Christmas treats

Lucky recipents of this year's cookie plates will sample chocolate-coated peppermint cookies, lemon-poppyseed butter cookies, carmelita bars, apricot-almond cookies, treasure chest bars, gingerbread and cranberry-nut swirls.

Photographs and Memories

All the love you gave to me....

Remember the Jim Croce song from the 1970s?

I've compiled a family photo album containing 192 pictures.   The album spans just over a century, and it's nice to have all of these pictures together in one book.

Now this could only happen in a town like this....

Over 150 significant venues opened their doors to the public for a free weekend on October 13-14. Here are a few of the 25 Open House Chicago sites that I visited:

Conference room, Gottsch Partners Architectural Firm, located on the 17th Floor of the Railway Exchange Building. The left window has a view of Buckingham Fountain and the right window has a view of the Field Museum of Natural History and Soldier Field. (The Gottsch firm was responsible for Soldier Field's renovation and bowl.)

Marquette Building Lobby. They answered that they were Illinois.

Entrance, Marquette Building

Our Lady of Sorrows Basilica

Frank Fisher Apartments

Ganz Hall, Auditorium Building

Sears (not Willis) Tower

Hyde Park

No other Chicago neighborhood has more attractions than Hyde Park. The neighborhood's landmarks include the University of Chicago, the Museum of Science and Industry, the Oriental Institute, Smart Gallery, DuSable Museum, and the Robie House.

Henry Moore, Nuclear Energy. This sculpture marks the spot at which the world's first atomic chain reaction took place in December 1942.

The Robie House, designed in 1909 by Frank Lloyd Wright, was one of the architect's greatest masterpieces and one of the most influential buildings of the 20th Century. It is currently being restored.

The University of Chicago Booth School of Business is adjacent to the Robie House and is designed to compliment Wright's building.

The University of Chicago Rockefeller Chapel

The University of Chicago Library

But is it "art"?

The Skokie Northshore Sculpture Garden is a 2-mile linear park housing over 75 contemporary sculptures, including these:

Jack Howard-Potter, Gendron

Andy Zimmerman, Inside Plant

Patrick McDonald, Weeee

Ted Gall, Charger I and II

Jack Holme, Bridge to the Next Millennium

A man's house....

The Beverly Neighborhood on the far south side of Chicago is the highest spot in Cook County and was once an island in glacial Lake Chicago. It has many spectacular homes, including 4 by Frank Lloyd Wright, and several historic commuter rail stations.

Taxviking Companies

This summer, I've reorganized my business. The new name, Taxviking Companies, reflects my three distinct lines of service:

• Tax Attorney
• Private Tax Service
• Taxviking Continuing Professional Education Services

I've also remodeled my website and given it a new look. You can see the changes at www.taxviking.com.

A visitor

Thursday afternoon, this sweet, 12 year-old dog showed up at my door. She was lost, hot, tired, hungry, thirsty and very scared. I let her in, and while I cooked a chicken breast for her, she laid down and cooled herself on the cold tile floor inside my door.

Once the smell of cooked chicken permeated the air, "Gladys" decided to come to the kitchen and investigate. After her meal, she retired to a spot underneath my dining room table, where she settled in for a long nap.

A digital picture and an advertisement on Craigslist reunited her with her owners, who live several blocks away. "Gladys" resumed her life as "Chiquita," and all is well.

She was good company on a summer afternoon.

Running away and joining the circus!

Circus World is located on the former winter grounds of the Ringling Brothers Circus in Baraboo, Wisconsin. You can see a magic show, a circus, and view dozens of circus wagons, circus memorabilia, and other paraphernalia!

Marshall Field and Company brought us "The Golden Age of Chivalry." How apropos.

"Make every day a circus day!"

Inspiration in Iowa

St. Luke's United Methodist Church in Dubuque, Iowa has a collection of over a dozen windows by Louis Comfort Tiffany. It is regarded as one of the 5 finest religious Tiffany collections in the world.

Do all the good you can, By all the means you can, In all the places you can, All the times you can, To all the people you can, As long as ever you can.
                                                                                                      John Wesley

It's just a checking account.

While in college, I banked with the Bank of Lansing in Lansing, Illinois. They called themselves the "willing community bank." They walked the talk and set the standard. There are decent financial institutions out there. But you have to search for the George Baileys.

Pay a fee for a checking account? Dream on, Mr. Mooney. If you can't run a simple business like a bank and make enough money on the spread, you aren't talented enough to be handling other people's money.

Why accept torture? Switch banks if yours is acquired. And not all credit unions are created equal.

Beyond Form 1040

I've started a second blog, Beyond Form 1040. It's an archive of my tax column, as printed in The Boone County Journal. There is a link to Beyond Form 1040 in the right-hand column. Feel free to submit a tax question!