Who's badass?

We're badass.

The great state of Illinois that is.

It's been a kind of an odd start to the year for the Land of Lincoln.

First it started on a high note as we watched the senator from Illinois, Barack Obama get sworn in as the first african-american president of the United States.

We were feeling pretty good about ourselves. It was cold, but nobody cared, we were just soaking it all in, enjoying Aretha Franklin's hat (I became a fan of it on facebook) and feeling proud that we produced yet another note-worthy president.

I'm going to throw this picture in, just because when I was googling things for this post I found this and thought it was such a stunning photograph.



So it's January and we're feeling good about our state and then the whole Blago-gate goes down.

Who would have thought that little muppet face would betray us? You know something? We went to the same grammar school and he went to the same high school as my sisters. Andie even met him when he was campaigning for Governor. Jeez it's almost like we're family. How could you Roddy, how could you?

Then there's Roland Burris.

'Nuff said. Although I will give him this...he's spunky.

But we have reason to hold our heads high again and remember how awesome we are as a state. And that reason is the Mt. Rushmore of Sports.

I was sitting around after a long day of editing my news package (it'll air next week, check it out MetroMinutes.TV), getting caught in the rain and being in class. I was eating my hot pocket and reading the Sun-Times starting at the back cover where the sports' section is (but mostly because if I go backwards through the nespaper I can get to the Ziggy cartoon, I so enjoy, and the Funnies section the fastest). I'm going to admit it...I read the newspaper soley for the funnies. ;P

Well as I looked for Ziggy I stumbled across this article about this competition ESPN was having to decide which state had the best possible Mt. Rushmore of sports. Apparently no one could deny that Illinois had it, so we won.

The four famous athletes chosen for the hypothetical monument were, Michael Jordan (I wanna be, wanna be like Mike), Walter Payton (ironically my high school which was named after him had a shitty football team), Ernie Banks (I don't really have a witty aside for him) and the great Mike Ditka (who would win, a hurricane or Mike Ditka? Ditka. What if the hurricane was named Ditka?)

You can check out video for yourself about why (as if we need an explanation) these four were chosen. Linky-linkerson

Just another reminder, no matter how corrupt our politics, it's always a good day to be an Illinois-ian. ;D So take that Forbes, tell me I'm unhappy because I live in Chicago. >:P