St. Charles East mascot keeps crowds entertained
Quite a few kids have worked really hard playing the role of their schools' mascots over the years. So, I'm not singling out one as a slight to others.
But I really liked watching the St. Charles East mascot, known as "King Charles," in action a couple of weeks ago. The large king's head casts a look of the Burger King mascot, while the costume looks as if it could come right out of a Harry Potter movie.
Does it appear to represent the Saints? Well, maybe not at first glance. But the name fits, and the crown does have the Saints' fleur de lis symbol on it.
No one will know who plays King Charles until a year-end school assembly, said Lisa Dandre, assistant principal for student life at East.
"The students apply for the role of mascot, and one of the things on the application is they have to agree not to tell anyone they are the mascot," Dandre said.
I haven't been to enough St. Charles East games to say this mascot has any sort of great routine that can't be missed, but on this particular night it was a mascot for the ages.
A river gem
Great things aren't created overnight. They take time.
The same holds true about bad things. They become bad over a lengthy period of inaction.
Those generalizations come to mind as St. Charles officials show the courage to consider a grandiose plan to make the Fox River a far more important downtown centerpiece than it is now.
A lot has to take place before St. Charles can fully embrace plans for the riverwalk and river activities. But officials at least want to keep moving forward with the due diligence needed to make proper decisions about how this could happen and when.
The First Street redevelopment is a good example of something that looked great on paper five years ago, but continues to take time for it to reach its full potential because of a jittery economy. But it got started and has time to grow.
A few decades from now, residents here may look back on these times with great fondness, saying someone or a group of someones surely had a good idea to make St. Charles a place that simply wows visitors and residents alike.
Loves that holiday
There's a reason that Acosta Consignment in Batavia has been full of cool Halloween stuff spread out through the furniture rooms for several weeks.
Owners Christine and Ces Acosta and their family's love of Halloween is well documented. They have decorated their St. Charles home beyond belief each year for the annual Halloween House Decorating contest.
Quick exit
It didn't take the Subway in the strip mall along Randall Road near Fargo Boulevard long to close its doors.
Subway must have seen the sandwich writing on the wall, vacating its spot shortly after the McAlister's Deli sign went up for the new deli coming into that strip.
Maybe Subway had exit plans in place prior to McAlister's entrance, but it makes sense that two places essentially offering a similar type of lunch might have trouble coexisting. Work continues inside McAlister's, so for the time being there are no sandwiches available in that retail spot.
Fine music reunion
As expected, the rock and blues music flowing out of Kiss the Sky in Batavia last weekend brought out a lot of people who fondly remember some young Batavia musicians in the 1960s playing at area high schools and community events.
Guitarist Jim Freedlund orchestrated the reunion of this band, known then as Gross National Product, with some traveling from Connecticut and Arizona to perform. It was especially fun for those who followed harmonica and saxophone player "EZ" Dave Haines during his many years as frontman for DeLuxury.
Haines, who cut his teeth with Freedlund and his friends before his great run with DeLuxury, sounded as if he had never missed a beat. He and the rest of this 11-piece band were in fine form.
It was like a high school reunion of sorts in the crowd, with many people who graduated from Batavia High School in those late 1960s getting together to take in the sounds they grew up with.
dheun@sbcglobal.net