Blue Eyes

The four-story mural of Frank Sinatra at Broad and Wharton streets in South Philadelphia is scheduled to be dedicated Nov. 13 at 2 p.m. So far, $63,500 has been contributed to pay mural artist Diane Keller.

Blue Eyes, the Rat Pack-style supper club in Sewell, Washington Township, has updated its lunch menu and added a patio bar. Executive chef Ian Palagye, who was trained at the Culinary Institute of America and noted Philadelphia and South Jersey restaurants, felt the four-year-old steak house needed a bit more variety. About three weeks ago, he added coconut shrimp with pork-fried rice; pan-seared veal diablo; fiesta salad with a made-to-order shell and Cajun dressing, and shrimp salad in a grilled pita.

Ah, but you suspected it was more than a mere pinched nerve, didn't you? Frank Sinatra's daughter Nancy has confirmed that the 80-year-old singer has indeed been fighting pneumonia in Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, but adds that her dad is now feeling better. Nancy made her comments to Daily Variety after visiting her father at the hospital late Monday. When Sinatra was admitted to Cedars-Sinai on Friday, both his flack and the hospital's denied he was suffering from anything but the pinched nerve - and they offered no explanation when his stay was extended beyond the weekend.

Seven-year-old Tom has blue eyes, strawberry blond hair and a toy guitar. It seems as much a part of him as his freckles. And he plays it and happily sings along whenever the musical mood hits him. His interests include swimming in a pool, riding a bike in the driveway, drawing, coloring and playing board games. He also enjoys climbing on the monkey bars, sledding, singing in the church choir, helping make snowmen, building with Legos, and planting daffodils and corn. Tom receives therapy to help him deal with feelings of loss and the effects of abuse and neglect, and to prepare him for adoption.

They'll listen. And at last, another local radio station is listening. Later this month, Sid Mark's "Sundays with Sinatra" and "Fridays with Frank" programs will be returning to the Philadelphia airwaves, via WPHT (1210 AM). They were dropped Nov. 6 when WWDB-FM changed formats, leaving listeners bereft. Urging that some other station pick up the popular programs, we invited readers to write, saying "I'll listen. " This is a partial list of responses (hundreds are still pouring in)

From the living rooms of South Philadelphia to the sidewalks outside a Los Angeles hospital suite, the prayers of long-smitten bobby-soxers are with Ol' Blue Eyes today. Francis Albert Sinatra is gravely ill, according to some reports from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. At least one report said that he was being treated for heart failure and pneumonia and that his hospital room resembled an intensive-care unit. While his family remained silent about the saloon singer's condition, thousands of fans around the world prayed for his recovery.

Mikey Pies was thinking of Frank yesterday, singing "The Lady is a Tramp" as he flung the dough for a large pepperoni pizza high into the air at Marra's Restaurant. The self-proclaimed best pie-man in South Philly dedicated his latest creation to Ol' Blue Eyes. Former chorus girl Diane was thinking of Frank, too, as she nursed a vodka at Kathleen's Cafe and remembered her conversations in Atlantic City with the skinny crooner who sang as smooth as the Johnny Walker Black he liked to drink all those years ago. And Millie Amicone had Frank very much on the brain as she and her family ate a birthday cake she bought for the singer, a tradition she started when Sinatra celebrated his 25th birthday 55 years ago. In South Philly yesterday, Frank Sinatra's 80th birthday qualified as a local holiday as Italian Americans honored a working-class paisano who saw what he wanted in life and grabbed it. "It's pretty much the conversation down here," said Vince Litrenta, manager of Marra's and Mikey Pies' boss.

A crime is committed by a gang that apparently believes in ethnic diversity. Police issue descriptions of the suspects: a white, a black, and a Hispanic. A what? In most cases, a victim who gets a halfway decent look at the assailant can tell whether he (or she) was white or black. But what does a Hispanic look like? There is no universal Hispanic "look. " This is something not well understood in this country, where both Hispanics and non-Hispanics make easy assumptions about the way Hispanics are supposed to appear.

The trial in 1879 of the Blue-Eyed Six, accused of cold-blooded murder, was the O.J. Simpson trial of its time. It became the most talked-about event in Lebanon County since the area was settled in the 1720s. People flocked from hundreds of miles around into the county courtroom, where the conspirators were being tried. The big-city newspapers in New York, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh sent correspondents. It was one of the New York correspondents who noted the strange coincidence - that all six of the defendants had extraordinarily piercing blue eyes.

Fairy tales can come true, Ol' Blue Eyes used to sing. Yesterday it happened to one of his old pallies - Sid Mark. The silver-haired, silky-voiced host of the legendary long-running radio show, "Fridays with Frank" and "Sundays with Sinatra" - bounced unceremoniously from the airwaves of WWDB last month in a format overhaul - is making a comeback. Mark, 67, was hired yesterday by local talk-radio station WPHT (1210-AM) to do three shows every weekend beginning Dec. 29. And he says the best is yet to come.

It's only Kyleigh Cheyenne Stich's first Christmas, but whatever gifts the years to come place under her tree, it's unlikely any will come close to 2011. Eleven-month-old Kyleigh, of Levittown, got the best present a little girl could hope for: Her dad. Staff Sgt. Jeffrey Stich Jr. was one of 15 National Guard airmen flown home Tuesday in time for the holidays. Members of the 108th Security Forces Squadron stationed in Iraq since July, the airmen were reunited with their families at the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in two separate arrivals.

On Tuesday afternoon, I refreshed the Twitter stream on my iPhone. I scrolled through the usual flurry of tweets: updates on the Eagles' battle at center, Cole Hamels' move to the DL, Evan Turner's announcement he was "getting his lift on. " And then a few words whirled past, the combination of which separated them from the usual chatter. I pressed my finger to the screen, freezing the chosen message. "An awful diagnosis for anyone - this will wear on Pat Summitt's players as well.

The FBI is seeking help in finding a fugitive radical who allegedly blinded a police officer with acid during an antiapartheid protest in New York 30 years ago. The FBI is making the appeal here because Donna Joan Borup has family ties to Philadelphia and Horsham. Kelly Langmesser, a spokeswoman for the FBI office in New York, says a new agent has taken over the case and is hoping that Borup has dropped her guard after three decades on the run. According to the FBI, Borup was charged with throwing acid into the face of Port Authority Police Officer Evan Goodstein during a antiapartheid protest at JFK Airport on Sept.

Blame the blue eyes Texas outfielder Josh Hamilton , last season's American League MVP, has an explanation for batting .122 during the day and .374 at night this season. His blue eyes. "I ask guys all the time," Hamilton told ESPN-FM 103.3 in Dallas. "Guys with blue eyes, brown eyes, whatever . . . and guys with blue eyes have a tough time. " Hamilton also has an opinion about the Rangers' leading the AL West: "Amazing. " Texas, which went to the World Series last year, has six fewer wins than it had at the same point in 2010 and as many interleague losses even though it has played just half its schedule against National League teams.

INDIANAPOLIS - Sam Schmidt's blue eyes never stop moving. They dart from one side to the other: checking out what's going on over in that corner of the garage, keeping a lookout for those who might not see him coming, and always - always - searching for the next opportunity. His body may be motionless below the shoulders. But there's so much going on behind those eyes. "I don't have time to get depressed. I don't have time to think about what I can't do," said Schmidt, parked in one of the few quiet spots in the bustling paddock at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

More nightclub show than theater, My Way: A Musical Tribute to Frank Sinatra is two hours of pure entertainment. There are no big thoughts to think, no complex plot to follow. Just a slew of great songs, sung by four talented performers, accompanied by two terrific musicians, with a bar in the lobby and a vaguely loungey atmosphere in the audience seating. What's not to enjoy? When asked what the key to his success was, Ol' Blue Eyes replied, "Sing good songs. " Sinatra recorded 1,300 - most of them better than good.

As he tells it, Bradley Cooper in 1999 is just another awestruck theater student in the audience of James Lipton's interview show Inside the Actors Studio . Then the hunk with the laser-blue eyes seizes the chance to ask a question of Robert De Niro, his idol, his lodestar, the guy who inspired him to be an actor. De Niro tells him it's a good one. It exceeds Cooper's wildest dreams. Considering what happens next, those dreams are pretty tame. In Limitless , opening Friday, Cooper, the heartthrob from the Philly burbs best known for The Hangover , not only holds his own opposite De Niro, but also in two scenes his character wipes the carpet with his idol's.

Police are asking for the public's help in locating an 83-year-old man with dementia who has been missing since Wednesday morning in the Tacony section of the city. David Fleming was last seen in the 6300 block of Gillespie Street around 11 a.m., police said. He is described as 5-foot-11, 180 pounds, with blue eyes and gray hair. He was wearing a black T-shirt with animals on it, jeans shorts, black socks, and white sneakers. Anybody with information is being asked to contact Northeast Detectives at 215-686-3153 or -3154.

Police want the public's help in locating an 83-year-old man with dementia who went missing Wednesday morning in the Tacony section of Northeast Philadelphia. David Fleming was last seen in the 6300 block of Gillespie Street around 11 a.m., police said. He is described 5-feet 11-inches, 180 pounds, with blue eyes and gray hair. He was wearing a black T-shirt with animals on it, jean shorts, black socks, and white sneakers. Anybody with information on Fleming's whereabouts is urged to contact Northeast Detectives at 215-686-3153 or 3154.