Author Archives: Susan DeGrane

Michael Haynes is built like Adonis, with white-blond hair and skin the color of alabaster. Wearing a tight white T-shirt and standing stock-still beneath the two-story columns of the Civic Opera building, the 29-year-old resembled a marble statue in faded black jeans. On November 9, clusters of men of similar conformation stood nearby, all awaiting […]

Anatomy of a Bust By Susan DeGrane The bricks of cocaine formed a solid wall, 20 feet long, 4 feet high. Weighing more than a ton, the wall had an estimated street value of $143 million. Once the cocaine was cut, police say, it could have wound up as ten million bags of crack. The […]

Aliens Among Us By Susan DeGrane I met Pat two years ago. The disagreement she was having with another woman–over whether or not aliens desired contact with women who’d had hysterectomies–immediately caught my attention. Pat seemed annoyed when the other woman insisted extraterrestrials only wanted women for their wombs, and the conversation soon dissolved. But […]

TV Guidance By Susan DeGrane The eerie glow of a television flickers across the faces of two young women, a man with shoulder-length hair, and a clown wearing a bright yellow wig and a big red nose. Except for being a bit bunched up on the couch, the four seem to be enjoying a normal […]

On a chilly December day at 26th and California, traffic bustles near the civil courts building and the enormous 20-building complex of Cook County Jail, which houses 10,000 inmates. Pedestrians brace themselves against the wind and cold, pulling on hats and opening umbrellas. The gray sky is spitting rain and large fluffy snowflakes. But in […]

Lake Michigan’s new 25-perch limit is a sympton of an ecodisaster in the making.

Fisherman fight ballast-borne aliens.

My Night at the Biker Slam