Gapers Block is a Chicago-centric web publication providing information on news and events around town. There are many terms for the slowdown in traffic that occurs when there's an accident on the side of the road. Some people call it rubbernecking, others a lookie-loo. Here in Chicago, we call it a gapers block (or gapers delay). What better name for a site that asks you to slow down and check out all the cool things in the city?

Consider GB an antidote to all those sites infatuated with the coasts. It contains Merge, a collaborative weblog on a wide range of topics updated weekdaily; Slowdown, a calendar highlighting events you may not have heard about; daily columns from our resident Airbags; and Detour, a weekly feature, as well as a daily photo in Rearview, and a question to ponder and discuss in Fuel. In Transmission, you'll learn all about Chicago's music scene, and Drive Thru is all about the food in the city. Book Club is both an actual book club and a blog about Chicago's literary scene.

Our staff of contributors is made up of Chicagoans with diverse backgrounds but two things in common: a deep love of the city and a wish to share it with you.

Editors

Andrew Huff, Editor & Publisher
Andrew works deep into the night at his West Ridge two-flat, writing and editing and playing with the cats. He spends more time online than is healthy; follow along at me3dia.com. Email him at .

Naz Hamid, Creative Director
Naz is easily irritated by inactivity but is a firm believer in simplicity. He takes a mellow approach to things but thinks a great lot about them. His online endeavors congregate here. Email him at .

David Schalliol, Managing Editor
A graduate student in sociology at the University of Chicago, David is involved in far too many non-academic projects for his own good. You can check out some of his diversions at his personal website, metroblossom, and that flickr place. He has South Side pride.

Veronica Bond, Book Club Editor
An Air Force brat, Veronica has lived in Chicago as long as she's lived anywhere else and likes to think of the city as having adopted her instead of the other way around. Her one super power is the amazing ability to read, write, eat, and watch televison at the same time. She reads a lot.

Ramsin Canon, Mechanics Editor
Revenge of the Second City, Bears in Five (2005 & 2006 seasons)
Ramsin Canon works and lives in Chicago. He has worked in and written about local and state politics for the last six years, and currently writes about the big issues at SameSubject.com.

Ken Green, Tailgate Editor
Ken Green is a lifelong Chicagoan, ex-newspaper reporter, editor and sportswriter, a sometimes poet, wannabe playwright and lousy dancer. He was a member of several poetry slam teams, placed third in the Goodman Theater's David Mamet Write-a-like contest, can run a 5K and thinks 2005 is the greatest year in Chicago sports history.

Anne Holub, Transmission Editor
Anne still thinks of herself as a Southerner, even though she moved to Chicago from Montana. During the daylight hours she likes to edit books and pictures, and in her copious amounts of free time she writes poems for no money at all. At night, she enjoys knitting and roving with The Crafty Ladies. Email her at transmission@gapersblock.com.

Alice Maggio, Assistant Editor, Book Club Editor
Ask the Librarian
Alice is a native Chicagoan and a librarian. She reads way too many books, loves opera and early '90s Brit pop with equal passion, and enjoys macrame without irony.

Rose Miller, Slowdown Editor
Rose came to Chicago by way of San Francisco and St. Paul, pursued higher education, and has been here ever since. Dull is how she rolls in her work life, but when not cheerfully steeped in routine she inhabits a colorful world of comic books, crafting, and saying she'll finally update an often-neglected blog.

Robyn Nisi, Drive-Thru Editor
Robyn is from Omaha, home of the best pizza in Chicago. She laments the discontinuation of such foodstuffs as PB Max and OK Cola, and continues to fight for sweet treat justice (using elite street justice).

Merge & Slowdown

 David Schalliol, Editor

Jim Allenspach, MVP — Most Valuable Poster
A former spelling bee champ (Von Steuben Grade School, Peoria, IL), Jim wants you to know that "crepuscular" and "vespertine" are synonyms. He also has a Website.

Vince Jose Cancasci
Vince currently lives in Avondale and works in graphic design. He squeezes watching movies, listening to music and playing with gadgets into every wedge of free time not spent enjoying the company of family and friends.

Jasmine Davila
Jasmine Davila thinks of herself a New Yorker even though she's lived in Chicago for the last 14 years. Read about her internal struggle at flipfront.wordpress.com.

Katie Donbavand
Katie is a recent Boston import and a Scorsese movie buff. By day she's a mild-mannered publishing drone, but her secret identity is a blog-writing fashionista. She loves winning at Texas Hold'em, thrift store hunting, Frank Miller, and Chuck Palahniuk.

Antonio Garcia
Raised in Chicago's Northwest suburbs, Antonio now lives and works in Humboldt Park. He collects vinyl toys, Puma sneakers and rare international grooves from the '60s and '70s. He's a graphic designer by education and b-boy for life. He never gets sick of Chicago's skyline and falls madly in love with the city just about every other week. He hates sports but will whoop your ass at Tetris.

Jill Jaracz
Freelance writer Jill Jaracz lives in Lakeview, where she and her husband enjoy running fitness trails and acquiring books. She also blogs, enjoys beer and reads Oprah's magazine, not necessarily in that order.

Pat Jurgaitis
Pat Jurgaitis grew up in Waukegan, but has been frequenting Chicago ever since his friends could drive. He currently resides in Edgewater with his partner, four cats, two turtles, and their combined dust bunnies. In his spare time he is fine tuning a manifesto for a surrealist art movement/alternate rules of miniature golf known as Taco!Lightbulb!

Dan Kelly
Dan Kelly lives on the northwest side with his wife, son, and three graceless cats. He's written for the Reader and the Baffler and can usually be found gibbering about subjects like architecture, politics, film, comics, and Lisa Loeb on his blog.

Amy Lillard
Amy Lillard is nearing the decade mark of her Chicago life, and will proclaim her love for the city to the point of annoyance. She is an independent medical, feature and creative writer, an occasional blogger, and a masochistic lass who holds out hope for her novel's future, and her future as a novelist.

Lindsay Muscato
Lindsay Muscato is a writer, editor and arts administrator in Chicago whose original work has appeared at the Around the Coyote arts festival and at the 2nd Story storytelling festival. She writes frequently at lindsayliveshere.org.

Deb Oestreicher
Deb Oestreicher is a freelance writer and editor — and sometime project manager — living in Lakeview with her husband, Victor, and a few thousand books. After two years in Chicago, she still can't get over all the great stuff that goes on here. When life calms down a bit, she takes notes at The Blog Is [not] the Territory.

Jenni Prokopy
A transplanted Texan, Jenni adores her adopted hometown of Chicago, surviving winters with the aid of a massive collection of colorful wool socks. When she's not eating sushi in Uptown or riding her bike by the lake or tapping her feet at Schubas, she writes about young women and health at ChronicBabe.com.

Shaz Rasul
Shaz Rasul spends his days between The University of Chicago & the Chicago Public Schools (not unlike a rock and a hard place). He enjoys literature, music, and taking long walks through dense urban landscapes. Shaz is fascinating by all things Chicago and maintains the weblog Present Tensed.

Alissa Strother
Alissa is an enthusiastic Anglophile with an unhealthy addiction to travel, music, books, reality television, comedy podcasts, word puzzles and coffee. Born in Iowa and raised in Florida, she is thrilled to finally live in a city with public transportation, music festivals and seasons.

Sandor Weisz
Sandor Weisz likes to eat, especially food he's made himself. When not in the kitchen, he's usually in the living room playing Scrabble. He once thought about opening his own restaurant; now he dreams of the next triple-triple. In real life Sandor develops web sites.

A/C

(Arts & Culture)

 David Schalliol, Editor

Becky Brett
Becky Brett serves as artistic director for Appetite Theatre, director of special events for the Chicago Improv Festival, and in many other capacities with other arts and culture institutions around town via her event producing company, 10 to Midnight Productions. She also writes for Performink and Insights & Lessons.

Jaime Calder
Jaime Calder was born and raised in the south suburbs. She has been a Featherproof Books intern, a temp, and builder of ramps for skateboarding cats. Jaime presently helps out at MAKE: A Chicago Literary Magazine, and talks a lot about that one time she met Ira Glass.

 Ramsin Canon

Amy Dittmeier
Amy grew up in and around Chicago, but did most of her maturation in her basement watching Humphrey Bogart and Jean Gabin or in her room blasting the Rolling Stones and David Bowie. Graduating with a critical studies in film degree from Columbia College, she continues her passion for film and music through her writing. She currently writes for HEAVEmedia and The Deli, as well as freelancing at other Chicago publications. She's also working on a non-fiction book about zombies in film and comic books, which you can follow here.

Norman Doucet
Norm moved to Chicago three years ago and has become a loyal Northsider and fierce Cubs fan. His affinity for theatre stems from a wonderful high school English teacher and was rekindled by a little theater called The Old Globe in San Diego, California. He spends his work time as a consultant and much of his free time as a sci-fi geek, amateur wine connoisseur, and political aficionado.

Dyan Flores
Dyan likes having a laugh, politics, and Chicago. If you were to Venn diagram these things, much to Dyan's delight, there would be a significant portion of the diagram where those three sets overlap. She also likes tamales, the White Sox and books intended for high schoolers. Dyan has contributed to The Bastion, Time Out Chicago and Consumerist.com.

Carl Giometti
Before moving to the city, Carl grew up in the suburbs and considers himself to be a "Chicagolander." He can often be seen on Wabash Avenue muttering on about how the South Loop is "only a year or two away from being an incredible neighborhood." He spends his free time scrounging for any mundane piece of information about Chicago and excitedly repeats it to his sleeping wife and cats. When he is sick he only eats Taco Bell Mexican Pizzas and he can almost sing several Italian operas, word for word.

Laura Mayer
Laura Mayer is a senior journalism major in the Medill School of Journalism. When she's not thinking about the Internet or watching Planet Earth on DVD, she spends her spare time wandering around Chicago recording sound for tiny audio documentary projects.

 Lindsay Muscato

Laura Pearson
A native of the Great Lake State, Laura Pearson is an editor and writer whose favorite subjects to explore include books, art, music and self-motivated creators of culture. She has contributed news stories to Pitchfork Media, is a former associate editor at Punk Planet magazine, and currently writes about independent media and culture for Is Greater Than. Laura has been a writing tutor at 826 Chicago and now volunteers at Misericordia/Heart of Mercy.

Katherine Raz
Katherine Raz is a freelance writer and the Community Manager for a non-profit arts organization. She's trekked all over Chicago in search of thrift store and estate sale bargains, and writes BackGarage, a blog about stylish apartment living on a garage sale budget. A two fisted-drinker and Chicago resident for over a decade, she lives in Ravenswood with her fiancee, Jem, and loves the Chicago Bears.

Christian Scheuer
Christian, an artist, photographer and builder of things, works for a small gourmet bakery in Evanston, bringing sweet goodies to the masses in various coffee shops in and around Chicago. In his downtime, he makes "stuff for people who like stuff" and keeps a blog about his varied interests in design and things with wheels.

Marla Seidell
Marla Seidell is a professional wanderer, having lived in New York, Washington, D.C. and Amsterdam before returning to her roots (Chicago) in 2004. Foreign flicks, documentary film and experimental theater are just a few of her passions. Read more of her journeys at her blog.

Jamie Smith
Jamie came to the big city from the buckle of the Bible Belt and couldn't be happier in her adopted hometown. When she's not working as a para-paralegal, she's reading, knitting, biking, baking, blogging and adding new hobbies to the list every day. She may eventually come to terms with the fact that her to-do list will never be done, but until then she plans to continue behaving as if there are 36 hours in a day.

Rachel Zanders
Rachel has called the dance studio her second home since the day she could toddle across a room, and she's still at it. A born-and-bred Midwesterner, she is elated to be living among "her" people here in Chicago. She feels lucky to make a living by editing or writing just about anything anyone will let her sic her pen on (OK, anything on which anyone will let her sic her pen).

Book Club

(Literature)

 Alice Maggio & Veronica Bond, Editors

Drive Thru

(Food & Drink)

 Robyn Nisi, Editor

Lori Barrett
Lori Barrett moved to Chicago from Brooklyn last summer. She's a freelance copy editor, writer and the mother of two vegetarian foodies. She fills her days in Chicago by job hunting and grocery shopping, an eye-opener in this town: Her local Brooklyn Met Food can fit into the salsa section at any Dominick's. She's trying to find out which stores have the best free samples, to better distract her little sous-chefs (when she can drag them away from the Food Network). Her goal is to find a way to blend family, writing, fake meat and work into a perfect cocktail — preferably an Absolut martini, straight up with olives.

Christine Blumer
Christine Blumer is the owner of Winediva Enterprises, a wine education company that provides private tastings and classes to corporations, restaurants and anyone else who wants to pay her. (Seriously. Bridal showers, book clubs, speed dating. She's done it all.) Check out her website for info on her public appearances, free newsletter and blog. You can also catch her on WGN radio once a month with The Steve Cochran Show, and occasionally on stage with Appetite Theatre Company. She's a sucker for rose Champagne.

Bobbi Bowers
Bobbi is a culinary guru wannabe whose training includes countless hours of watching Food Network and experimenting with recipes. She believes that there isn't anything that a good meal and a glass (or bottle) of wine can't cure. And while she loves her gig as a copywriter at a well-known Chicago advertising agency, deep down she'd love to give it all up for her shot at culinary stardom.

Chris Brunn
You may find Chris at a farmers' market in Chicago or at a dhaba in India. He has volunteered cooking vegan short orders at Inspiration Café and has worked a stint in the kitchens of Chicago Diner. Chris designed and constructed his oversized chopping block and loves to cook with friends in his Wicker Park apartment. Chris also enjoys finding great vegan eats while visiting restaurants that might not even seem vegetarian-friendly. He takes plenty of photos while bicycling everywhere, from work to grocery shopping and social outings. Chris also serves on the Board of Directors for the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation.

Mandy Burrell Booth
Mandy Burrell is a writer who has lived in Chicago for six years. Her love of eating and cooking was instilled in her by her mother, grandmother and four aunts, whose annual all-day Polish cookie-baking extravaganza can only be described as raucous. Her favorite time of year is market season, when local fresh food is available everywhere but her local supermarket.

Dana Currier
Dana studies French literature, teaches French language, and loves French cheese. Even though she grew up in the suburbs of New York City, she is fiercely loyal to Chicago and to Andersonville in particular, where she has lived for the past three years.

 Jill Jaracz

Yu Kizawa
Yu is a recent (2003) expat from Japan. Though she occasionally misses hot springs (sans bathing suits) and some food items in her native country, she is now fully in love with the wide-ranging mix of edibles in Chicago — something unimaginable in her rather unadventurous, carrot-growing hometown. She thinks she's a pretty good cook, and writes about her daily food adventures in Nibble&Kibble.

Kaitlin Olson
A transplant from St. Paul, Kaitlin has been in Chicago for a year and, admittedly, loves all things food. Eating it, cooking it, talking about it, photographing it or reading about it. She thinks there's nothing better in life than good food, good company and an excellent glass of beer (or wine). Curious by nature, she is always looking for new and cheap places to find music, food and drinks. During the day, Kaitlin is a marketing coordinator for a strategic communications firm in Chicago.

Gemma Petrie
Gemma grew up northwest of the city in Woodstock. She studied philosophy at Reed College in Portland, Oregon where she reveled in the abundance of fresh produce and microbreweries. Upon her return to Chicago in 2004, Gemma created Pro Bono Baker to document her gastronomic interests. She currently lives in Pilsen and works in nonprofit development.

Andie Thomalla
Despite all warnings, Andie is curious about how both laws and sausages are made. She contributes thoughts on these issues at chicagowonk.com and Hungry mag, as well as Gapers Block. By day, she helps bring Shakespeare to the children of the tri-state area.

Leah Williams
After growing up in rural Oklahoma, Leah came to Chicago to study math; she then stayed to study Chicago. She currently spends her days in the Loop, her nights in the Ukrainian Village, and her spare time everywhere. She once flew 45 minutes just to get brunch, and it wasn't even her first brunch of the day. Her love of bacon is exceeded only by her ardor for coffee. She blogs sporadically at Ms. Prolix.

Mechanics

(Politics)

 Ramsin Canon, Editor

Bruno Behrend
Bruno Behrend is a lifelong Illinois resident who grew up in Lake Forest, Illinois, graduated from University of Illinois (1983) with a degree in Finance and from IIT-Kent College of Law (1989). He is the host of the Extreme Wisdom Radio Show, recently heard on WKRS - 1220 AM out of Waukegan. His show features cultural and political discussion ranging across international, national, state and local issues, but with a strong focus on the State of Illinois. He is also the co-author of Illinois Deserves Better - the Ironclad case for an Illinois Constitutional Convention, which laid out the case for a "Yes" vote on the recent referendum.

James Bube
James Bube lives and works in Chicago.

Mike Fourcher
Mike Fourcher is a Democratic political consultant from and based in Chicago. Besides managing a slew of Illinois campaigns, Mike worked on Clinton '96, Gore 2000, took a turn as a Hill staffer and served in the Clinton Administration at the US Department of Energy with then-Secretary Bill Richardson.

Aviva Gibbs
Aviva Gibbs is a public affairs professional at Resolute Consulting, as well as the Executive Director of the Illinois Technology Partnership, a non-profit policy advocacy organization. Prior to these roles, Aviva served as chief of staff to the Hon. John Fritchey (D-Chicago). where she oversaw all legislative and community affairs, and managed interaction with news media, intergovernmental affairs, local organizations and residents. Before working with the Illinois House, Aviva was a fundraising coordinator at the Goodman Theatre(theater being the obvious predecessor to working in politics). An active member of both the arts and political communities, Aviva is also an accomplished vocalist who performs with other local musicians throughout Chicago. She resides on the city's northside, where, in good times and bad, she proudly cheers for her Cubs and Michigan Wolverines.

Ramona Gupta
...helps edit Mechanics.

Levois
Levois is a lifelong Chicago resident and a longtime political junkie. He's a current college student and has been blogging at It's My Mind since 2005. You can also catch some of his postings at not only Illinoize, but also The Sixth Ward.

Jacob Lesniewski
Jacob Lesniewski is a full time graduate student at the University of Chicago, a part time activist and full time observer of the great political theatre of Chicago. He's originally from New York, but now craves Luisa's pizza of Crestwood more than Vincents of Lynbrook. He lives in Hyde Park, which seems to be a problem for alot of people.

Brad Loberg
Brad Loberg is a practicing attorney and writer in Chicago.

Richard Lorenc
Richard Lorenc is the director of outreach for the Illinois Policy Institute, Illinois's free market think tank. A libertarian, Richard has worked previously with the Sam Adams Alliance and Americans for Limited Government. He is a graduate of Emory University, where he continues to play the double bass as a member of the Emory Symphony Orchestra. Richard additionally serves as the director of communications for Lorenc+Yoo Design, an Atlanta-based exhibit and museum design firm.

Charlotte Lynn
Charlotte Lynn lives and works in politics in the greater Chicago area when she's not laying low in a suburb of Cleveland.

Jerry Morrison
Jerry Morrison is the Executive Director of the Service Employees International Union's Illinois State Council, and a founder of and contributor to Progress Illinois.

OneMan
...writes One Man's Thoughts, an Illinois politics weblog.

Bob Quellos
Bob is a native of Cleveland, but has called Chicago his home for the past nine years. He spent a majority of those years studying architecture at UIC, evetually earning a Master's Degree. A local activist when not working in his field of study, he spends his spare time secretly wishing he was an emcee -- but is slowly coming to terms with the fact that he has no mic skills.

Kenzo Shibata
Kenzo Shibata is a public school teacher, educational policy researcher and graduate student at Northwestern. He lives on the North Side, teaches on the South Side, and spends the rest of his time shlepping between the two. He has coached two championship debate teams -- so in other words, arguing with him can be insufferable.

Jeffrey Paul Smith
Jeff, a Chicago native and Harvard law grad, is a veteran activist, organizer, and former Democratic committeeman for the lakefront 9th District. Currently president of a community organization in Evanston, Jeff is known for political independence, passionate progressive advocacy, and tweaking conventional wisdom. He professes to have no life outside of policy wonkdom, but some whisper that he plays a half-decent rockabilly guitar and is involved in a tragic love affair with a certain North Side team.

Daniel Strauss
Daniel is a University of Michigan student majoring in history. All he really does is read, write, and occasionally watch t.v. (online of course). He currently lives in a house with nine beautiful girls who are good friends and great housemates. He has a growing interest in three things: politics, urbanism, and Chicago.

Dan Telfer
Dan Telfer is a technology trainer by day, writer/performer by night. He co-produces and performs in the stand-up comedy showcase Chicago Underground Comedy, and he writes, produces, and performs in several other comedy showcases around town. He currently lives in Evanston with his wife, daughter, and their two cats.

 Andie Thomalla

Prescott Tolk
Prescott Tolk is a stand-up comic and writer living in Chicago. He hosts one of the most popular open mics in Chicago on Sunday evenings at Schubas Theater.

Tailgate

(Sports)

 Ken Green, Editor

Tim Carnahan
Tim Carnahan watched his favorite sports teams lose a lot of important games during his childhood. His backs the underdog. A graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism, Tim has produced radio pieces for Chicago Public Radio and KFAI Fresh Air Radio in Minneapolis. Tim holds a broad view of sports, which means he thinks ping-pong matters.

Steve Gillies
Fire in Five
Steve Gillies watches too much soccer to be completely healthy. He's been a Fire fan since he stood in a torrential downpour while the Fire beat New England 6-0 and he realized watching American soccer games in person was a lot better than watching European football matches on television.

Brian Lauvray
A self-proclaimed "obstinate cad and thief of all things pertinent or humorous to my lifestyle," Brian writes about football for Gapers Block. Additionally, he writes restaurant and bar reviews for the Not For Tourists guidebook series; beyond that he produces and hosts a quasi-weekly and poorly received sports/culture podcast with Tom Katers. Listen here.

Michael Longhini
Michael Longhini was born and raised in the north suburbs of Chicago. After a brief hiatus to attend college at UC - Santa Barbara, he returned to the city after graduation to pursue his career. Despite the struggles of his favorite Chicago sports team over the years, he can't help but love them.

Brian Livingston
Brian Livingston is a graduate of T.F. South High School and currently attends Columbia College, where he majors in sports journalism. Livingston was raised on South Side of Chicago, but has an undying devotion to the Chicago Cubs. He can be found spending his summers at Wrigley Field cheering on his Cubbies. Livingston looks forward to being one of the future baseball writers of America.

Jeremy Piniak
Pucks in Five
Jeremy Piniak grew up watching hockey on all levels and is a lifelong Blackhawks fan who, inexplicably, still has hope that Bill Wirtz will once again provide Chicago with a championship hockey team and broadcast home games on TV, though he still mourns the destruction of Chicago Stadium.

 Shaz Rasul

Marco Scola
Marco Scola is 18 years old and graduating this year from Barrington High School. He's going on to Columbia College Chicago to study broadcast journalism and hopefully become a sports newscaster or a play-by-play announcer. He is absolutely in love with the Chicago Cubs and the Chicago Bears.

Zach Thomas
R. Zach Thomas, a recent transplant to Chicago from Ohio, and graduate student of journalism at Ohio University, spends most of his time working on his thesis and racing bikes for the Half Acre Cycling Team. When he's not sorting data or riding his bike, he likes doing boring things such as eating oatmeal, reading the newspaper, and going to bed early.

Transmission

(Music)

 Anne Holub, Editor

Aharona Ament
Aharona Ament was born in Skokie, but considers herself a Chicago native since the Skokie Swift is so gosh darn quick. She is a contributor to Cul de sac magazine where she writes about music, art and health. Now a Ukrainian Villager, Aharona divides her time between school, working for various non-profit social service agencies, volunteering with the Chicago Independent Radio Project and watching "House" on her computer with her cerebellar hypoplasic cat. You might see her around at shows drinking a fizzy water and singing along.

Jason Behrends
Jason Behrends has lived in the suburbs of Chicago his entire life. He is the creator of the arts & culture blog What to Wear During an Orange Alert. As a natural extend of the blog, Orange Alert Press was born. The first novel, Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine by Chicagoan Ben Tanzer can be found here (link). His interviews have been published by Rural Messenger Press and Tainted Coffee Press, and he is involved with three different on-line literary journals. He has been a music nerd since birth.

Erik Cameron
With the exception of four years in school on the West Coast, Erik has lived in Chicago since sometime during the Reagan adminstration, when he was small. His time is spent largely on music, writing, his dog Bessie, and a motley assortment of virtues and vices. He has too many guitars and not enough groceries.

Alexis Finch
Chicago's lack of topography and tidal action still make Alexis uneasy, though she vows she'll never move back to Boston. Originally an Osteologist. she remains more interested in her friends' bone structure than they find comforting. For pocket change she spends her days photographing bags of potato chips and bottles of shampoo in places like Tokyo, Madrid, and Lexington, KY. She has recently run out of space on her shelves for books and collects more plastic toys, light up barn yard animals and bicycles than is advisable. Music has kept her sane in this city so far, but that might just be the whiskey talking.

Stephanie Griffin
Stephanie grew up in one of those small suburban towns two hours away from the city where the residents still considered themselves Chicagoans. Having now lived in Chicago proper for five years, she feels she is finally gaining some street cred. She is a science fiction and Scrabble enthusiast and embraces all things nerd. Her lifelong goal is to acquire the perfect avocado. You can usually find her reading underneath a tree, sipping vodka and cranberry at a dive bar, or dancing horribly at concert venues around the city.

 Andrew Huff

Troy Hunter
A creative trapped in a techie body, Troy Hunter came to Chicago from Southern Cali for proper schooling. More than 10 years, four worn keyboards, and numerous sheets of Bristol paper later, he's still here. He and his wife reside in Edgewater and coordinate activities at UrbanTherapy.

Kara Luger
Kara is a Chicago transplant who escaped from the Rocky Mountain high that is Colorado, and before that, North Dakota. She currently works as an editor and writer of things both structurally and sonically sound. She enjoys reading obsessively, knitting, live music, and beating the holy hell out of other women (i.e. roller derby).

Raf Miastkowski
Raf Miastkowski is a graduate of Loyola University Chicago and a former intern at The Onion's A.V. Club. He enjoys obsessing over the White Sox, kung-fu movies, artificial intelligence research, Mongolian history, Point Break, and chicken wings.

Dan Morgridge
Dan has wandered the paid and unpaid music worlds of Chicago for some time now, and is currently a DJ and music director at 88.7 WLUW. He can be found wearing ugly hats to good concerts, playing Ultimate all year round, and encouraging an artistic re-appraisal of video games. He is a tireless advocate for socially-conscious hedonism.

Michelle Meywes
Michelle escaped from small-town-Missouri to big-city-Chicago because she wanted to live in a city where she didn't need a car. Little did she know what a nightmare the CTA is. She can usually be found at a concert, on the beach, or under the bar. She also has a blog about -- get this -- music.

Gavin Robinson
Gavin Robinson was originally raised in Baton Rouge, LA where he first learned what really good music sounds like. After moving to Chicago two years ago, he has been pursuing a career as an actor at various theaters around town. When he's not acting, he's writing. His work can be found either at Geek.com or here at Transmission. Currently a resident of Uptown, his heart is still in the South. He's also on Twitter, but isn't everybody these days?

Graham Sanford
Graham Sanford is a writer, editor, former radio DJ, and incessant doodler who live and works in Chicago. His writing has appeared in New Art Examiner, Stop Smiling, and a number of other publications.

Chris Sienko
Chris' earliest musical memory was hearing "Lady Madonna" by the Beatles emanating from his parents' wood-paneled console turntable. He has no idea what happened from that point to the where he is now, writing about the most unusual and difficult "music" to be found in Chicago. Like the witnesses at the scene of the crime always say, he seemed like a regular guy — nobody really saw this coming.

Kirstie Shanley
A photographer covering Chicago shows in the area for the past three years, Kirstie Shanley is just as excited about the music as she is about capturing the live experience. You can check out her portfolio that also includes theater, street, and experimental photography at kirstiecat.com or on flickr.

Lisa White
Lisa is a born and raised Midwestern girl who's had numerous adventures and escapades, all in the name of music. She's spent time working at labels, venues, in publicity, touring, and of course writing about music. You can usually find her at a show jumping around and encouraging others to dance, and if you ask nicely, she'll probably make you a mixtape. You can find her on numerous social internet sites, including Twitter

James Ziegenfus
James Ziegenfus moved to Chicago on a whim and now lives in Ravenswood. He spends entirely too much time digging for records wherever Odessey & Oracle and The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady could be hiding.

Airbags Columnists

 Andrew Huff & Alice Maggio, Editors

Blagg the Axman
Tales of Blagg the Axman
A former mercenary for hire, Blagg is an axman by trade and still carries the banner of King Mandrake, the once and true ruler of the realm. Gapers Block readers are invited to contact Blagg for advice, insight and recommendations at blagg@gapersblock.com.

Cinnamon Cooper
One Good Meal
Cinnamon, being curiously strong and originally celebrated, tries to keep her ego managable by learning trivia bits as she wrestles with wayward electronic graphics by day and tames bolts of fabric and skeins of yarn by night. You can read what she learns at Did You Know? and see what she makes at Poise.

Steve Prokopy
Steve at the Movies
A Windy City resident for more than 20 years, Steve writes about everything but movies at his day job for a trade journal publishing company. Using the alias Capone, he has been the Chicago Editor for Ain't It Cool News since 1998, and has been writing film reviews since he was a wee lad of 14, growing up in Maryland.

Dee Stiffler
Pop Goes the World
As a child, Dee was only allowed to watch one hour of television a day. She usually chose Sesame Street. Today, she overcompensates by knowing far too much about the WB's lineup as well as pop culture in general. She hardly ever updates her blog.

Lori Upchurch
Kids Ride Free
Lori McClernon Upchurch lives on the far Northwest Side in a house that's overflowing with books, kids, pets and too much stuff from the thrift store. She is a proud member of Team Upchurch, a family of multi-talented unschoolers. She can generally be spotted driving around with a bunch of kids, not all of them hers, looking for someplace fun to get out and play.

Peter Zelchenko
The Party Line
Peter has been growing up in Chicago all his life. He's also angrily hacked everything from mainframes to iPods over the decades. Today he hacks pretty much anything that gets in his way. He writes for Chicago-based startup The Point, and has a popular column for the Chicago Journal. He also wrote the critically acclaimed expose, It Happened Four Years Ago: Mayor Daley's Brutal Conquest of Chicago's First Ward.

Contributors

Alan Lake
Alan has been a professional chef for 25 years and has won numerous awards, professional competitions and distinctions. He's mainly consulting now, setting up projects like kitchen design, menu development, hiring and training staff, research, etc. He has also been a professional musician most of his life, coining the term "jazzfood" to describe "solid technique based upon tasteful improvisational skills." Just like the music. Check it out at alanlake.com.

Ted McClelland
Ted McClelland is the author of Horseplayers: Life at the Track, published in 2005 by Chicago Review Press. He spent last summer driving around the Great Lakes — a 9,600-mile trip that took him as far west as Duluth, Minnesota, and as far east as Kingston, Ontario — to research his upcoming book, The Third Coast, which looks at the Lakes as a distinct region of North America, with its own culture and common interests. The Third Coast will be issued by Chicago Review Press in 2007. Gapers Block is pleased to present a series of excerpts from the book over the next several months.

JP Pfafflin
JP was raised in Glendale Heights, and now lives in Roscoe Village. She also moonlights as a designer for MEAT, a set-up that specializes in hand-printed textiles, and has designed gig posters and album art for bands around Chicago. Since you axed, her guitar heroes are Fred Frith, Frank Zappa and John Fahey.

There's quite a bit more that will go in this section — past staffers, a colophon, etc. — but we're rejiggering the pages and decided to leave that off for now. It'll be back soon, I promise.