Recently in Local Stuff Category

Status Quo + Your Highway Dollars = Status Quo

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There's this three-way stop just down the road from my house (Auburn @ Cook, for you locals) where one of the legs immediately transitions to a bridge over I-69. It is a major bottleneck at morning rush hour, with traffic backed up more than a quarter mile in both directions of Auburn Road, as people are trying to get to the junior high and high schools on Cook. It's a moderate bottleneck at afternoon rush hour, with dozens of cars lined up on Cook trying to turn either way onto Auburn.

Before: 2-lane bridge, 3-way stop with one lane in each direction.

Do: Destroy bridge, cutting off easy access to east Fort Wayne for thousands of people and gerhosing the traffic patterns of thousands more. Spend three months rebuilding the bridge higher. As an exclamation point, close the whole intersection for two weeks at the end to rebuild it, essentially making Auburn Road a mile-long cul-de-sac.

After: 2-lane bridge, 3-way stop with one lane in each direction.

Fusion vs. Green Bay Blizzard, 3/31/07

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The FreedomFusion were victorious in their debut, winning 36-28 over the defending-conference-champs-in-name-only Green Bay Blizzard.

Random thoughts:

  • QB Cody Hodges must work through his reads pretty fast - there were at least two times he seemed to surprise the receiver with the ball, like the receiver knew he was the third option and really wasn't expecting it (to their credit, I'm pretty sure all of those were caught).
  • Speaking of Hodges, he seemed pretty well dialed in considering that he's only been with the team since Monday. Imagine what another week of familiarity with his team might do.
  • One of the things you have to watch out for when a longtime star player becomes a coach is whether or not he can actually, you know, coach. 'Touchdown' Eddie Brown looks like he's well on his way, based on how the team looked in their debut (indeed, for most of the players, it was their first af2 game at all). I didn't see much of the confusion that you might expect from an expansion debut.
  • There was also one little bit of what I think was 'coachmanship' - the Fusion had the ball 4th and goal inside the Green Bay 10 with seconds left in the fourth quarter. They sent out the field goal team, but let the clock run out on the quarter. When the quarter break ended, they ran out the offense and caught Green Bay by surprise, making them burn a time out - one that might have proven crucial in the final minutes. Not only that, they got a touchdown on the play!

I should have some pictures up on Flickr tomorrow.

Tags:

Heading out to the Coliseum to watch the FreedomFusion opener. It's against Green Bay, who were the conference champions last year. Normally, that'd be a recipe for a grade-A pimpslapping - defending conference champ against expansion team - but since they have a new coach, and only five players return from that team, maybe the Fusion has a chance.

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Maybe Men's Health Was Right, Part II - drunk and stupid in Fort Wayne:

The Indiana State Police say their post is not a motel, but they will still leave the light on for you.

That hospitality may have been bad news for a Warsaw driver who police say wanted a room at the Fort Wayne post early Wednesday -- especially because police say he was driving a damaged Hummer and was intoxicated at the time.
Well, at least the guy wasn't actually from Fort Wayne. OTOH, maybe Fort Wayne just exudes such stupidity that it corrupts out-of-towners.
Dispatcher Jonathon Jacob, watching from the back door, saw a woman passenger crawl across the Hummer's center console to exit through the driver's-side door. He asked whether they needed assistance. The driver said they were going to the front door to get a room.
To be fair, there was a hotel right next door.

But why he drove past it to get to the cop shop is beyond me.

I had occasion to be down at the county jail not too long ago, where I snapped this little bit of irony with my camera-ish phone-type thingy:

Yes, that's a metermaid truck. Yes, that's the sidewalk.

That Kind Of Advertising We Don't Need

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One of the issues of driving a vehicle with your company's name on it, particularly if you're a small business or one-man operation, is that if you hose somebody over in traffic, the negative association may make them less likely to buy from you.

"Tom Hoot Siding, Windows, and (whatever)," I'm looking at you.

Yeah, there's a website. No, I'm not going to link to it.

Potential Career-Limiting Move Narrowly Averted

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A friend of mine subscribes to email updates on news stories/sports/weather/et cetera from a local TV station. At the end of one of those emails a couple of weeks ago was what I can only call the most charming cut-n-paste-o I've seen in a long time. I've changed identifying details but the rest is verbatim:

Nice article [deleted]! I will say that I have been in the business since Lastname was [a young age], and I have never met a person that has as much class and honesty as Firstname. In this day and age it's difficult to find many people who are as dedicated to honing their craft and getting each story correct like Firstname does. He is also one of the most humble and down to earth people you will ever meet. In other words a gentleman in the true sense of the word!

Hockeypalooza 2006 In The Books

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Yesterday was the last day for lunchtime roller hockey at the Plex, as they're about to put the turf down to make a second soccer field. The usual suspects showed up, and we skated for an extra hour this last time. I played pretty much the same way I always do - a few good plays, a lot more bad ones, but at least I ended the season trying to make a play instead of just watching the play happen somewhere else. If you're going to suck, the least you can do is suck at full throttle.

And as an extra bonus, I gave Chess a nice little souvenir to carry into the offseason.

I miss playing already.

And You Can't Back Up While In One, Either!

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It's the beginning of the fall semester here at IPFW, all the new freshmen are clogging up my campus, and none of them knows how to drive in a roundabout. This should be mandatory reading for any incoming freshman.

One more time, people:

  • You cannot turn left into a roundabout.
  • You cannot turn left into a roundabout!
  • YOU CANNOT TURN LEFT INTO A ROUNDABOUT!

OK, that was three more times. Sorry.

I can't wait until the less motivated half of the freshman class quits.

(title callback here) ... because we seem to have some pretty dumb outlying towns.

Later dusk catches some organizers off guard:

Fireworks organizers and spectators across northeast Indiana are realizing that the daylight-saving time switch is presenting a problem for traditional Fourth of July celebrations.

When asked when their local fireworks shows would occur, most local fireworks coordinators just said “dusk” and confessed to not knowing exactly when it would become dark with the clock change.

OK, guys, I've got your answer. It's pretty complicated, so stay with me here...

IT'S ONE HOUR LATER THAN IT WAS ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR! AND YOU'VE HAD THREE MONTHS TO FIGURE THAT OUT!

Maybe we shouldn't have adopted DST; we don't seem to be coping all that well.

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