Robert Pence

I <i>do not</i> wear a cardigan! :x

Toledo provides an alternate interpretation for the expression, "Where the sun don't shine." :| It's good that they are making some serious attempts at sprucing up; there are some nice heritage buildings. A lot has been lost, though, and much of the more recent construction is, well, typical of its era. I remember going there occasionally in the sixties, when there was some life in downtown. Even then, though, I couldn't say it was exactly pretty.

That comment immediately brought to mind Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury (1953). If you haven't read it, do. You'll find some scary examples of Bradbury's knack for anticipating where society might be headed. For years I watched very little commercial televison, pretty much sticking with PBS. A couple of years ago I unplugged my TV, and it has stayed that way. I've completely lost my tolerance for most of it now, and if I anticipate spending time waiting for something like car service, I take a book with me. If there's no one else in the waiting room I'll turn off the TV (If I can reach it). Otherwise, I'll find someplace else to sit and read. Hospital/clinic waiting rooms are the worst, because the TV is up high on the wall and I can't go someplace else because I won't hear them when they call me. The only salvation is that sometimes they're showing proprietary health-care programming and some if it's actually informative. At work, I was usually clueless about office conversations. Typically they were based on NFL or NASCAR (depending upon the season), or Seinfeld, none of which I get.

A hangover is an expected consequence of sobering up. So ...

The problem isn't with the road; it's perfectly safe at the posted speed limits, 35mph coming out of a residential area and rising to 40mph. Hundreds of drivers pass this way daily, and only a very small number crash. You can't make a road idiot-proof, no matter how much you engineer it. The problem is with the city's position regarding traffic enforcement. They claim that traffic stops are up; but that's because in the areas known for drug dealing, they stop everything that moves in order to check for drugs and probable cause to search cars. I'm not saying that's bad; they make a fair number of drug busts and arrests on outstanding warrants doing that. So far as traffic enforcement in most of the rest of the city, though, it's anarchy. People pretty much do what they want. Speeding and aggressive driving are rampant. I've been given the finger, screamed at and tailgated for driving at the posted limit on a two-lane street. Stop signs and stoplights are suggestions, to be observed at drivers' discretion. This is second-hand, but I was talking with a neighbor about speed limit enforcement. He said he had brought up the subject with a friend of his who's a cop, and his friend said that the judges don't want their courts clogged up with traffic violations. Suppposedly there's an undocumented policy of not ticketing speeders unless they're going at least 16mph over the posted. In a 35, that's 51. The city plans to return on-street parking, gone since the 1950s, to the north side of Washington Boulevard. Traffic engineering emphasizes that that's technically not a traffic-calming device, but I'm hoping it may have some effect other than a lot of parked cars getting hit. I know I won't park there, and I won't recommend it to any visitors.

Beautiful! You're about a week ahead of us with the spring foliage.

Damn! Beautiful shots, beautiful weather.

Nice!

I see/hear one every couple of months on average, I suppose, and there are ones I miss, but I know about them when there's a big, new dent in the guardrail and a new batch of plastic and glass scattered around. The rollover was the third crash in just under a month, though. Might be an entertaining summer. I've been nagging the city about the speeding and weekend drunk drivers for more than twenty years. Two administrations ago I even got face-to-face with the mayor and chief of police to try to get action on the problems. Nothin'. There's signage - big, reflective ones that are hard to miss. and guardrails, but I couldn't get any pictures of traffic enforcement in the area because I've never seen any. <rant> FWPD doesn't have a traffic enforcement division. The previous mayor, Graham Richard, disbanded it to reallocate the resources to "more pressing issues." I don't remember if that was before or after he got a ticket for 45 in a 30. Despite not having enough resources to enforce posted limits on Washington Street in the vicinity of Swinney Park, for most of a summer FWPD had enough resources to put plain-clothes cops in that park to cruise the bushes, with a uniformed cop parked for most of a shift on the cross-street a half-block from that intersection, waiting to take custody and transport any unlucky lad who got caught with his pants down. I don't condone sex in public parks; it gives all gay men a black eye. I still have to question, though whether a closet case whacking it in the bushes is a greater threat to public safety than an impaired idiot driving 50+ in a 35 through residential neighborhood and in the vicinity of the park and greenway. </rant>

Lucky you! Those are nice scenes!

Pretty nice-looking downtown, nice & tidy. If my memory is correct, it's been just over forty years since the Silver Bridge collapsed, probably the greatest tragedy in a lot of residents' memory.

Too Damned Fast? Car Crashes Onto Rivergreenway On Sunday afternoon about 2:30 I heard a car skidding. I looked out the window and saw cars pulling over and a couple of people running toward the greenway where it runs between Thieme Drive and Swinney Park. Here's what I found. I don't know how it happened, but a sober driver in a halfway decent car can negotiate the curve at 50mph on dry pavement. The posted limit is 35mph. This section of the greenway is heavily used in good weather; I walk or bike it frequently. Fortunately no one was in that spot at that time. Speeding is rampant on West Washington Boulevard, and in recent years I've seen very little enforcement. The speed limit coming into the curve is 35mph, and west of the curve it increases to 40mph. By the time drivers pass my house, many are going more than 40 and accelerating.

I've heard one account that says Bluffton, Ohio was founded by people from Bluffton, Indiana. The two downtowns don't have a lot in common, and I think Bluffton, Ohio is smaller than Bluffton, Indiana. That's counter to the traditional migration. Many of the families who settled around Bluffton, Indiana came from Pennsylvania via Ohio. I wonder what prompted some of them to head back eastward. Properly restored, the town hall could be a interesting. It doesn't look like they have much of an eye or taste for authentic restoration though (possibly one thing they share with Bluffton, Indiana). I'm not at all excited about those windows, but I'll withhold judgement until I see the finished product.

Uh-oh. Sounds familiar. Why do you suppose I'm on line at 3 a.m.?

Nice-looking downtown with quite a few handsome buildings. Looks like a lot of vacant storefronts. I caught the similarity to the Marion (IN) courthouse right away, and thought it must have had a dome originally. I believe I read something a while back about Grant County (Marion) planning a courthouse renovation and considering putting the dome back. That style really needs it; it clearly lacks something without.

Exciting stuff!

How 'bout this one in Pittsburgh?

Very impressive. I've only seen downtown Canton, which isn't bad considering the economic hard times. I didn't know about those beauties. Between Taggart's Ice Cream and Heggy's Chocolates, I could probably stay contented for a while.

Norske Nook is something of a legend among people who travel that route. Once you've eaten there, it's nigh on impossible to drive by on future trips without stopping. While we were the Minneapolis Streetcar Museum, the fellow who was showing around asked us if we had eaten there on the way up. When we told him we were headed for Rollag, he said, "Dat's a pretty good time, but don't let dem make you eat none o' dat lutefisk!"

A sampler from a trip through Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota, taken at the end of summer in 1992. If you want to see the whole thing (200+ pics), stop on over at the Road Trip 1992 section of my web site. Illinois Railway Museum, Union, Illinois. Mid-continent Railway Museum, North Freedom, Wisconsin Circus World Museum, Baraboo, Wisconsin. Pelican Rapids, Minnesota and thereabouts. Rollag, Minnesota Pontiac, Illinois Sights along the road

Fabulous structure. It'll be interesting to see how that takes shape, and I hope it succeeds. So many cities have destroyed assets like that.

Golly-gee, Yes! Interesting looking place. Even has some 19th-century wood-frame business buildings downtown; those have gone extinct most places.

Nice. That made me go and check to see if I have any refills left on my Flonase!

Good stuff! I think this nonsense of forbidding photography has gotten completely out of hand. Sometimes it's paranoia run amuck, and sometimes it's just some authoritarian SOB throwing his weight around and telling people "no" because he can. :whip:

From the earliest days of drilling for crude, oil production has been inseparable from narratives of flim-flam! :roll: