A mouse on the loose

The Fox Valley attracts visitors from all over the country. One recent visitor -- so small we missed her while she was here -- was Paige the Library Mouse at the Denton Public Library in Denton, Texas.

We learned about Paige's visit from the Texas library's new blog, dentonlibrary.wordpress.com.

She wrote, "Occasionally they let me out of the library and I get to see the world! For my very first trip I went to see ... Chicago!!! Well, OK, I only saw Chicago from the plane, but I did visit its suburbs."

Among those stops in the suburbs? The BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Bartlett.

Pictures on the blog show the fluffy, white stuffed mouse buckled into a seat on an airplane, gazing wistfully at a slice of deep-dish pizza and posing in front of the Hindu temple.

Paige had hopped along on her first trip outside the library on a trip with Denton Public Library librarian Rebecca Ivey to visit her grandparents in Des Plaines. The Hindu temple was something she had not yet seen, but the rest of her family had, Ivey said.

Bringing along the library mouse was something new as well. The library just had discussed wanting a mascot before Ivey's trip, she said.

"My grandparents got a huge kick out of it," Ivey said. "They were like, 'Bring the mouse! The mouse wants to go!'  "

And the mouse wants to go again.

Paige's blog entry continues: "Overall it was a very fun trip. I can't wait for my next adventure."

Ivey said other Denton Public Library librarians already have plans to bring Paige along on trips to Minnesota and Arkansas.

Just in time for Halloween, The Clearwater Theater in West Dundee takes a decidedly horrific turn when The Misfits perform there on Thursday, Oct. 22, followed by Deicide on Friday, Oct. 23.

Deicide is one of the first "death metal" acts, a scene that began in the late 1980s in -- of all places -- sunny Tampa, Fla. Deicide vocalist Glen Benton is one of those guys who sings like an angry version of the Cookie Monster. With Satanic-tinged releases including "Till Death Do Us Part," "Scars of the Crucifix" and "The Stench of Redemption," the band has met with some controversy.

Meanwhile, the horror-punk-metal Misfits have been around in one form or another since 1977. The band's fan group is called the Fiend Club. The Misfits' career retrospective coffin box set recently was certified as its first gold release, as it has sold more than a half-million copies. And it even covers the Halloween classic, "The Monster Mash."

Last week, Jeff Cao, proprietor of the New Hunan Restaurant in Carpentersville's Meadowdale Shopping Center, was giving out mooncakes to some of his favorite customers. The round, golden mooncakes come in ornately decorated tin boxes and are made from lotus seed paste. Cao said they are a traditional dessert served in China during the Mid-Autumn Festival, one of the country's biggest feasts, which is marked by the appearance of the harvest moon. And if you caught the moon at all Sunday, you saw it was full and beaming brightly. When the movie "A Serious Man" opens this weekend, one of the rabbis in it will be played by actor George Wyner. Seen most often on TV and screen in roles as a lawyer (he played the assistant D.A. in "Hill Street Blues" and Roy Cohn in the TV movie "Tail Gunner Joe"), he's the son-in-law of Elgin's Frank Jacobs. "A Serious Man" was written and directed by the Coen Brothers, who also did "Fargo" and "No Country for Old Men." On Thursday, longtime Elgin resident and Plato Township historian John Russell Ghrist will be honored for his years of promoting big band music during a dance program at the Willowbrook Ballroom in Willow Springs. After a half hour of dance lessons starting at 6:30, the Weiss Brothers Orchestra, Steve Cooper Orchestra and Jay Witcher Orchestra will play for an hour each. Admission is free. "Do it just for a free night to enjoy an evening of big band music," Ghrist says.

Ghrist will receive honorary membership in the Chicago Musicians Union. The radio host will become only the fourth person to receive this honor, the others being TV newsmen Joel Daly and Harry Porterfield and author Charles Sengstock. The award honors Ghrist's "Midwest Ballroom" radio show, which began 12 years ago on School District U46's WEPS in Elgin and later moved to WDCB in Glen Ellyn. The show combines music played by local big bands plus records from the masters of that now rarely heard genre of music. It can be heard 5 to 7 p.m. Saturdays on 90.9 FM, or at www.wdcb.org.

Oct. 5 was declared Colonial Cafe and Ice Cream Day in St. Charles by Mayor Don DeWitte. That day marked exactly 50 years since Colonial Cafes transitioned from snack shops with counter service into the full-blown sitdown restaurants we see today. But as DeWitte's proclamation notes, the St. Charles-based chain actually has been "known for scoopin' fun since 1901." It was founded as a dairy by Simon Anderson that year, and is now owned by a fourth generation of the Anderson family.