Meeting number three of the Gun Rights and Responsibilities Group on March 28 went much more smoothly, I'm happy to report. For most of the session, the members who emphasize firearm rights presented their side of the issue while those of us who emphasize responsibilities respectfully listened.

If you were going to predict the arc of Jason Narvy's theatrical career, you probably wouldn't guess that it would go from Los Angeles, playing a character named Skull Skullovitch on the kids' action series Power Rangers, to assistant professor in the theater program at Concordia University in River Forest, Illinois. But that is precisely what happened.

Oak Parkers are a conflicted bunch. On the one hand, we take pride in being anti-establishment — progressive, innovative, cutting edge. But we also have mortgages, kids, careers, so we've developed a strong establishment streak as well.

The Gun Rights vs. Regulation Group — for want of a better name — met for the second time on March 7 at Dole Library, and participants got into a heated discussion. Not about guns but about organizational issues. So far, we're challenged on that front. Not surprising, I suppose. We're amateurs, trying to find our way.

Francis. Francisco. Frank. Oh my. What have we here? Someone different. Do we dare get our hopes up? For a long time, I thought I couldn't respect any pope unless the Curia was actively planning his demise. Then Cardinal Bergoglio of Argentina, the new elected pontiff, announced he was taking the name Francis, and my heart momentarily leapt.

After either 111 years or 130 years of continuous Oak Park presence – depending on how you trace the paper's lineage, we thought it was worth looking back at the paper's proud history in the village.

Just finished the longest book I've ever read. Doris Kearns Goodwin's Team of Rivals inspired the recent film, Lincoln, which should have won the Best Picture Oscar.

It must be a left-brain, right-brain thing," says Roger Finnell, by way of explaining the long-running connection between the Fenwick Math Department and the Blackfriars Guild (the school's theater department).

At 7:30 p.m. this Sunday at the Arts Center of Oak Park, 200 N. Oak Park Ave. (in the auditorium upstairs from the Hemingway Museum), the Oak Park Area Lesbian and Gay Association (OPALGA) will present 8, a staged reading of the play by Oscar-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black (Milk), based on the transcripts of Perry v. Schwarzenegger, challenging California's Proposition 8, which rescinded the legality of same-sex marriage in that state.

It's not easy landing a major talent like Audra McDonald. Just ask Leslie Rodriguez, managing director of the Dominican Performing Arts Center. Every year, Rodriguez sits down with Dominican University President Donna Carroll to put together a "wish list" of possible performers for the annual early-March Trustee Benefit Concert and Gala, which traditionally features A-list performers from the world of music.