Hey Ravinia, Knock it Off!

 

Ravinia Festival is a beautiful wooded park in the northern suburbs of Chicago where individuals and families have, for over 100 years, gone to hear a musical concert while picnicking on the well-manicured lawn. From what I read it seems similar in every way to Wolf Trap Park in Virginia. Ravinia is a breathtaking venue and we used to take the kids there when they were little.

During the summer months Ravinia presents a musical concert just about every evening. Half the time it is a concert of classical music and the other half of the concerts feature other types of popular music, even rock and roll. Here is their concert schedule so you can see the wide variety for yourself.

So varied is Ravinia's programming that one could say they offer something different every day. In fact, they seem to have taken the phrase something different every day to heart because last week I heard a Ravinia radio commercial that used that phrase something different every day. And that's where I start having a problem.

Back in 1982 when Alan Light invited me to regularly draw 'commentoonies' for his weekly Buyer's Guide for Comic Fandom newspaper, I knew I needed a name for the series. Everything has a name, after all. Murray Bishoff had Now What? and Don and Maggie Thompson had Beautiful Balloons and Cat Yronwode had Fit to Print, but what in the world could I call my series in which the content would vary wildly from one installment to the next?

After careful consideration I settled on Something Different Every Time, and you can see that phrase titling the sample below from 1982's TBG #433. (That page's title lettering is of course channeling the helter-skelter nature of the original logo for Shade the Changing Man, about which you can read more from Todd Klein over here.) Admittedly I did not display the SDET title on every installment of my series, but still you'll certainly agree with me that Ravinia is flying a bit too close to the sun with their something different every day tagline. I considered having my lawyer call their lawyer but, alas, I've grown soft in old age. Instead I will just publish this blog article and leave them shaking in their boots and wiping a sweat of relief from their mottled brow that I have chosen not to pursue the matter.