"Peter, you're giving me a migraine!"
May. 5th, 2010 03:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogFor all the bashing this city takes, from the weather (we just ended one of our shortest and nicest winters ever, tyvm), through the crumbling economy, all the way to our championship-starved sports teams, there are dozens of blessings hidden just below the surface, if only you stop to look for them.
We have General Mills facilities here- not the huge ones from the days of Erie Canal and Great Lakes shipping greatness, but enough that on Cocoa Puff manufacturing days, the whole downtown smells of chocolate.
Virtually everyone is smart, funny and friendly beyond your expectations.
Yet even knowing all this, my mind is still in for the occasional local blowing, as it was just now when I headed up Elmwood from an otherwise useless journey downtown (two court hearings, both called off after I got down there; one courthouse stop, papers not ready) and saw this sight after making the left onto Allen Street, the spiritual center of the old funky city neighborhood called Allentown. I have to blow it up full-size for the point to be made, so here,
That's not snow coming down to the right of the green light, kids. Those are soap bubbles. Some wacky Allentowner got out a bigass bubble wand and just started letting em rip across traffic, for the whole five minutes or so I spent paused to set up, take the picture, and resume my journey.
----
By coincidence, the other notable feature in that picture is on that Hidden Treasure list, as well. The Towne is one of the oldest and most legendary of the late-night/all-night diner-style places that have kept this city's still 4 a.m. Last Call from being too much of a bummer or hangover. It's not the food (tending to the Greece/Grease point of origin) or the location (too far from the burbs to be convenient and yet far from the further-in downtown concentrations of clubs, pubs and sporting events), but just the perfect ambience for this City of No Illusions.
Eleanor will recognize the quote in the header of this piece. When we still lived in Rochester, we came in here for some sort of event and wound up at the Towne, where our waitress spent much of the meal in loud, yet wonderful, repartee with the short-order cook responsible for her orders. When yet one more of them (I don't think even one of ours) came out wrong, or cold, or whatever, she yelled back to the kitchen, "Peter, you're giving me a migraine!" Close to 20 years later, that phrase still endures in our lexicon as capturing a moment of frustration turned into just plain fun.
We have General Mills facilities here- not the huge ones from the days of Erie Canal and Great Lakes shipping greatness, but enough that on Cocoa Puff manufacturing days, the whole downtown smells of chocolate.
Virtually everyone is smart, funny and friendly beyond your expectations.
Yet even knowing all this, my mind is still in for the occasional local blowing, as it was just now when I headed up Elmwood from an otherwise useless journey downtown (two court hearings, both called off after I got down there; one courthouse stop, papers not ready) and saw this sight after making the left onto Allen Street, the spiritual center of the old funky city neighborhood called Allentown. I have to blow it up full-size for the point to be made, so here,
That's not snow coming down to the right of the green light, kids. Those are soap bubbles. Some wacky Allentowner got out a bigass bubble wand and just started letting em rip across traffic, for the whole five minutes or so I spent paused to set up, take the picture, and resume my journey.
----
By coincidence, the other notable feature in that picture is on that Hidden Treasure list, as well. The Towne is one of the oldest and most legendary of the late-night/all-night diner-style places that have kept this city's still 4 a.m. Last Call from being too much of a bummer or hangover. It's not the food (tending to the Greece/Grease point of origin) or the location (too far from the burbs to be convenient and yet far from the further-in downtown concentrations of clubs, pubs and sporting events), but just the perfect ambience for this City of No Illusions.
Eleanor will recognize the quote in the header of this piece. When we still lived in Rochester, we came in here for some sort of event and wound up at the Towne, where our waitress spent much of the meal in loud, yet wonderful, repartee with the short-order cook responsible for her orders. When yet one more of them (I don't think even one of ours) came out wrong, or cold, or whatever, she yelled back to the kitchen, "Peter, you're giving me a migraine!" Close to 20 years later, that phrase still endures in our lexicon as capturing a moment of frustration turned into just plain fun.
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no subject
Date: 2010-05-05 08:18 pm (UTC)Someone has a bubble wand most days on Queens St here. :) We also have a Living Statue, but what else would you expect in Cardiff? ;)
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Date: 2010-05-06 01:59 am (UTC)When he was a child, his mother was driving him and a friend to the store to buy underwear (and other things, I'm sure). She got distracted and passed it by mistake. From the backseat came "Mom, you overshot the underwear!" Which, throughout our marriage, was shouted out at any and all faux-pas.
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Date: 2010-05-06 01:32 pm (UTC)One of us (probably me): "What the hell's that noise?"
The other: "It's just the plow guys."
Probably me: "The BUG EYES?!?"
Many years and several snowplow contractors later, they are still nearly always referred to now as that. Just not to their eyes.
no subject
Date: 2010-05-06 04:36 pm (UTC)http://archives.buffalorising.com/story/chuck_the_bubble_guy
http://www.wivb.com/dpp/news/local/Meet_the_man_behind_the_bubbles_20091110