New this season! "Survivor: Norwich"

As discomfiting as one of the letters in today's Norwich Bulletin is, yet another ad hominem attack on the former City Manager (turned candidate for City Council), I think a positive may be that more than a few are upset waves have been made and boats have been rocked, all of which could change the configuration of our pond. I'm unclear as to why this change would be so frightening (then again, I know how to swim).

Relentless optimist that I am, I hope this Norwich City Council election is about expanding the opportunities for all to participate in municipal decision-making as valuable and valued members of the community. Six days until the election and well-meaning people (who should know better) insist on defining a small town council election as 'us vs them'; as if Marc Bunnell were producing "Survivor: Norwich". I'm not convinced being voted off 'the island' is such a bad thing, but then as I'm often told, I'm "not from here". But, I am here, now.

Norwich voters should make this election about who we are and who we are to become. This election will help define what our city is and what we wish it to be.
For city council candidates (and all of us), win or lose, the sun will come up next Wednesday-but it will shine brighter if we all do what we know we must when we vote Tuesday.
-bill kenny

Two all beef patties, special sauce......

You'll see it in newspapers today and it'll be all over the 24 hour TV news outlets. A recent survey of indeterminate origin indicated that while 35% of Americans surveyed can name ALL the ingredients of a Big Mac, only 14% can name all Ten Commandments. Almost 30%, however did know that 'not covet thy neighbor's wife' is a Commandment, so it's NOT all bleak as long as no one wonders why so many MORE would know that commandment, I guess.

I'm wondering, based on the survey, if established churches will set up drive-throughs and take-out windows. Would you like fries with that Act of Contrition? Supersize those Hail Marys?
Amen on a sesame seed bun with Hallelujah Honey Barbecue Sauce.

-bill kenny

PS: At last night's Norwich City Council meeting, the decision was made to move back to City Hall a meeting projected for the Rose City Senior Center (because room size, accessibility and connectivity concerns couldn't be resolved satisfactorily off-site).

Almost parenthetical was an observation by one of the alderpersons that, because of the date of the next meeting of the Commission on the City Plan (who must review and recommend the zoning change to be discussed on 19 November), the City Council, acting as the Zoning Board of Appeals, will, as I understood it, not be able to take any action on the zoning request that precipitated the meeting scehduled for the 19th.

I think this means next Tuesday's elections for City Council could be a referendum on how citizens in Norwich want to manage economic development and smart growth. Or not.
(I'm not from here, and don't always see what's in front of me, despite my eyeglasses).

Shaken but not stirred: People as packages

Are we the only species on the planet who become as unhappy when we get what we want as when we're denied it? No wonder visitors from other galaxies steer clear of us (okay, NOT Dennis K, but the rest of us). We can't even get along with each other when we have agreed that we want the same thing. The devil, and a reasonable amount of turbulence, seems to be in the details.

Have you ever been, or watched an American in a foreign country? From the way many of us behave, it seems we Americans think people in other country are deaf and stupid so we SPEAK ENGLISH VERY LOUD and S-L-O-W-L-Y. News Flash: They can hear us fine. They just don't understand us. Can you blame them?

As persnickety as we are, might we also be the only species on the block who can appreciate who we are and where we are? I have a hard time imagining a dog, purebred or pound puppy, admiring a sunset. Or encountering a box turtle who enjoys cloud watching.

We are capable of many emotions, some perhaps not very admirable (I can't imagine wolves shunning one of their own because 'his den isn't from around here' but they haven't gotten to that on Animal Planet yet) and others so profound you have to assume it's what helps define us.

Yes, we behave crazily sometimes, but that insanity is a component of our humanity just as much as our thumbs and an appreciation for Goethe are all part of the package.

Maybe that's why we seem so fragile and are best handled with care.

-bill kenny

Is Jennifer Love Hewitt the President of Argentina?

I saw a news clip of 'world events' over the weekend and in the footage of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner elected President in Argentina, I, at first, thought it was JLH. I'm not sure if I was hoping it was true or afraid it might be. Or what I should make of either of those thoughts.

I suppose this morning in Boston they'd elect Mike Lowell mayor and possibly Manny or Big Papi to the governor's mansion. Ten days ago in New York, some wanted to elevate Joe Torre to sainthood for his service to the House of Steinbrenner that, at times, has resembled the House of Usher (and EAP is not a Baltimore Ravens fan, fwiw). And many who cheered A-Rod all season are now jeering him-change just one consonant and watch what happens.

A hero/heroine makes a difference everyday while a celebrity makes a headline every week.
After awhile the twain does meet and we lose twack of which witch is which.

Wait until that Mischa Barton for President movement catches fire.
Except in California. They deserve a break.
-bill kenny

That Joni Mitchell is one bright person.....

Something about 'paved paradise and relocated a national pharmacy chain store.' It sounded a LOT better when she sang it than when I typed it and come to think of it, I'm not sure I even nailed the original lyrics.

The Norwich City Council, less than ten days away from a possible "Extreme Makeover" on Election Day, 6 November, is holding a special meeting tomorrow night at 7:30 to return to a previous meeting's discussion and decide (perhaps) on long-term (actually, five years with the first three guaranteed) extended support for the Norwich Community Development Corporation which serves as the agency for economic development in the city of Norwich. Except when it doesn't.

I had thought the Mayor of Norwich, by charter, was 'a catalyst' for economic development or maybe I was thinking of the Redevelopment Agency, or Rose City Renaissance or APED, or the aforementioned NCDC or three or four other well-meaning organizations. Or all of them.

Something about 'too many cooks' and what they do to a broth comes to mind.
Ironically, we actually have some wonderful places to dine in downtown Norwich.

We just don't seem to have the foot traffic for those businesses to flourish at the level and degree that rewards their hard work and effort. Maybe if we can get everyone who owns (or thinks they own) a piece of the responsibility for economic development (forgot all about the City Council! DOH!) to dine just once a week at the establishments we already have in downtown, those businesses could breathe a little easier.

To be honest, we can't always count on crowds of citizens coming to City Council meetings (the 'other' big item on the agenda is relocating the Council meeting of 19 November which will be about the partitioning of a traditional residential zone into a commercial retail district (because we don't have enough national pharmacies and coffee shops in Norwich)) to propel downtown development, but unless and until we have better ideas, or more elaborate PowerPoint presentations of old ideas (and you can bet the one being prepared for the 19 November Council meeting will be a humdinger), we'll have our current level of success or lack of.

What I find confusing about the proposed venue for the 19 November meeting is that it is actually smaller and less equipped than the current Council chmabers to host the large number of residents this meeting is expected to attract (suggest destroying a neighborhood that has existed for close to three generations and people will turn out; we're funny that way).

Meanwhile, the City of Norwich owns a 6,600 seat stadium, home of a Double A baseball team, that would seem to have the space and accommodations to be the ideal venue for just such a hearing.
And having that many people show up at Dodd Stadium might gladden the heart of one of the ball team's biggest fans who is also the attorney whose client's proposal for commercial redevelopment in a residential neighborhood is the reason for the special Council meeting in the first place. He, working in cooperation with NCDC, helped build the ballpark.
"And we go round and round and round in The Circle Game."
-bill kenny

Does this Blog make my butt look big?

Nature works to maintain a balance even if, at times, we lose ours.

Here in Norwich CT, a "Dominos" pizza place and a "Curves" fitness center peacefully coexist under one roof. If there is a God, s/he must be amused. We have come as close as we may to a perpetual motion device....one place puts the pounds on your belly and your thighs and backside and the other part helps take it off. And so turns the Great Mandala.

Driving this afternoon to visit "the mall" in Waterford, though not the Waterford known for the crystal but rather for its Speedbowl, passed, on Route 12, another 'strange bedfellows' pairing of businesses: a personal injury attorney sharing the building with a chiropractic service.

A couple more pairings like this and I anticipate we'll soon see the Four Horsemen dismount and open up their own "Apocalyptic Discount Outlet Store", where 'everything must go! No offer refused!'

Walking into the mall I passed TPTG, The Post-Teen Goth.

You know the type even if you don't actually 'see' him anymore:

Hair sort of spiky, but only because during the week he has to comb it down for that job, probably in the audit department of some large corporate operation;
the jeans with the holes/tears at the knees, that are sold that way (remember how loud it would get at your house when you came home after playing with a hole in your chinos or dungarees? Your mom would carry on like they were the last pair of pants on earth even if they were older than your kid brother. She couldn't understand how you could do this to her, again.);
and, of course, the Pale Rider long coat.

Has anyone else, aside from Clint Eastwood, ever worn one of those and pulled it off? I have to concede he also made that poncho in "The Good, Bad and the Ugly" work and not even Ugly Betty has come close on that one. (Of course, Clint had spurs while Betty has braces.)

TPTG lives in his parents' partially finished basement and sleeps on a pullout couch.
He has a couple of posters scotch-taped to the concrete walls (Mom doesn't want him ruining the wood paneling she and his Dad have started to put up when they have a few extra dollars); more than likely one of the posters is of Ozzy, post 'Sabs, while the other is of Killswitch or one of the other shriek-bands whose vocalists all sound like fingernails on a chalkboard who lament long and loud at how horrible their lives are. And from where they're yelling, they probably are.

That NONE of his heroes live in anything approaching the style that he does, has never crossed TPTG's mind or he'd be shrieking louder and longer than they are and then ordering a rifle scope via the Internet.

I'm by myself on a Saturday afternoon because my daughter, home from college for the weekend, is attending, with my wife, the marriage of someone they both worked with back when I had more hair than scalp on my head and the Norwichtown Mall had more stores than mall-walkers (and it has less than a half dozen of the latter-you do the math).
I had a bit more candy earlier, those 'Starburst' chews sneak up on you, than my type II diabetes is comfortable with so I need to walk off the sugar rush, and it's pouring outside.

Indoor malls of America, unless they're located in Norwich, CT, are like village greens where everyone you know, or would like to know (and a few you'd rather not know) all meet.

I've often wondered if it would make more sense to move most of the apparatus that is the municipal government of Norwich, the departments and service agencies, etal, into the Norwichtown Mall, as there's literally acres of space. Acknowledge the inevitable and get it out of the way. Then we can stop the"Search for the Guilty" part of the problem-solving exercise and proceed directly to the "Solutions" portion of our program. And we could then offer meaningful rehab activities for those suffering from TPTG and other maladies of our age.
-bill kenny

Child of the Novelty

I've finally found a use for one piece of the wireless phone wizardry that has become so essential in my life, as well as in yours. What did we do before we had cell phones? I honestly don't remember so it must have been horrible. Will Verizon or T-Mobile help pay for the therapy I may need to recover those memories? Inquiring minds want to know.

I talk to myself. I have probably done this since I was old enough to start forming words (forming thoughts is a bit trickier; I'm still working on that). Not sure exactly why, maybe it's the only way I've ever found to make my point (aside from here, of course).

Please understand, I'm not thinking about a conversation I have had or am going to have. I am talking out loud, and taking all the parts in the conversation, complete with the accents and intonations of those with whom I am (nearly) speaking.

I'm not even aware I do this until I look up behind the wheel in traffic, and realize there's someone in another vehicle staring at me with wide eyes and a wary heart. I can't very well roll down my window and, in the three point five seconds I have until the signal changes and we all drive away, explain that I am not crazy and it's not what it looks like and even if it is, I'm not crazy-or did I already mention that I'm not crazy? And off they go....Damn!

But now, I have my face saver or should I say ear ring(er)?
When CT passed that "hands free while driving" cell phone law that nobody pays any attention to (we only obey the laws we like. Helps explain the increases in ethical improprieties and sexual peccadilloes) my son got me a blue tooth earpiece. You know the device I mean: it looks a check mark that a left handed person might make if we didn't make them use the one right-handed people use.
I always feel it makes me look like a walk-on in one of the Star Trek TV shows, just not sure which one (and I never rate a speaking part-maybe that's one of the reasons I talk to myself?).
I am not a big fan of these things since they feel and look goofy and I need so little help in either of those departments to start with.

Most of the time, I can't figure out how to answer the phone when I have the thing in my ear, or, conversely, how to hang up when I'm done. Compounding the problem may be that I often forget to turn the earpiece or the phone on, or can't find one or the other (or both). You can't use the earpiece with a toaster oven or a Palm Pilot and you can yell 'HELLO!' at the satellite radio receiver all day but the cell phone will continue to ring. (You do not need to ask how I would know this, okay?)

I just found the earpiece which I had mislaid so long ago I didn't even realize what it was or what it did when I first saw it (my Christopher Columbus impersonation).
As it turns out, I found it at work ('see,' I said to my wife, 'I told you I hadn't lost it.' ).

It's (probably) not charged since that soft blue glow they have while working doesn't come on no matter how often or hard I push the little silver gizmo (all the while saying (out loud, of course), 'don't die, Tinkerbell, don't die!') which is just as well since I'm pretty sure I left the cell phone at home in the living room (perhaps). I'm thinking it's uncharged rather than broken because when could I have broken it? I didn't know where it was.

But now, it doesn't need to be charged, ever.
I just used it and it was perfect for my new purpose. I put it in my right ear as I set off on a quick walk from my office to where I needed to be for a meeting that wasn't (they called to tell me it was cancelled but I didn't answer my cell phone when they rang). Sure enough, from the glances passers-by were giving me, I was (obviously) talking aloud to myself but.......this time, no one was staring because, ta-da!, with the Star Trek blue tooth doo-dad in my ear, they thought I was on the phone. Now I look like the other six billion here on the ant farm.
Beam me up, Scotty, or if you can, take everybody else and leave me here.
-bill kenny
PS: Just noticed sometimes there's an advert on the top of the page-a moment ago it was for a product to help people "loose (sic) weight". Somewhere, a Literacy Volunteer weeps......