4/23/2007

Recently, I was happy to take part in a special “Celebrity Day” at CRIS Radio. Okay, before you start tuning around trying to find the station- chances are you can’t. It’s a special station that broadcasts to the visually- impaired and handicapped via special frequency radios. The station is carried on a sub-carrier channel of WBEZ, and is the source of news for over 40,000 Chicago area listeners! Volunteers read aloud newspapers and magazines, covering everything from the big news stories to sales circulars and classified ad listings. Every year, they ask celebrities to come read on a special day, and, I guess that means even bottom-feeder celebs like yours truly. Some of you who work downtown, and have used the pedway to travel underground from the CTA trains, or just as a short-cut, might remember that their studios used to be down there, right near Michigan Avenue. They are now located at the Chicago Lighthouse, a great facility that helps blind, visually-impaired, and multiple-disabled people become more independent. They even have a factory there, where various people who are part of their industrial training and employment program build the clocks that are used in most government facilities! Anyway, my job was to read articles from a recent edition of People magazine. You can choose what you’re going to read, And, since you will be reading straight through for a little less than a half-hour, non-stop, you kind of need to choose enough articles of interest, of the correct length, to make sure that, when you get down to that last minute of your time, you’re not just at the point in the article where Brittney Spears is about to decide if she should shave her head or not- and you’d have to stop! The kind people at CRIS always allow me to ad-lib a little and add my own comments, so , hopefully, it’s a little extra fun for those listening. I know this year, my old pal John Records Landecker, currently heard on the True Oldies radio channel, was among the folks scheduled to read there- and, I’m sure John would agree with me that it’s a real privilege to be able to help CRIS Radio provide news and entertainment for their listeners. You can find out more about the Chicago Lighthouse and CRIS Radio at www.thechicagolighthouse.org - if you know somebody who can use their services, you’ll find the information there to hook them up. Maybe next year, they’ll be listening to me reading from People- like I did this time, telling how Martha Stewart went to Russia to watch a wealthy pal blast off into space!(Too bad he couldn’t get her to stow away for the ride…)