BY JIM KNIPPENBERG
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Well dang, you gotta hand it to Mark Reiman. He's not going to let something like Lou Gehrig's disease (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) get him down. Not when he has a song to sing.
To wit: Reiman, diagnosed with ALS seven years ago, will sing the national anthem today at the 1:15 p.m. Reds game.
So why's it a big deal?
Cinergy is Reiman's 20th major league park this year. He has confirmed dates in nine others, and a promise from one more but no date yet. Meaning he'll be the first person to sing the anthem in every ball park in one season.
That, says ALS Association spokeswoman Rexy Legaspi, is something the Guinness Book of Records promises to get into its next edition. Reiman, a Seattle resident who calls this his Season for Hope tour, is trying to focus attention on ALS, a debilitating neurological disease that causes degeneration of nerve cells, leading to paralysis of all muscles. Most people die two to 10 years after diagnosis, says the Mayo Clinic Family Health Book.
Meaning the tour's a strain for Reiman, but it's more important to spread the word. The other important thing, he says, is "to focus on living with ALS, not dying from it."
BIG BOY LUNCH: A bunch of people in Greenville, S.C., are lunching on Big Boys Monday, and never mind that there's no Frisch's for hundreds of miles.
Seems ex-Cincinnatian Bob Highley, owner of Greenville's Southern Marking Systems, was cleaning his desk (never a wise move, that) and found an old Frisch's menu.
"I had to have a Big Boy," he says. "I've been gone from Cincinnati 20 years and haven't visited since the early '90s. That was my last Big Boy. I need one NOW.
"I grew up with those things at the Newport Frisch's, after dances and football games."
He got in touch with Frisch's exec Karen Maier, who worked out logistics with Delta Dash. Come Monday, 25 Big Boys hit the road for a one-hour flight. By lunch time, Highley and employees will be dining Cincinnati style.
Meanwhile, Highley's unearthed a Dixie Chili menu. "That's my next project," he says.
LADIES WHO LUNCH: Look who's coming to town for dinner: Lady Chablis, the sassy, over the top drag queen so prominent in John Berendt's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. She'll also sell some shirts.
True, says Jim Taylor of the Imperial Sovereign Queen City Court of the Buckeye Empire, which is organizing the dinner and T-shirt auction to benefit AIDS Volunteers of Cincinnati and American Foundation for AIDS Research.
Chablis, known as the Grand Empress of Savannah, will be here Aug. 1 for the dinner ($100 a person, open to the public) at a private residence in East Walnut Hills. About the house: We've been there for the owner's annual Christmas party; it's a spectacular place. Anyway, Chablis will do a meet 'n' greet at the dinner and, we're certain, be totally outrageous.
The next day (Aug. 2 for the calendar-impaired) she'll help with ISQCCBE's celebrity T-shirt auction. So far they have T-shirts autographed by Lauren Bacall, Liz Taylor, Bette Midler, John Travolta and Madonna. The shirts will be auctioned 4 p.m. at the Celestial, $25 (free for folks who attend the Chablis dinner).
Info: 421-2437 or 421-0582.
Psst! appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Have an item to report? Call Jim Knippenberg at 768-8513; fax: 768-8330.
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