres of land it owns in Arlington Heights that had tripped up plans to build a new stadium in the northwest suburb.
4 things we heard from the Chicago Bears, including 4th-down confusion and Jaylon Johnson’s pass-interference calls
Chicago Bears coach Matt Eberflus and two players met with reporters Monday at Halas Hall after the 30-27 overtime loss to the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday.
Here are four things we learned from Eberflus and his players.
US goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher is retiring from international soccer
Naeher is on the team’s roster for a pair of upcoming matches in Europe but those games will be her last after a full 11 years playing for the United States.
The 36-year-old has played for the Chicago Red Stars since 2016.
Review: Daniel Bernard Roumain outshone by colleagues in first MusicNOW of CSO season
In a matter of days, composer and violinist Daniel Bernard Roumain is going to walk the same tightrope as many of us over the holiday season, writes Hannah Edgar.
Roumain, 53, was born to parents who were part of the first wave of Haitian immigration to suburban Skokie. He recently returned to the Chicago area with two high-profile engagements: composing a section of Lyric Opera’s “Proximity” last year and, on Sunday, curating one of the Chicago Symphony’s two concerts in its contemporary music series.
Barbara Taylor Bradford, million-selling novelist known for ‘A Woman of Substance,’ is dead at 91
Starting with “A Woman of Substance,” published in 1979, Barbara Taylor Bradford averaged nearly a book a year as one of the world’s most popular and wealthiest writers, her net worth estimated at more than $200 million and her fame so high that her image appeared on a postage stamp in 1999. In 2007, Queen Elizabeth II awarded her an OBE (The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire).
10 of the best books of 2024: The surprising reads that stuck
When Christopher Borrelli thinks back on what he read this year, on what stuck, and stuck, refusing to unstick, the common denominator was his surprise at his own surprise. A fresh take! A subject he’d assumed he knew! An antidote to heard-it-all-before-ism, that cynicism we develop from having access to every story ever told, every opinion ever voiced and every song ever sung, behind a black mirror in your pocket.
Column: The lights of the holidays blaze on, including in a little park in Streeterville
The city and suburbs have come alive with light, as they tend to do this time of year with ever increasing wattage and artistry. Though Rick Kogan has been intrigued by and come to appreciate some of these extravaganzas, he is more powerfully drawn to subtler displays. That’s what he was doing Thursday night, standing inside the oldest firehouse in the city.
