Her Paint's All Over Town

Somehow, I don't think when Charlton, channeling Moses, spoke about his cold, dead hands, this was quite likely NOT what he had in mind. Sounds like we're adding broken hearts to bare arms, and quite frankly we haven't had enough nice weather yet this Spring to even contemplate wearing just a light sweater. And it looks like in one instance we actually might have an order for Kevlar.

Not intending to trivialize what happened (okay, maybe just a little) who tries to whack someone with a BB gun or conversely (in case this was a match dot com situation gone awry) how can one person inspire three others but only so far...and no farther?

I do appreciate that this wasn't a mob-style hit in the middle of the night with spent cartridges littering the area, chalk outlines and police tape. Norwich is, after all a small city of about forty thousand and the Chamber of Commerce doesn't really need to have any of the residents trying to take out any of the other residents. Even if it's Girlie Gangsters, and I'm not saying it is.

Judging from the ages of the alleged assailants, possibly one or more of them had a curfew (it was a school night, after all) so the decision to strike at four in the afternoon probably made a lot more sense in the planning stage than in the execution phase. Kind of like launching a rocket to the moon at night because it's easier to see.

And if you're positing the attack suggests there was no plan of any kind, you might well be correct in that assumption. This is definitely one of those newspaper stories that you hope will have updates and follow-ons perhaps even a Bill Kurtis' American Justice special but somehow you know your hopes will be dashed to pieces. He's not into miracles-sees life all too cynical and yet the song remains the same, except for the choruses.
-bill kenny

So It's Not Just Blindness and Hairy Palms?

Talk about putting the fun in funerals and the hot back in hot sex, make a note whenever you're in San Francisco car pool with Scott McKenzie but avoid antagonizing Roger Huang. Between you and me, if you have to pick only one, Roger should win because he may have supernatural powers. I'd ask for a show of hands on that, but that could prove to be downright unhygienic.

Here's what I'm talking about. Yeah-I know what you're thinking, a lot of things can burst in a porn shop peep show, but I think we'd agree very few of them end up in flames. I'm not sure what to make anything called an "Adult Superstore." Perhaps it's a building that can leap over grown-ups in a single bound. Or not. (I was hoping to read a rating or two; that might have been quite the literary adventure. Which is more than I can say for the notion of sharing photos. That could have obviated the whole point of going into the Adult Superstore in the first place.)

According to the report, the object of (perhaps) divine retribution was thoroughly toasted. I'm curious as to what 10% of his body parts are reportedly unburned though I imagine my curiosity has no particular color. (I never knew the film's title was based on the Swedish flag until I read it here; of course, it took me eleventeen hundred hours to get to that part of the story.)

If you're shopping for a get well card, and don't we all want to know what Hallmark has up its corporate sleeve in this case, you can probably use this address to share your wish for a speedy recovery. I'm wondering if we just put "Attention: Richard" on the front, will it get delivered?
-bill kenny

Let the Day Begin

By now you may have heard about the developers from Ohio, or perhaps it's Pennsylvania, who are putting the finishing touches on a project that will place all of Norwich under a geodesic dome. We're talking about enclosing the whole city from Laurel Hill to Plain Hill over to Occum and Greeneville to include the Eastside and across to Thamesville, too. In very short order, we could be the eighth wonder of the world and maybe the ninth, too. Heard all about it from my barber's landscaper's babysitter.

Of course no one in City Hall knows anything about it. They are not alone. In truth, no one knows anything about it as I made up that entire first paragraph from whole cloth (I always wear a ski cap, so even the barber part is a lie) and even though I'm telling you it's a fable, some part of you still wants to believe it's true. And why not, we've talked so often about how we're thisclose to the big development idea that will bring Norwich into the Now that we overlook the small(er) steps we're taking every day to incrementally improve our town.

Could a geodesic dome large enough to cover the city be feasible? I'm not Buckminster Fuller and I didn't stay at a well-known hotel chain last night, but I'd suggest we're not quite as likely any more to get too emotionally invested in believing in the One More Big Wish theory of development. And that's probably just as well.

Maybe you've noticed, and maybe you haven't. We've stopped looking for people to blame when projects start too slowly to gain altitude and soar or never quite take off at all. We've begun to channel the energy we used to waste on Searching for the Guilty back into fixing the original problem (conceding the former has little to do with the latter) and, more importantly, agreeing we cannot simply talk our way into a better and more successful city, there's got to be doing and we're the ones who have got to be doing it.

By voting in support of the Board of Education's initiative to expand and enhance Kelly Middle School while reorganizing the entire public school system and, more recently, to fund downtown improvement efforts, we may have surprised even ourselves with our willingness to improve our reach and our grasp. Money aside, and yes, I realize I'm talking about a lot of our tax money, we've also been willing to turn out and turn up for public meetings across the city with our elected leadership and listen as they explain what they're trying to do and, when it's our turn to talk, to tell them our hopes for a future for our children and ourselves.

It's a good thing that Spring's coming with short sleeve shirts because we'll be needing to roll up our sleeves and lend a hand as our neighborhoods start to reinvent themselves as the hesitancy evaporates from our optimism and confidence and we rub the sleep from our eyes to greet the day. And let the day begin.

-bill kenny

More to Freedom of Choice

This is the sesquicentennial (150th anniversary) of the start of the War between the States better know by the epic misnomer 'The Civil War.' Despite murmurings to the contrary I have NO firsthand knowledge of any of the battles fought during those hostilities but I am a better than average history buff on that era. But today is not the day I'm writing about the war itself but, rather, the political frame of mind in the years leading to the hostilities and how history can we repeat itself and to what extent.

I'm thinking about all of that because in the freeze-dried, drive-by manner in which we live these days, we spend about a minute looking at a headline and maybe the cut line on a photo and move on to the 'next news story' as if involved in a marathon sprint contest. Whoever talks last or loudest tends to carry the day, even if they're talking trash. It seems that was as true in the decade leading up to the Civil War as it is in our current one.

I will point out in the period just before the winds of war swept everything before them a century and a half ago, Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas engaged in a campaign for Senate in Illinois regarded by historians and others as a model of civility and extreme intelligence.

One of my favorite places in the on-line world is here, for information and more on every aspect of an election campaign whose outcome may well have influenced the rush of events that would produce the Civil War (I don't pretend to know how true that statement really is but I take comfort knowing that in less than thirty seconds you will have forgotten you read it).

Fast forward to the hear and now and scan any national political headline and tell me your flesh doesn't crawl with dazed revulsion at the motion and commotion on both sides of every issue. We've gone from "(A) house divided against itself cannot stand" to "(Y)ou think we're stupid?"

I guess I shouldn't be surprised at the level of rhetoric when we've chosen to offer a doorstop with a tan more acclaim and remuneration than a Nobel and Pulitzer Prize recipient. I'm not sure we let this hullabaloo go on like this because we're too tired to stop and think or because we fear if we stop, we may never start again.

Perhaps it's the fatigue of feeding the white noise generator that are the 24/7 news services that's numbed us to our core. With so many tongues wagging there's no effort being made to listen by anyone to anyone else. Somewhere along the line we've added "Nyah, Nyah! Hanny, Nanny, Do-Do" to the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance and it seems to be the only part we can remember.

Often enough in the past, we've gone crazy from the heat two hundred almost two hundred and thirty-five years will do that to you sometimes, but our better angels have always intervened and interceded but this time they are conspicuous in their absence, leading me not so much to wonder as to what will happen next, but to dread it.

-bill kenny

Watching Your Crazy Ways and All the Lazy Days

Today is a big deal in Boston (no Anthony, not just at supper) as it's Patriots' Day (I prefer the possessive plural while admiring how each individual is a singular patriot). Admittedly, the Bruins stole a march on all professional sports teams in The Olde Town, but the main event today is, of course, the Boston Marathon.

Marathons are perfect figures of speech for much of how we live our lives--requiring, as they do, natural ability, endurance, conditioning, strategy and no small amounts of courage and luck in addition to just the right amount of speed. Sort of like our political process, except for all the qualities I just listed (money is the great equalizer for some political parties).

Beyond politics, this is a solemn week as Passover begins today at sundown and yesterday, Palm Sunday, marked the start of Holy Week for Christians. Political life goes on, of course, perhaps tempered by the realization and recognition of a higher power, though too often (I fear) that's not the case and we plunge headless and often headless into the rut of routine without thinking of other, better and higher, callings.

At nine this morning in the Rose City Senior Center it's a meeting of the Senior Affairs Commission, though a check of their meeting minutes on line leaves me at a loss to understand if this is their first 2011 meeting or if the City of Norwich continues to fail to comply with State of Connecticut Public Act 08-3. Hmmm...

Tuesday afternoon at six, it's a regular meeting (but the last meeting minutes posted on line are from February, so maybe not) of the Personnel and Pension Board, all of whose members' appointments, not the members themselves, have expired.

At six-thirty in Council chambers, it's an informational meeting of the City Council (always fun to see how many alderpersons show up, especially this time of year as budget deliberations take a lot of the focus) on the repaving project on Canterbury Turnpike.

At seven, in the Planning Department basement conference room at 23 Union Street, it's a regular meeting of the Commission on the City Plan, whose agenda you'll find here.

And at seven thirty , it's a regular meeting of the City Council (albeit on a Tuesday because of the start of Passover on Monday) with a refreshingly short agenda that could prove to be the tip of the iceberg in terms of the length and, perhaps, intensity of this meeting. Something about tonight's sole topic makes me think again of Tom Sawyer's once in a lifetime opportunity to paint and how eagerly so many of us reach, first for our wallets and then for our paintbrushes. (Sometimes, we reach for other people's wallets; confusion abounds.)

At 8:30 Wednesday morning in their offices in the Norwich Business Park it's a regular meeting of the Southeastern Connecticut Council of Governments, whose April meeting agenda on-line link is broken as is the one for the meeting agenda of their Executive Committee.

At nine, in their usual meeting place, the community room of The Dime Bank on Route 82, it's a regular meeting of Norwich School Readiness Council (Children First) about whom much is published and little is updated (in my opinion).

Thursday afternoon at five in Room 319 of City Hall, it's a regular meeting of the Historic District Commission, whose meeting agenda and March meeting minutes are here.

Saturday afternoon, from noon to four in honor of Earth Day (and you forgot to send a card, didn't you?) it's a Repurposed Sculpture Exhibit at the Leffingwell House Museum. This has a little bit to do with picking up the leftovers of winter from around your neighborhood and bringing it to the museum to make into works of art (beauty and the eye, etc) and a lot to do with having some either hysterical or historical fun. You can get more information by calling 860.889.9440 or visiting their Facebook page. I don't know where you can get less information.

This has nothing to do with anything listed above, except that it's a beautiful thought wrapped in a delightful melody, magically executed. Everyone should have someone who inspires them to feel this way; I hope you, too, have someone like this. See you at something in the course of this week here on the Big Blue Marble, unless your luck is really good.

-bill kenny

The Kool-Aid Wino and the Car Wash on the Corner

This should have been posted at one minute after midnight today, Saturday, April 16th, 2011. Today fishing season opens in The Nutmeg State. Coming back from an appointment with my orthopedic surgeon yesterday I watched the State of Connecticut trucks with their bred-fish hanging the left onto the 2-32 expressway that cuts across Norwich, Bozrah, Lebanon and other points yonder as it heads towards Colchester, Manchester and Hartford. The fish can travel light because they won't be staying in the lakes and streams that long.

We may not have a lot of money here in the Land of Steady Habits (even on a good day-the rest of the week, we're busted but we try hard to NOT think about it) but if you drive past any body of water today across the state, you'll realize we have a surfeit of anglers who are extremely serious about fishing. We should be so serious about everything else (but perhaps we're better off not).

Our Dad was a serious fisherman. I hated when he took us to the Shore for fishing, not because I hated going there or the fishing, but because of the bait. He'd buy a cardboard package of semi-frozen little fish, killies. The containers always reminded me of those Chinese take-out boxes, which might be why I don't eat Chinese food, except it's actually the food I don't like, not the boxes.

I was never good at baiting a hook and got really lousy really fast when the ice the killies were packed in would start to start melt and they began wriggling and you realized they were alive. The 'no fun' light would start burning brightly at that point and I would often watch my bait work itself free of the hook an eye blink after being placed in the water and say nothing for ten minutes or so since I didn't want to have go through the entire drill all over again.

Of course, I never caught a fish. How stupid do you think a fish would have to be for me to catch it with a naked hook? Not even close. I can remember Dad catching fish but have no recollection of what became of them. My Mom doesn't strike me, now or in my memory of then, as being the wife of a fisherman type. Don't get me wrong, she liked all kinds of seafood, as did my father. I'm a fish sticks guy at best and like to think that somewhere on an ocean floor right now a parade in my honor in gratitude for my dietary choices is going on. Look for bubbles that sound like cheering.

I'm thinking about JetMec and I hope he gets his boat out today to someplace teeming with trout because he enjoys fishing and is very good at it. He has offered to take me fishing though I think we both know how that would work out (good for the fish, not so much for those in the boat) and I'm thinking at this stage in my life, why disturb the natural order.

I'm also thinking about two somebodies whose today started a lot earlier than mine, JetMec's and yours, and whose efforts (and those of tens of thousands of others in uniform) help make possible all of our tomorrows to include idle thoughts about fishing. I shared one of my favorite books, Richard Brautigan's Trout Fishing in America, with one of them as a midway present (books are excellent presents, much better than fish; not as good as pony rides, at least for birthdays) because the assignment to Afghanistan lasts for six months.

I suggested saving it for dessert after reading the other books I shared as it is an excellent decompression book possibly best decanted right around you become a single digit midget because after returning, and a rousing chorus of Anchors Aweigh, the next chapter in life will begin and Brautigan is a tonic for a restless soul and a fearless heart. Petri Heil!

"Father forgive us, for what we must do. You forgive us and we'll forgive you. We'll forgive each other 'til we both turn blue and then we'll whistle and go fishing in heaven."

-bill kenny

Six Weeks Can Be a Long Time

I never need to use GPS where I live because I never get lost. Everybody tells me where to go. And yet, here I am today almost lost in explaining what has happened to get us to this point. You're right, I should start at the beginning....when all there was was darkness and a void, though perhaps that's farther back than necessary.

I've mentioned I have slacker on my smartphone, or as it likes to phrase it, I am the 'bi-pedal attachment that comes with the device holster.' I enjoy slacker a great deal and use it every morning as I listen to a variety of music, known and unknown (to me) as I get my power-walk on in the morning hours in the gym not far from where I work (and, yes, I do walk to the gym rather than drive just in case God is really keeping track of all the hypocrites).

Yesterday, I was listening to a station built around the music of Elliot Smith, of whom I am inordinately fond. I don't think you can listen to songs like Waltz #2 or Baby Britain or--don't get me started on his catalog-often enough. It's a cliche to say 'left too soon' but he did.

Anyway, a song I hadn't heard before really hooked me, "Wouldn't Mama Be Proud?" But in the course of looking for that song, I got the title wrong which makes finding it a LOT harder (remember when you'd ask dad how to spell a word and he'd tell you to 'look it up in the dictionary', seemingly unaware of the irony of his own suggestion? And then when you grew up you went 'waitaminit!') but that's still NOT the whole story.

The song the search bot found had nothing to do with Elliot Smith and has already slipped my mind. But on the right hand side of the page, ready to leap into the center of the screen with the click of a mouse, were other titles of songs that also had nothing to do with Elliot Smith.

Which brings us thisclose to the end for today, Pilgrim, right after you make doubly sure before clicking on the last link that no children under the age of (I don't know) thirty (?) are anywhere near a speaker. Consider that your warning (which means I don't want to get any snotty notes, okay?). I haven't decided which would be worse-that they've never heard any of the words in the song, or that they have.

If it were the latter, you might want to call Parents Magazine and see if they're interested in doing a story. Or they might just tell you to keep it under your hat, or words to that effect.

-bill kenny