Chicago Tribune

Chicago real estate mogul Sam Zell has become the favored suitor for Tribune Co. - owner of 11 daily newspapers, 23 television stations and the Chicago Cubs - with a $33-a-share bid that offers a clear premium for a company that has been buffeted by new media challengers, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. Investment bankers are working feverishly to try to strike a deal, but so many details remain to be resolved that the company might not be able to meet its self-imposed deadline to conclude deliberations by the end of the month, the person familiar with the negotiations said.

He's about 5-foot-5 and has a bald dome and a beard like an Amish farmer. He revels in the nickname he gave himself years ago: "the Grave Dancer." At 65, Chicagoan Samuel Zell is still apt to arrive at a cocktail party by motorcycle and walk in wearing blue jeans and a Chicago Bears jersey. He thinks like an economist but can talk like a dockworker. He has vacation homes on the beach in Malibu, Calif., and on the slopes in Sun Valley, Idaho, where people say he skis like a maniac. He's also a paintball fanatic who Forbes says is worth $4.5 billion.

Champagne is not made from the champagne grape. That honor belongs to chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier. The diminutive champagne grape found in stores is actually the black corinth, also known as zante, according to The New Food Lover's Companion. The grape is believed to hail from Greece. Its more glam nickname is generally attributed to smart marketing and, possibly, a nod to its pea-sized bubbly shape. The grapes are deeply colored violet, lavishly clustered and very sweet and juicy, with a nice crisp snap on the finish.

Chicago real estate magnate Sam Zell is proposing to participate in a buyout of Tribune Co. in a deal structured around an employee stock ownership plan, several sources close to the situation said Friday. The deal is one of several options being considered by the special committee of independent directors charged with overseeing Tribune's months-long effort to sell or restructure the company. It would create a privately held, highly leveraged company that would be able to take advantage of federal tax breaks associated with employee stock ownership plans, or ESOPs, to provide "a bigger payoff" to existing shareholders than the other restructuring options being studied by the Tribune board, one of the sources said.

Who would have thought a mock graduation speech published in a newspaper column almost two years ago would turn into one of the most requested songs on alternative radio stations?"

The Chicago Tribune said in an editorial Monday:IT'S TOO soon to know how the government's historic antitrust suit against Microsoft Corp. will play out, but those who treasure memorable -- and deliciously wrong -- predictions already have won."This antitrust thing will blow over," Microsoft founder and chairman Bill Gates allegedly told executives from Intel Co. in July 1995, according to notes introduced at trial by the government.L Maybe he meant "blow over" like Hurricane Mitch in Honduras.

An excerpt of a Chicago Tribune editorial that was published yesterdayAn excerpt of a Chicago Tribune editorial that was published yesterday: MATTHEW Shepard, a 105-pound, 5-foot 2-inch, soft-spoken wisp of a kid, couldn't have been much of a threat to anyone. Yet he had been assaulted twice in recent months and last week he was pistol-whipped, strung up spread-eagle against a fence on the outskirts of Laramie, Wyo. He died five days later.It's an inconceivable crime that yet cries out for an explanation.

CHICAGO -- From bar stools to bus stops, this city wept yesterday.Columnist Mike Royko was dead and the coffee over the morning paper would never taste the same again.The local news coverage of his death Tuesday from an aneurysm at age 64 befitted a president or mayor -- the more important office in this ferociously parochial city.Local television stations fanned out in "team coverage" to report from Royko's favorite watering holes and from the offices of the Chicago Tribune.Talk radio was filled with mournful callers.

By filling out computerized forms and paying a few hundred dollars, Massoud Chaharbakhsh built an empire of big-city newspapers.Now, the Rockville man is being pursued by lawyers for a half-dozen media companies who say he is ruining prestigious names by using variations of their trademarks on his World Wide Web sites.The owners of the Chicago Tribune and Tampa Tribune are suing Chaharbakhsh in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt in a case that Internet experts say is among the first in the country to pit newspaper trademarks against so-called computer domain names.

If there is one painful emotion that is shared by most of mankind, it is fear of the unknown.A thumping at the door late at night when visitors are not expected. The squeaking of a floorboard when no one is about. Walking down a dark, deserted street or into a room filled with strangers.It is why people look under beds before retiring. Or cover their eyes during a frightening movie. And why agoraphobics won't leave their homes: They are terrified by what's out there, even though they don't know what it is.Shrinks have written enough books and papers about the subject to fill a library, while making a tidy profit listening to the frettings of the fearful.

FDIC expected to require banks to prepay insurance fund fees WASHINGTON - The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. may take the unprecedented step of ordering banks to prepay about $36 billion in premiums to shore up the shrinking deposit insurance fund. The FDIC board likely will call for "prepaid" bank insurance premiums at its meeting Tuesday, three industry executives and a government official said. The banking industry prefers that option over a special emergency fee - which would be the second this year.

Children in rainy areas may develop disorder autism Children in California, Oregon and Washington are more likely to develop autism if they lived in counties with higher levels of annual rainfall when they were 3 or younger, suggesting that something about wet weather may trigger the disorder, according to a study released last week. Among possible explanations: Bad weather could lead to more TV and video viewing, which in very young children have been linked to language-development problems.

CHICAGO - United Airlines' stock fell more than 75 percent yesteday morning after a nearly 6-year-old Chicago Tribune news report was distributed via a market information site operated by Bloomberg L.P. The stock, which had closed Friday at $12.30 a share, hit a low of $3 a share before the confusion was cleared up. The stock closed at $10.92, down $1.38 for the day. After being alerted to the issue yesterday morning, the Chicago Tribune removed the...

ORLANDO, FLA. -- Waterslides, wave pools, meandering rivers and cooling fountains -- and dolphins? Dolphins and other creatures are the newest twist on Central Florida water parks, found at Aquatica, which opened in March. PATISSERIE PARIS Little Bookroom / $16.95 This charming book profiles almost 100 of the best patisseries, chocolate shops, tea salons, ice cream parlors and other sweet spots in Paris. Author Jamie Cahill also includes the best picnic spots and offers several lovely sidebars, such as a profile of a chocolate buyer for a fashionable gourmet store, a behind-the-scenes look at the daily goings-on in a patisserie kitchen and the history of three crucial items in the French kitchen: the Madeleine (a shell-shaped tea cake that originated in the 18th century)

CHICAGO -- Research tells us that people are happier and more productive when they have good friends at work, but the fact is, most of us don't. Fewer than one in three U.S. employees has a close friend at work, someone in whom they confide, reports a University of Michigan study. Americans also are less likely to extend professional ties outside work than their counterparts in other cultures, even though they feel energized when they do, the study found. "If socializing with co-workers is energizing, why don't we do it more often?"

The Baltimore Sun Media Group, which publishes The Sun, said yesterday that it will start a free daily tabloid and Web site targeting young adults. The newspaper, b, and Web site, bthesite.com, will launch April 14, focusing on news, sports and pop culture geared to readers in the roughly 18- to 34-year-old range, with a heavy dose of entertainment and nightlife coverage. It also will publish reader-generated content and material from other publications, including RedEye, a young adult-oriented tabloid published by the Chicago Tribune.

MORGANTOWN, W.VA. -- Despite a $50 million renovation, a fifth star has once again eluded the Greenbrier. Mobil Travel Guide released its annual ratings of the world's finest properties Jan. 28 but gave West Virginia's historic resort only four stars for 2008. 1001 BUILDINGS YOU MUST SEE BEFORE YOU DIE Universe / $36.95 At first blush, it seems an insurmountable task. How can one possibly choose the 1,001 buildings one must see before departing from this Earth? In the introduction, the general editor, Mark Irving, explains the selection process as "a mixture of rational consensus, personal whim and, in some cases, individual obsession."

For a trip to Barcelona, Jorge Cuadros, a lawyer from Alexandria, Va., turned to the Internet to book a rental car. On hertz.com, Cuadros was quoted a price of 626.12 euros for an automatic Mercedes for five days in October. At $1.42 to the euro, that amounted to about $890. SAN FRANCISCO ENCOUNTER Lonely Planet / $11.99 Lonely Planet's Encounter series consists of compact pocket guides for city visitors on a tight sightseeing schedule. Each is designed to enable the traveler to "discover twice the city in half the time."

CHICAGO -- Pointing to "an inexcusable time lag," Illinois Sen. Richard J. Durbin, a Democrat, has asked the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission to explain why the agency took more than two years and the deaths of three infants before it recalled 1 million cribs for design and hardware flaws. In the wake of reports in the Chicago Tribune that the agency failed to fully investigate the death of a 9-month-old boy in California in 2005, Durbin sent a letter on Tuesday to Nancy Nord, acting head of the agency, demanding a detailed timeline of events going back to 2003 when the commission received the first complaint about a drop rail problem in a crib manufactured by Simplicity Inc. Last Friday, Simplicity and the CPSC announced the recall of 12 models of cribs sold by the company under its name as well as the Graco brand name from 1998 until May 2007.

Champagne is not made from the champagne grape. That honor belongs to chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier. The diminutive champagne grape found in stores is actually the black corinth, also known as zante, according to The New Food Lover's Companion. The grape is believed to hail from Greece. Its more glam nickname is generally attributed to smart marketing and, possibly, a nod to its pea-sized bubbly shape. The grapes are deeply colored violet, lavishly clustered and very sweet and juicy, with a nice crisp snap on the finish.