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Age-inappropriate literature
I was a bookish boy. I read at school and at home, encouraged by boredom and the summer reading programs at Lincoln Library. I didn’t read to learn; I read to be entertained. (There is no spur to youthful literacy as sharp as crap TV.) I plowed through the entire collection of nonfiction — it didn’t take long — at the Matheny School library.

Anti-terrorism officials are regulating us, not terrorists
You didn’t get a virgin when you drew me as one of your political commentators, for I’ve been through the fires of Texas politics, including having been elected state agriculture commissioner. Among other duties, this office made me the regulator of such matters as pesticide use, the accuracy of gas pump gauges and even the sizing of eggs.

hitchhike song # 1
thirty five years ago michael reid maybe nineteen hitch hiked illinois his banjo on his knee singing names to the tune of the irish washerwoman later at walker church minneapolis his first theatrical performance he called it land o lincoln, give it...

LETTERS
If you people think Sam Cahnman is an embarrassment, what about the fact that Springfield is the only major city in Illinois that still allows drive-up liquor window sales? How embarrassing is it to know that of the ten largest cities in Illinois...

YOUR TURN TO LEARN
Lincoln Land Community College is making it easy for the overworked and overburdened to take one-time-only classes on things like umpiring, drumming and woodfurniture refinishing with its new Try It! program. This month’s classes — only $12 each — are NIA Technique for Relaxation on Jan.

HAVE A BALL
The ball is a celebration of African- American history and heritage, featuring historical performances, live entertainment and food, as well as community awards and a $250 scholarship for a high school essay writer. It’s a chance to learn about influential black figures in our nation’s past and a chance to just have some good fun.

Primary primer
The 2010 primary election is right around the corner, and there’s a lot at stake for Illinois. With heavy budget troubles, Illinois’ next batch of leaders will have a huge say in the state’s future. It’s a year of hot-button issues and hotly-contested races, with many politicians aspiring to higher offices.

New state architect chips away at Capitol Complex restoration
Throughout the years, the Statehouse has retained its grandeur and status as the tallest non-skyscraper capitol at 361 feet. But where the zinc-plated beacon once stood lonely against a prairie sky, structures like the Howlett and Stratton buildings have appeared over the years to form the Capitol Complex.

Creative differences
Artists in the project track receive $2,000; $3,500 or $5,000 grants, with a 25 percent cash match, to create, produce and present their work, while those in the professional development track receive $500 or $750 grants to finance career-related opportunities.

Reel foreign
Springfield area cinephiles benefit as the Route 66 Film Festival and the Springfield Art Association’s Film Series grow in size and quality. The 2009 Route 66 Fest, held last September, tripled its 2008 attendance while the SAA’s 2010 Film Series features one of its best lineups yet.

An independent obsession
She has organized the Springfield Art Association’s annual film festival for the past 18 years. The event, she says, was started not as a fundraiser, but as a way to offer greater variety to Springfield’s movie audiences. “We thought we could add a little more culture and a little more choice,” she recalls.

2010 Film Series
BRIGHT STAR An unlikely love affair between 19th century poet John Keats and his next-door neighbor Fanny Brawne is cut short by Keats’ death from tuberculosis at age 25..

IT Exclusive: Q&A with Goodbye Solo director Ramin Bahrani
RB: It was in Winston-Salem, where I was born and raised. A lot of people think that I am an Iranian director, but I’m American. I was playing soccer and met a charming guy like you see in movie.

Feasts and Food Rules
One of my first catering jobs was for a dinner party given by a cardiology group to honor a colleague who’d come to lecture at SIU Medical School.

RealCuisine Recipe
My grandmother’s “creamed” spinach contains no cream; rather it uses the water the spinach was cooked in. It remains my most favorite food; and is the only thing I’ve ever eaten so much of that once, when I was a child, I got sick. The recipe can be found online at IT’s website.

Daybreakers has bite
The time is 2019 and a bat-bourne plague has turned 95 percent of the world’s population into vampires. The remaining five percent do their best to stay in at night as they’re hunted down and harvested for their blood. Obviously, the small number of remaining humans and the vast number of vampires ensures the blood supply will eventually run out.

Leap Year takes few chances
Unless someone comes up with a radical departure in the romantic-comedy formula, there should be an indefinite moratorium on these types of films. Just once, I would like to see the boy and girl in question meet in a way that’s not overly cute.

Movie times
PLEASE NOTE: Kerasotes listings are for Friday, Jan. 15 through Thursday, Jan. 21. Bracketed show times are Saturday, Sunday, Monday (MLK Day) only matinees or Friday, Saturday, Sunday only late shows. All times are subject to change. For updates on Kerasotes films, call 1-800-FANDANGO.

Terry’s take on the top ten
Prior to taking off on an adventure somewhere this week, I needed a Now Playing idea before I left. Lo and behold, Terry Hupp, one of my best friends ever, delivered a review of what he says are the 10 Best Albums of the 2000s.

BAND SPOTLIGHT
For over 30 years, Jake’s Leg has faithfully and uniquely reproduced the music of the Grateful Dead while extending the spirit of the popular band through heartfelt lifestyle interpretation and imitation. The St. Louis-based group started as a guitar/vocal duo with Randy Furrer and Tim Fahy in the mid-70s, then later added lead guitarist Dave Casper.

PUB CRAWL
9:30pm-1am. Backyard Tire Fire w/ Deep Lunar Blue

MUSIC
Elvis fans are expected to pack downtown’s Hilton Hotel this weekend for the popular Elvis competition. Seventeen Presley tribute artists, selected from over 200, shake, sing and strum for cash prizes. Special guests are KAVAN, World’s No. 1 Rock ‘n Roll Elvis and Alphonse Franklin, a Smokey Robinson look-alike and former lead singer of the Miracles.

THE CALENDAR
Submit calendar listings at www.illinoistimes.com.

HOLIDAY
Guest speaker next Monday for the Frontiers International Springfield Club’s 35th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Memorial Breakfast is Joseph A. Brown, S.J., Ph.D. Brown is a Catholic priest, professor and director of the Black American Studies program at Southern Illinois University, published poet and author.

THEATER
This weekend and next, Springfield Theatre Centre presents Earnest Oscar Wilde’s comedy of mistaken identities and deflated Victorian pomposity. No one is quite who they seem to be in this witty farce. Directed by Rebecca Loschen and produced by Jim Leach.

WORKSHOPS
classes (acrylic on canvas / watercolor): Tuscany landscape, still life, painting birds, Georgia O’Keeffe flower. Children’s classes: Seascape with lighthouse, learning perspective drawing using a vanishing point. For dates, times and prices, call 732-7771.

PUBLIC NOTICES
NOTICE UNDER ASSUMED BUSINESS NAME ACT STATE OF ILLINOIS COUNTY OF SANGAMON TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: Notice is hereby given that on 17th day of December, 2009 a Certificate of Ownership of business was filed in the Office of the County Clerk of...

THE ADVICE GODDESS
My girlfriend of a year is 21 and I’m 22. I fell in love with her the moment I saw her, but there are issues. She has money problems, including $14,000 in credit card debt. Yet, she demanded I get a credit card, and when I refused, kicked me out and said we couldn’t live together until I got one.

NEWS QUIRKS
Tita Nyambi, 25, tried to withdraw $700 from his mother’s bank account by dressing in the woman’s clothes and speaking in a high-pitched voice, according to authorities in Somerset County, N.J., who added that he also presented her driver’s license and forged her signature on a bank form at the bank’s drive-through teller.

FIND LOCAL BIZ
public accountants and business advisors you need. Not your typical accounting firm. Income tax planning and consulting, estate planning, personal financial and retirement planning. 1000 Churchill Rd., 793-3363 www.sikich.com.