Monday Bear’s Den Open Thread, January 16, 2017

Welcome to your Offseason Monday Morning Open Thread.

I’d like to do something a bit different today (we’ve done it before but it’s been a while)... let’s do a Windy City Gridiron Selphie Day.

I’d like everybody here to stop for a minute and tell us just a bit about yourself. No personally identifiable information necessary, just things like your age (or generation group if you prefer), what part of the world you live in (i.e. Chicago area, downstate Illinois, NW Indiana, SE Wisconsin, Adak Alaska, wheverever), and a little about what you “do”. I’ll go first, and I’ll be pretty specific (since you can google and find me anyway), you don’t need to be quite as specific (or specific at all)... just put whatever you feel like sharing.

I am early 50’s in age, I became a Bears fan because of Butkus and Sayers, I was a military brat and from the age of 5 ¹⁄₂ I was raised on various pacific islands, mostly Japan with significant stops in Hawai’i, Okinawa and many other places. I went to HS in West Central Illinois, college in Northeast Missouri where I met and married my wife of 30+ years. Majored in journalism, minored in criminal justice. I have worked as a full-time photographer for a daily newspaper in Illinois, was the Editor of a couple of different small town weekly newspapers in Northeast Missouri, and after I realized just how bad journalism paid I switched over into the IT field, which is my day job for the last 20 or so years. I still do journalism “on the side”, I am a sports cameraman for KHQA TV 7 in Quincy Illinois and occasionally KTVO TV 3 in Kirksville, MO on a shared basis (they are sister stations), I remain a contributing editor with The Edina Sentinel and NEMONews.net for whom I do a weekly podcast, and I also do this gig daily. In my copious spare time, I am a photographer specializing in shooting models portfolios, nature and sports. I am an avid FILM photographer, and I also teach yearly photography classes.

Now you know about me (please do not feel you need to share that much detail about yourself, my life is a bit of an open book, yours doesn’t have to be).

On to the regularly scheduled programing:

Since beat reporters don’t work over the weekend & during the offseason there are very few weekend stories, until further notice (i.e. Free Agency gets here) we are going to just post Open Thread Dens on Mondays. Links Dens will appear Tuesday-Friday. Saturdays will remain Weekend Open Thread Dens and may or may not contain links, depending on the news cycle.

The seat belt light is off, feel free to get up and wander around the cabin! As always, open thread responsibly!!!!

Bear Down!!!!

THE RULES

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