Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • Page 5-4

123456 4 CHICAGO TEMPO A contemporary version of the Bowl is Chicago Magazine writer Jeff Bowl taking off, smartly, from the current comparative lack of personality. up at my blog, address below, and the Chicago mag Web site. take seems confirmed on the sports gossip blog Dead- spin, which loves nothing more than to find and post photos of proathletes imbibing with women who their wives. Bears 2005 quarterback Kyle Orton became an underground star this way, posing with his good friend Jack But Deadspin apparently has nothing on current model Rex Grossman beyond the insinuation that such pictures are on the Web. The one I could find, undated, seems to show Grossman, bearded, toting a bottle of Captain Instant poll: Which shows worse taste, the facial hair or the brand of booze? Deadspin even offer much worthwhile on beleaguered defensive lineman Tank Johnson.

But still I like the site because its authors seem to believe in the Bears, unlike virtually every other national expert out there. Bears fan blogs, if your taste runs that way, include Mega Bears and Da Bears Blog. Finally, there is Big Media. The ESPN site is a well-run behemoth, sort of the aircraft carrier of Internet destinations. One glitch: As of this writing, when you click on the banner says, In fairness, some of my checks still say thattoo.

But troll around a bit, and in an hour or two, have some outside perspective on the Bears, and be able to sound informed when you call in to sports radio. And then the very own ChicagoSport- s.com,which I recommend over the competition not only because it does not include one word written by human weather vane Jay Mariotti. Beyond collecting the wisdom of Tribune staffers and adding a lot of Web extras, packed with some of the liveliest fan chatter and most thorough Bears coverage seen. And what the Indianapolis Star is offering (indystar.com) is also thorough and nicely packaged. A dutiful Bears fan probably should have a look at what saying down in place.

notice, perhaps, that at the end and I even mentioned any sites that might help you score tickets to the game. because a firm believer in the proposition that the NFL is best enjoyed the way Roone Arledge and possibly higher powers intended, on the tube. Go Bears. Internet critic Steve Johnson blogs at chicagotribune.com/john son. Breakfast The of it is overwhelming.

YouTube also has at least two versions of the Bears fight song up, and in a duel between the robust professional version done by Lyric Bryan Griffin and the hallway version done by 7-year-old Daniel Spencer, going to have to go with Daniel. Sorry, Griff. Super Bowl site, topped by a countdown-to-game clock, which seems the perfect thing for obsessive fans to look at, oh, 9 or 10 times a day. Expect this one to get richer and richer as the game draws near. Already the video quiz, telling you which Super Bowl bandwagon you should jump on, is amusing.

But when you move out of the NFL preserve that things get more free-wheeling and interesting. Over at YouTube, for instance, note that the 1985 Bowl is back in heavy rotation. You can find it with the search function and be tossed back to an earlier, more innocent time, a time when Jim McMahon could describe himself as the and people who had never seen the Sex Pistols believed it. From the modern perspective, the whole team looks less like menacing football players, more like a group preparing to audition as extras for Beyond that, from Sen. Barack mildly embarrassing Night introduction to a hopeful preseason photo montage, the site has more than enough to let you sidestep a whole day of the meet-the-press buildup be taking place in Miami, site of the Feb.

4 game. INTERNET: Hunting for Bears on the Web CONTINUEDFROMPAGE1 San Jose Mercury News photo frey. In addition to the Lyric, also leaving positions as a voice teacher at North Park University, a soloist in Lake Street Church choirand as co-director with his wife of the handbell choir there, among other jobs. had to give up three covers and one role while gone, so the Lyric was kind of left scrambling when they got the notice that I was going to he said, sitting in the nondescript canteen, passing the half hour or so before he and the rest of the chorus had to return to the stage. Live music from the opera continuing onstage played over loudspeakers in the background; another singer in a jewel-colored ballgown wandered into the room and stood staring into a vending machine.

been pretty he saidof the Lyric in general, and it was clear on this afternoon, from the hugging and doting he got from his fellow singers and the backstage staff a lot of whom he had known for 15 years that he was leaving two families behind. have been going through those steps of denial some of them started off angry, some of them were sadder than I Watkins saidof his had given him a big going-away party just a few nights earlier. can just see it in their eyes some people leaned a little bit toward really wish you have to do And he almost When he joined the naval reserves, he was 35, and barely slipped under the age had to get in while I he says. (He enlisted through NPS the Non Prior Service program which not allbranches of the armed forces have, he said, and which offered boot camp tailored to people who have jobs.) And his wife on board right away. was probably the greatest sales pitch of my he says.

she knew how badly I wanted to do it, and it seem that dangerous at the time. And it was Navy, so people figure, be on a Watkins be on a ship, though. be deployed as part of the Fleet Marine Force which means a sailor with infantry training and will serve, boots on the ground, with U.S. Marines. also an RPS a religious program specialist; during his tour be the secretary and bodyguard to a military chaplain, although Watkins meetthe chaplain assigned to until he gets to Iraq.

Enlisting felt natural carry a weapon per the Geneva Convention. a non-combatant. So, if he comes under fire, my responsibility to protect said Watkins, carry an M-16 and drive a Humvee as the escort. did some research on him. 5 feet 8 inches, 140 if I need to throw him around somewhere, I feel pretty Obviously, something of a rarity to see an opera singer going to war (Lyric officials say they recall sending a singer, although a few stagehands had tours in Vietnam, and a freelance actor and naval reserve lieutenant who appeared in the recent production of and was deployed during Operation Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom).

But to Watkins, enlisting felt natural. think from an early age it set itself in my mind, because I had a grandfather inWorld War II, and uncles in the Army and the AirForce during Vietnam. My dad was in he said. And the rigors of training for the two disciplines are not as wildly different as you might expect. music rehearsal takes quite a bit of he said, not to mention the drills and the physical discipline standing in one place for 30 minutes at a stretch.

I was doing one of the wise men, up on a ramp, and the ramp is tilted down and just got these slippers on. His military training so far has consisted mostly of drilling one weekend a month at Naval Station Great Lakes, but also hasincluded training in Okinawa once a yearin two-week stints on the USSKennedy and on the USSReagan, and Fleet Marine Force training at Camp Lejeune. Which, Watkins admitted, seem like a lot. The natural questionthat people tend to avoid, and that he bring up, is: Is he afraid? said Watkins, who suddenly looked much younger, like a kid almost, despite the costume. get some more training when I get back down to Camp As far as his singing career goes, his job will be waiting for him when gets back, said the General Director William Mason, hire a full- time replacement for him next season.

be delighted to have him come back an excellent Mason said. wish him In fact, only worry in that regard is long will it take to get the sand out of my lungs and get my voice back in shape when I get he said. And, he pointed out: take it with a grain of salt when they tell you coming home at a certain On with the show Suddenly, he stood up. my he said, over the music, then began making his way back toward the stage, through the back halls, where a double- wide elevator door opened and unloaded a gaggle of ballgowned women in big hair and men in waistcoats and tails. the best all the a pair of women said, then hugged Watkins.

They all milled around together in the shadows of the tremendous set, waiting to go on, holding champagne glasses, and looking like a backstage painting by Degas. Onstage, Watkins smiled, sang the finalpaean to champagne and knocked back a glass of the stuff, looking from the stage-left wing as handsome and optimistic as ever want a person to be. The curtain came down, the applause stoppedand the huge cast came rushing back offstage, business as usual. Watkins paused a minute to have some photos taken, kidded around with the stagehands, who struck the set so fast you had to run to get out of the way, then stopped by the wig work- shopto have hishairpiece removed, revealing his military buzz a wonderful whispered Anelle Eorio, a member of wig crew, beaming at Watkins. Getting ready to depart Back in the dressing room, which looked a bit like a barracks, with pinups of Britney, acard table scattered with midgame poker hands, and metal lockers (as well as Hollywood- style vanity lights and makeup mirrors) Watkins looked slightly dazed, but he talked a bit more about trying to get ready for his departure: the seemingly small things, like getting an absentee ballot and packing his seabag with the right uniforms, and the larger things, like trying to explain to his son where be for the next year.

pulled any punches as far as telling him what the danger can be, old enough for said. Watkins had removed his costume for the penultimate time this year (he would sing in the Friday night performance before leaving for Camp Lejeune the following Monday). On his bare chest, just to the right of his heart, hung a set of dogtags. wear one around our neck, and one in our boot these days. Right on the left, inside the he said, standing in his skivvies in front of his cleaned out locker, next to his newly vacated dressing table.

Then he dressed himself in jeans, Army boots, an olive drab T-shirt, and a deep-blue military-issue bomber jacket, clothes almost, but not quite, suited for his next role. Tribune photo by Abel Uribe Ronald Watkins is a baritone with the Lyric Opera and a petty officer 2nd class in the U.S. Naval Reserve. headed for Iraq. WATKINS: From opera stage to the battlefield CONTINUEDFROMPAGE1 Lyric was kind of left scrambling when they got the notice that I was going to Ronald Watkins this is your big show.

Progressive parents be driven too exuberant chops of the attractive young skaters leaven the kitsch. The smiles seem sincere. The spectacle is quite flatware from fire-breathing dragon, castle, Day-Glo underwater scenes and the like. And you could make the case that this whole princess thing actually has pro-feminist benefits. They called that movie This show stars Jasmine.

Seems like a step in the right direction. Busy skating and waving, of course, the princesses talk only on tape. And they rattle many cages. But I think I caught Mulan best to be but in life, and shrewdly noting that world is full of Whoa! Life lessons are everywhere. For information on "Disney on Ice: Princess to www.disneyonice.com or call 312559-1212.

DISNEY: Dragon, flatware add to the show CONTINUEDFROMPAGE1.