Welcome to this Sunday’s Third Degree: Tough, Brief, Weekly Interrogations on matters public and private that force thinking and response. Today we target: BS

  • Understanding it used to be a cow pasture, has Washington Square, better known as Bughouse Square, the oldest small park in Chicago, achieved a reputation for BS?
  • Is it true or BS that Illinois translates: “Tribe of Superior Men” (Algonquin language)?
  • So, today, tribesmen of superiors, do we offer a Southsider’s BS (Birthday Salute) for Illinois year 205, offending only the left outers? WGAS?
  • Fuhgeddaboudit?
  • Except to note that the whole concept of supremacy apparently sprang from indigenous people and is pervasive and persuasive to human nature except when Blowing Smoke of victimization, without end, is preferred and profitable?
  • Browsing Sections of the enticing Newberry Library, whose front yard is Bughouse Square, do we appreciate that the park is really America’s own Hyde Park with outdoor oratory a staple for entertainment and enlightenment?
  • To cheers and jeers, do the eager and the earnest, intent on bringing Blinding Scintillation on matters large and small, contribute to the worthiest BS essential to the Republic? Being Skeptical?
  • Would profane, prophetic, comedic George Carlin be proud? Is it all really BS, question everything?
  • Didn’t the other George from last week urge the same thing in defense of the First Amendment?
  • But, being Brutishly Straight-forward, wasn’t Bughouse Square a great place for a cheap date?
  • On first leave, after first year at USAFA, on a warm, starry night, was Myrna, girlfriend then, wife now, impressed not so much with the various speeches but with the gardenia, sold by a little, old, Italian, violin guy, and carefully picked from his pail for a dollar?
  • People watching, from our Bughouse park bench, what happened when an approaching drunk’s Bungling Steps and Swerves generated derisive comments from a tony group down the way?
  • Steadying with lamp post help, just a few feet from us, he summons the old guy, whispers in his ear, and then, would you believe, with impassioned violin accompaniment, a soaring tenor voice thrills?
  • Our first Sorrento, “the drunk”, would you believe, concluding, pats the old guy on the shoulder, pulls out a half pint of Ballantine’s Scotch (actually it was Black and White but you’re into to this BS thing) , toasts his distractors, drains it, tosses it and Boldly Strides away?
  • Would you believe, thirty-five years later, John and Myrna, now opera lovers, at dinner, with Pavarotti, his hands on her shoulders, leaning over, singing, sotto voce, just for her, “Torna a Surriento,” but mention Bughouse Square, and that brings a special smile? No Bravo Sierra?

Socrates reminds: “The unexamined life is not worth living”. The answers and actions are yours?