Trump strangles puppy, popularity soars — The State of the Blog, 2023

Prince Edward Island, 2011 (Photo by Martin Cathrae, used with permission).

      Trying to hold 2023 in mind and comprehend the year before it slips into history, I picture an old truck, heavy, lumbering down a muddy road, big tires spinning in the ruts, ancient diesel engine shrieking. Moving forward, sorta, shuddering, fishtailing, sliding sideways here, lurching forward there. Making slow and spattered progress.
    Along the route, the monthly blog highlights:
     In January, I tried to put the rise of Artificial Intelligence in context, not to mention eyeball the competition, with "Get your human generated content here!"  February saw the first of a series of stories marking the 75th anniversary of the newspaper with a look at long-departed colleagues, "Gather in the newsroom for a brief meeting."
    When COVID-19 hit in 2020, I told myself I wasn't going to spend the pandemic sitting on my ass in Northbrook, and wondered how to best contribute to our coverage. I decided, given my connections to hospitals and experience viewing operations, to try to convey medical aspects of fighting the pandemic, and marked the third anniversary of the arrival of COVID in March by surveying the maxxed out medical community in "We nearly broke the system," working again with my ace colleague, photographer Ashlee Rezin.
    In April, in the constant quest to include voices not often heard in the media, we met Antonio Cox, AIDS patient, in "I'm glad I got HIV."
    In May, we greeted new mayor Brandon Johnson by thinking about his inauguration speech, "Weighing 'the soul of Chicago.'" I figured somebody should. After pestering Lori Ligthtfoot, for naught, I've decided to step back, let Johnson serve out his term, and hope for better luck next time. Though this year I did skip the middleman and interviewed Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates. A fun talk — always better to talk to the puppeteer instead of the puppet. But even that didn't result in anything printable. 
    June was a good month. On the 17th, we visited the John Deere combine plant in East Moline, in a 2,100 word essay on farming and technology — the story originally ran in Crain's Chicago Business. Then two days later, perhaps my favorite story of the year, "A visit to cat heaven," aka Fat Cat Rescue, again with Ashlee, who'll I'll always remember carefully moving  among the mewing, cat-strewn landscape murmuring, "Best. Assignment. Ever."
    July brought the most-read post of the year — and the third most read, ever — "Wrangle carts, earn quarters," which I thought was a trifle about visiting a certain discount supermarket for the first time. That was before it hit the significance distortion field of Reddit, where it got a million hits, I am told, among the army of Aldi fanatics, who damned me as if I had murdered a child for marveling over the cart system and clucking at the inferior products on sale. A reminder that sometimes social media is like going outside for a stroll only to be killed by a mob outraged at the kind of socks you're wearing.
     In August I wrote "What I can't say anymore," alerting readers to a dynamic I fear is going to be an increasing problem as 2024 unfolds — the Sun-Times' hesitancy to weigh in forcefully on political candidates, for fear of endangering their 501(c)3 charitable status by "endorsing" someone. I feel that is not only over-cautious, but also a betrayal of our beloved country for money, and plan to push back against it as hard as I can. 
    In September, I used a recent trip to Copenhagen to offer one of those out-of-left field posts I find so engaging and hope maybe you do too, Danish Notes #1 — Spiral City.
    The brutal Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel was the jarring event of the year, and here the independence of the blog proved vital. Both in allowing me to immediately react, that day, with "War in the Middle East" And to disseminate, a few days later, "How does this end," when my leash was yanked a second time, when a single complaint from some unnamed person within the organization was enough to keep the column from being printed in the physical newspaper, despite my willingness to make changes. Though it was permitted to remain online, I believe because it had gone up before somebody disapproved of ... well, I never did get a good reason out of anybody. I tried pointing out that the purpose of my column is to raise valid issues and provoke thought and conversation, not make the staff feel good about themselves. That opinion did not carry the day, alas. As I often tell people, I just work there; I don't run the place.
    I didn't interact with Chicago politics as much as I should in 2023, so in November honored my old pal Ed Burke's downfall by actually reading the rules he broke, in "C'mon guys, read the ethics code."
    Bringing us to this month where, in my continual quest to neither risk endorsing anybody nor  tread on the tender sensibilities of colleagues, I spent two days featuring Delightful Pastries, the first being "Baking bread with Dobra Bielinski." The bread was very good, and if I'm going to become the trifles beat reporter, I might as well enjoy myself.
    Thank you again for another year. Specifically, thanks to John O'Rourke, Grizz 65, Clark St., Coey and all the other regular readers and faithful commenters who pointed out at least 100 errors and allowed me to look more thorough than I actually am. Thank you to the Sun-Times for tolerating me on staff for 36 years and, if we both can stand each other, perhaps three or four more. Thank you to Marc Schulman, who insisted that Eli's Cheesecake sponsor the blog for the 11th consecutive year. If you haven't bought a cheesecake yet, well, get to it, right now, right here. When Edie and I were considering what treat, of all the conceivable delicacies in the world, we want to indulge in to mark New Year's Eve tomorrow, we settled on a slice of Eli's tiramisu cheesecake.
     The blog overall had 1.25 million hits this past year; I figure half of those actual human readers. The rest seem to be ... well, I'm really not sure. A device in China seizing on my URL like a dog grabbing a rubber toy and vigorously shaking. I picture a device the size of a microwave oven, only painted dirty white enamel, on some high shelf in a basement in Szechuan, vibrating madly, emitting a high hum, racking up hits on this blog for some purpose I just can't fathom.

    Not success in the usual definition of the term, but not bad either. Or, if it is bad, it's my bad, and I'll have to live with it. Acceptance is key to several realms of my life and I think, finally, I've come to embrace the idea that This Is It. I'm truly grateful it's something you find worthwhile and check in on, either regularly or now and again. Here's hoping you have a very Happy New Year. I'm looking forward to spending 2024 with you. If you're the type who makes resolutions, I hope you'll consider sharing mine: to usher out the upcoming year living in the same sort of democracy we enjoyed when 2024 began. One of those resolutions, like losing 30 pounds or writing a book, that won't just happen by itself, but requires continual attention, care and effort. I believe it's worth it.