Jennifer's Chicago Blog

This week's cup-runneth-over list lands on top of the half-dozen annual festivals (Bucktown Arts Fest, Viva Music Fest) also running this weekend. You can find those featured in our monthly calendar of annual events. Now, here's a little more to top off your cup.

• Cafe Finjan, a Jewish-Muslim cultural celebration and interfaith exchange including performances, music, and art at Mercury Cafe on Thursday at 6:30 p.m.
• The Planets by Gustav Holst performed by the Chicago Sinfonietta with accompanying video by Adler Planetarium astronomer Dr. Jose Francisco Salgado. On Friday at Millennium Park's Pritzker Pavilion. FREE.
• Quimby's Printers Ball at the Museum of Contemporary Art on Friday from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. (21+ only) FREE.
• The Windy City Rodeo opens Friday in Crete, IL and runs through Sunday. It is an Illinois Gay Rodeo Association event.
• "40 Years After: Filming the '68 Revolution" Film Festival opens at Facets Multimedia on Friday and runs through August 28.
• French Music Party with DJ Madrid at the Alliance Française de Chicago on Friday from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. BYOI-pod w/ your three favorite Francophone tunes to add to the mix.
• Soul Asylum at the Lincoln Park Zoo on Saturday at 7 p.m.

If you want to make your voice heard during the Obama-McCain election showdown on Tuesday, November 4, and I highly recommend that you do, you need to register to vote by Tuesday, October 7.

If you've moved or changed your name, you also have to re-register to vote.

If you live overseas or you are an active duty military person, the federal government has set up a website to help you register to vote and to vote absentee.

There was that time, many years ago, that I went scuba diving off of Belmont Harbor during the Air & Water show. I'm lucky my head wasn't propellered off. What was I thinking?

The lakefront will be jammed this weekend with the arrival of the show and loads of spectators and boaters trying to get a piece of it. You may want to plan accordingly. Enjoy.

• Croatian Fest (Velika Gospa) This festival, which celebrates the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, has been held in Bridgeport for more than 100 years. It takes place on Friday.
• Air and Water Show The uber-popular airplane and watercraft extravaganza expands to three days this year, so you can catch it on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
• Chicago Turkish World Festival A rich exploration and celebration of the Turkish, Balkan, and East Asian cultures takes place at Navy Pier on Saturday and Sunday. (Hope they know about the planes that will be zooming overhead.)
• Barrio Arts Fest Celebration of Puerto Rican and arts and culture at Humboldt Park Field House (1440 N. Sacramento) in Chicago. On Saturday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.
• Dress-up and Costume Sale at Emerald City Theater, a children's theater company. Cash and carry and build your toy box of costumes. 2933 N. Southport. On Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon.
• Chicago Fire at Home vs. DC United at Toyota Park on Saturday at 7 p.m.

(Oh, what did I see while I was scuba diving under Lake Michigan? One fish and two shipwrecks. One wreck was a steel-hulled ship and the other a wooden-hulled one. Both sunk during storms. The guys in the steel-hulled ship crashed on the ice, but walked to shore safely. I can't remember the fate of the other boat's passengers.)

Photo of the Air and Water Show by Tim Boyle/Getty Images

Yesterday, my colleague, Prescott Carlson, confirmed that the popular musical "Wicked" will be leaving Chicago at the end of January 2009. Get 'cher tickets now if you want to see it again (and again and again) before it goes.

As we begin to feel the encroaching Labor Day weekend, you might want to dip (or re-dip) into some of our museums before August ends. Many of them will experience post-Labor Day changes.

• The Shedd Aquarium's Oceanarium will close on September 2 for a massive renovation. It's not expected to re-open until next summer. This affects only the Oceanarium. (The belugas and dolphins will be shipped out for care at other aquariums and zoos.)
• Children under the age of 11 are free with a paying adult at the Museum of Science and Industry through the end of August. Two per adult.
• Free Thursday and Friday evenings at the Art Institute run through Labor Day from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. After that, they return to Thursdays only (and probably until just 8 p.m.)
• Mythic Creatures: Dragons, Unicorns, and Mermaids runs at the Field Museum through September 1.

Tickets for the Historic Game at Wrigley Field not Included

You can score Blackhawks single game tickets starting today online here or via phone at (312) 559-1212. The Blackhawks' ticket vendor is TicketMaster, so expect those frustrating surcharges.

PLEASE NOTE: Tickets to the historic game due to be played in Wrigley Field vs. the Red Wings on January 1, 2009 will not be going on sale today. According to the Blackhawks, "Winter Classic" tickets are only assured right now to Blackhawks' season ticket holders while supplies last. No more information about single tickets is available yet for that game, but the Blackhawks have set up this FAQ site to help address inquiries.

Comedian and Chicagoan Bernie Mac died early Saturday morning. That sad news sent me digging into our Guide to Hollywood Movies, Rebecca Murray's, archive of interviews with Bernie Mac. I pulled up this gem about Mac's memory of his very first baseball game.

Q. Do you remember the first big league baseball game you attended?
A. Oh, man. Cubs. No, it was the Sox. We couldn’t afford the Cubs. Cubs was way northside. Cubs was the elite. The White Sox was the hood. When you went to the White Sox and came out, your car was broken in. And they left a note, “Sorry.” It was the Sox. When they had Carlos May, Luis Aparicio, Wilbur Wood, and all those guys. And that was my first. I had my baseball glove and we [were] up there on the roof. I went with my grandfather, my brother, my cousin, my uncle and my other cousin. My uncle was a preacher and he did a lot of community work and he got some tickets. You didn’t care about where you sat at that time. We were all the way up here looking at the players like [far away]. And I had my glove like something was getting ready to come up there. I say, “I’m gonna catch it, I’m gonna catch it. Whatever it is, I’m gonna catch it.”

You can read the full interview, including more about his movie "Mr. 3000," here.

Bernie Mac in March 2007. Photo © Scott Gries/Getty Images

To dish you weekend tips, I cull my events listings, e-mails, and fave websites to figure out what I'd be doing if I could be everywhere at one time. Check out the nine Chicago festivals and fairs this weekend in our Annual Chicago Events in August, including Northhalsted Market Days, the Arlington Million, and Caribbean Fest. Plus a few bonus tips for your weekending consideration:

• Ignition: Emerging Playwrights of Color Festival at Victory Gardens, Th - Sun
• Walking with Dinosaurs at United Center. Seven performances this weekend, Friday through Sunday.
• Bicycle Film Festival runs through Sunday at Columbia College
• Queer Queens of Qomedy at Lakeshore Theatre on Saturday
• Valentina Lisitsa with the Grant Park Orchestra at Millennium Park on Friday and Saturday

The Chicago Public Library has chosen The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe as the fall choice for One Book, One Chicago. They've also snuck a showing of the film The Right Stuff into Grant Park's existing Outdoor Movie Schedule. The film, which stars Ed Harris, will play in Grant Park on Thursday night, August 14th at 8 p.m. Admission is FREE.

Related Reading: List of Books Chosen for Chicago's One Book, One Chicago Program

Man, it was my husband walking through the front door last night looking like someone dumped a bucket of water over his head that was my first clue. I hadn't been paying much attention to the storm. Then, he entered and said "tornado warning near Montrose."

Within a minute of his entrance, we plucked the three year old out of a deep sleep, grabbed the dog and headed to the basement. The 8 year old was way ahead of us.

This is the second time in the last two years that Chicagoans have had to think about tornadoes while emergency sirens wailed. I mean, it's not every day that you look at the weather map and see the little red tornado dot planted on the north side.

Fortunately, according to early Trib and Sun-Times reports, the worst damage seems to have been downed power lines and lots of tree branches. Wrigley Field got a scare, too.

More fun today. What's your storm story?

UPDATE: Add some building damage and flooding to the problems reported. Fortunately, no deaths.