Dr. Phil's Dreamwidth Journal

So, Proposition 1 went down to defeat in Michigan. "The Free Press called the election for the no side less than one hour after the polls closed, based on analysis of exit poll results and early returns showing the no side winning by 4-1 margins in many parts of the state." I can't say I'm surprised.

Back on Thursday 23 April 2015, a friend on Facebook asked her readers what they thought about Prop 1 -- she honestly wanted to know. And I wrote first comment:

Haven't decided. While we need a lot of infrastructure repairs and I applaud Gov. Snyder's efforts to promote Proposal 1, I need to dig further because some reports talk about other things. Also, I think the sales tax increase is (1) regressive and (2) division and multiplication by seven is not simple. Right now it sounds like it will go down to defeat by a wide margin. Dr. Phil

That sounds about right.

The Detroit Free Press article linked above mentions an:

EPIC-MRA... poll, conducted April 25-28 for the Free Press and WXYZ-TV (Channel 7). According to the newly released results, 64% of respondents said they would support a one percentage point increase in the sales tax if they knew all the extra revenue raised would go to roads, bridges and transportation.

It's the same poll in which 61% of the 600 likely voters surveyed said they planned to vote no on Proposal 1. The poll, which included 20% cell phone users, has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Here's the deal: Michigan has some of the worst roads in the country. It's not that hasn't been any new construction (M-6 in West Michigan) or repairs done in the last 15-20 years, it's that the legislature simply hasn't had the will to spend the funds anywhere close to maintaining a status quo, let alone improving things. Everyone talks about jobs and business, but if the roads suck, who will invest in Michigan's future?

There have been some successful projects. I remember the first time I was on the M-10 freeway in Detroit, it was completely bombed out. It was closed and stripped down completely and rebuilt. It's now a smooth modern 70 mph city freeway. But you can't then not keep these things up.

Michigan has gone through a whole series of anti-tax measures. Gotta cut the Michigan income tax. Gotta restrict local property taxes. Gotta cut the schools. (The legislature is currently crowing about increasing the schools budget by 2%, but doesn't want to point out that they are raiding the schools budget to pay for higher education, which they have been defunding for twenty years.) The worst, of course, was the unwillingness to touch the fixed state gasoline tax. It hasn't changed in forever AND all that work developing vast improvements in fuel economy while the prices have hopped around had come home to roost.

A 50¢/gallon fuel tax was voted down.

To his credit, Governor Rick Snyder (R) has made infrastructure a priority. He's tried a whole slew of attempts. Prop 1 was the latest deal which could actually pass the legislature with a two-thirds majority. Why was it a ballot proposal? Because it involved changing the state sales tax from 6% to 7%, eliminating the sales tax on gasoline and moving revenues around. Why was it defeated? Well, in part because the voters didn't trust it. I don't think they understood why a road repair funding proposal had anything to do with school funding. (It had to do with how they messed up school funding years ago.) And 7 really is a terrible number to do math with -- 7% sales tax, 1.07 multiplier, dividing $1.00 by 7 to figure out the sales tax brackets.

I commend Gov. Snyder for two things. (1) After indicating that the state needed about a billion dollars a year for ten years to try to get a handle on the highway crisis, he vetoed a Republican plan to fund about half a billion dollars a year through cutting all sorts of other programs. The legislature had acted like that bill would be sufficient and they could wash their hands of dealing with taxes. Snyder is a numbers man and he knew the numbers didn't add up. (2) Once the Prop 1 bill was passed, he went on a statewide tour talking to everyone who would listen about road repairs. He carried a metal bucket with him, filled with chunks of concrete that had fallen from bridges and overpasses onto the roads, and gave them out as party favors to make his point. He'd hold up a big chunk and ask what if that came through your windshield? Or you drove over it and broke your car?

Gov. Snyder is not my favorite governor by a long shot, but he tried, man. He tried.

Tuesday 5 May 2015

So with the polling against it, we come to Election Day. One with a single solitary item on most ballots across the state. A rainy, overcast day. I haven't seen final numbers, but the turnout was expected to be under 20%.

Mrs. Dr. Phil voted on her way to work. I think she had ballot 22 or 28. I went out after 3pm. The parking lot, usually filled on election days, was mostly empty. Precinct 3 of 5 is small, so I used my two canes and didn't even bother with a walker. I had ballot 248 and machine record 221.

I hadn't decided how I'd vote until I got there. I wish the legislature would do its job, not be so scared shitless about realizing that tax money needs to come from somewhere and had just made a case for a clean bill that would fix the roads. On the other hand, I had no confidence that the legislature would be able to agree on anything else -- until they heard it from their constituents.

In the end, I filled in the bubble for YES.

Not that it mattered.

Dr. Phil

Posted on Dreamwidth
Crossposted on LiveJournal

Back in March I was able to score a double -- one of the coal unit trains and part of the M-231 construction (DW). Amazingly almost a month later I did it again.

On Easter Eve, while traveling from seeing Transcendence to the D&W gorcery store in Holland, I saw a pair of BNSF diesels heading slowly west along Lakewood Boulevard leading a full unit coal train -- as opposed to the southbound empties I had shot in March. I knew it was going slowly as it would have to take the cutoff to go north, so I kept going, but where to shoot?

Practically speaking I am all about the head end of trains, so I needed to be over the grade crossing, so that after I got my shot we could go on grocery shopping. After all, this is a long train, maybe 50-100 hopper cars. So there's a no-name gas station just past there, big modern slab of concrete and a convenience store.

Even better, it's right by the tight curve of the cutoff -- almost model railroad like. Lined up the Bravada, brought out the D100 and the 28-80mm f3.3-5.6G AF-NIKKOR and waited.


Here comes the train, tried to get the shot head-on. 75mm (about 105mm FX equivalent). (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


And close up of BNSF GE ES44AC 5964 at 28mm (42mm equivalent). If it looks like the locomotive is leaning away from me -- it is. Railroad curves have a superelevated outside rail. This was the hero shot of the cover of my Spring 2014 PHYS-1070 Final Exam [Form-B]. The A-exam used the shot from March. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


BNSF SD70ACe 9271. Trailing units aren't nearly as photogenic as lead locomotives, but we're counting coup here. Also, those overhangs on the back of both locomotives on the left? Those are the oversized radiators to deal with the waste heat from the massive turbocharged 4400hp and 4300hp diesels engines. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


When we parked at the grocery store, we were far enough back to see the coal crowned the open hopper cars. Here at trackside you can't tell they're full unless you inspect the springs on the trucks (wheel mountings, bogeys in Europe). Old coal hoppers had triangular chutes underneath and unloaded by opening the doors. These cars have round bottoms. At one end there's a rotary mounted coupler, so the cars are turned upside-down two-at-a-time to unload. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


When driving south to the movie, I spotted this covered hopper on the siding at the pet food elevator on US-31, so I stopped to shoot it after groceries. At 55mph, couldn't tell if this was a paint job or an elaborate graffiti tag. Appears to be the latter. But Acer UNIX Erase? It could have been an ad for an Acer computer, which comes with both Windows and Linux, where you choose which one to run. This is the standard three-quarters view favored by railfans. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


I moved the Bravada to get a better angle on the artwork. If you enlarge, I think you can guess that the Jetsons characters are tags, not commercial art. It's not too different from the previous shot, but there's a cool diagonal lens flare -- even without a lens hood, it's hard to get modern multicoated Nikon lenses to flare like older lenses. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)


When the M-231 bypass around the Grand Haven US-31 lift bridge and Holland was first proposed, probably forty years ago, it was supposed to go from I-196 in the south to I-96 just north of a new Grand River crossing. Currently, if the Grand Haven lift bridge jams in the UP position, the detour is to 68th Avenue in Allendale -- a forty mile detour. The new as-built M-231 crossing will cut that in half when in gets finished in 2016.


View of M-231 construction looking north from M-45. You can see the overpass over Rich Street under construction in the distance. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)

Half a mile east of here they are widening the intersection with 120th Avenue which gets close to the US-31 freeway in Holland by the Chicago Avenue interchange. So the M-231 bypass doesn't actually connect with either US-31 or I-196 at the southern end.


Another way they're cheapening this project after farbling around for forty years putting it off is to make the southern end of M-231 just a grade level intersection with turn lanes under construction here, presumably with a traffic light at M-45. (Click on photo for larger.)
©2014 Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon (All Rights Reserved)

Still, it is exciting to see progress on this. Next up, the northern end of the construction project.

Dr. Phil

I Voted

Tuesday 7 August 2012 was Primary Day in Michigan. I was issued ballot number 264 and on the machine I fed it into, was counted as voter 105, though there are five precincts in Allendale and there were more than five machines.

But wait, I hear you ask, didn't you guys have your primary back on 28 February? No, that was a Presidential Primary (DW). Tuesday was the primary for all the Michigan offices. And also for any local issues.

It was hard to tell if there were any local ballot issues. The GRPress listed several Ottawa County issues in some townships, but not Allendale. The Secretary of State's website showed what was on the Allendale ballot, but said it didn't include all the local ballot issues. I suppose I could've called the township office, but what fun is that? And in truth, it turned out there were no local ballot issues.

Also, not much to vote for. See, this is a very conservative part of Michigan. As such, everyone is from the same party. The other party's primary consisted only of the incumbent Senator up for reelection, though I did think for a moment of writing in Candy Kraker's name for Clerk, because she's been doing a great job for years.

Anyway, someone has to vote for the opposition. (grin)

The Late Man Can Only Run Later

I didn't get out of the house as early as I'd planned. And then I voted. And I had to get gas, but I also had a bill to mail. Naturally, just before I put the bill in the mailbox, I realized in my rush I'd forgotten to put a stamp on it. So... park and go inside the Post Office. Huh -- I've been going through a stash of Forever stamps and haven't had to buy a single first-class stamp in some time. It's up to 45¢ now. It went up back in January and I'm sure I knew that, but buying sheets and booklets of Forever stamps just didn't register.

As for the gas, prices around here jumped up 25¢/gallon at least a week ago, as there were multiple refinery issues in Chicago/Indiana and then a pipeline shutdown in Wisconsin. Tuesday regular was down to $3.90.9/gal. Once again, the uncertainty of gas prices wiped out my discount slips from the grocery store -- 15¢/gal this time -- though I avoided paying just over four dollars a gallon for midgrade.

The Last Straw

Arriving on campus, I was surprised to see yellow CAUTION tape stretched across the width of Lot 61. All the K-rail barriers nearest to Rood and Everett were gone. Last week I'd noted that some of the benches and umbrella tables by the bus stop were gone, but I thought they were going to resurface the bare dirt where people were sitting. The bus stop is now on the northeast side of Rood Hall, instead of just west of it. Fortunately, on Tuesday there wasn't much going on beyond just the yellow tape and no one was going around as far as walking in.


Big empty space. (Click on photo for larger.)


Compare the previous to this view from the test shots with the Nikon D1H back on a sunny November day. (Click on photo for larger.)

Guess I'll find out in a few hours whether or not they're going to give us all of Lot 61 back... and whether they're going to mill out the asphalt torn up and diesel fuel stained by the buses and repave it all.

Dr. Phil

The Orange Barrels Are Arriving

Michigan's seasons: Color, Gray, Mud and Construction. And Monday seems to be the start of the latter. It's hard to tell -- there are either two or three construction zones on US-131 between Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo. The one is either really long or broken into two pieces. Looks like they've erected a solar recharged portable camera tower in one spot, presumably to monitor traffic backups.

This cannot bode well. (grin)

Gas Relief

After surging past the four buck barrier to $4.15.9/gal, the price has been dropping a few pennies every few days since before Easter weekend. I think I saw $3.74.9/gal this evening, after $3.79.9 this morning.

Perhaps were being conditioned to fatalistically accept the higher prices this summer. Or perhaps the economy can't support the four buck outrage.

Oh well. It was a really pretty drive today. There's a small joy in that.

Dr. Phil

Finally

The Grand Rapids Press reports that construction of M-231 in Ottawa County is about to begin.

Also known as the M-231 bypass, it will include a 3,700-foot-long bridge over the Grand River that will connect M-45 (Lake Michigan Drive) to the interchange at I-96 and M-104 near Nunica. It also will involve putting additional lanes on M-104 near I-96 and additional ramps at I-96 and 112th Avenue and, later, the widening of U.S. 31 in parts of Holland and Grand Haven.

There's been talk about bypassing US-31 out of Holland and Grand Haven for forty years. A full freeway bypass was around $170 million -- this project will run a hundred million less.

Sure, getting the traffic out of the cities sounds nice, but the real issue is the number of crossings over the Grand River. There's US-31 in Grand Haven and 68th Avenue due north out of Allendale. The problem? The US-31 bridge is a lift bridge to allow sailboats out to Lake Michigan. And sometimes the bridge gets stuck. The detour from M-45 to 68th Avenue to I-96 -- is nearly forty miles. Crossing on the 120th Avenue corridor will cut that in half.


18 Years Ago

About two weeks after we moved into our new house, word came around that MDOT was having a public meeting to discuss three bypass options. These were full-bore freeway proposals. One was right around Grand Haven, one at 120th Avenue and one at 84th Avenue. The last one would've taken out our brand new house. Yikes!

Still, the 84th Avenue corridor was the lowest probability option, because it required the longest road swinging down to I-196 outside Holland and was so far east it would only would have cut ten miles off the forty mile detour. But for a while there was a nervous sense of impending doom. (grin)

Dr. Phil

Paperless Newspaper

This week I started getting a Daily Update email from the Grand Rapids Press. I guess somewhere along the way I'd sent email to one of the editorial people, so my address was on their list. My first reaction was -- I already get the newspaper, what do I need this for? On the other hand, this email comes mid-morning and I won't see the paper until tonight or tomorrow morning, so I figured maybe I'd give it a shot.

Raising Speed Limits

So even though I haven't gone that way this week, I found out from my daily briefing on Thursday that MDOT crews were busy raising speed limit signs on US-131. From Ann Street on the north side to 28th Street on the south, the speed has dropped from 70 mph to 55 mph, except for the S-curve in downtown Grand Rapids. Now it's 70 mph all the way, except still 50 mph in the S-curve.

Not sure what that's going to do. According to the traffic engineers, not much, since the drivers have never slowed down much in the 55 mph zone. This created a mix of 55 and 70 mph traffic in the three lanes.

Isn't it nice that the criminals -- those breaking the law and speeding -- now get to set the standard for everyone?

A similar speed up is planned for I-196 through downtown, raising the speed limit from 55 to 65 mph, once The Fix On 196 construction project finishes up this fall.

A Little Bit Of News Is A Good Thing

Of course on the drive home I can pick up traffic & weather from WLAV-FM. And on Thursday I heard that there was a car burning at US-131 and 100th Street south of Grand Rapids. The fire was on the southbound side, but I was prepared for a gapers' block northbound.

Even before I got to the southern border of Kent County, I could see the ugly column of black smoke. Since, northbound traffic was still moving, in part due to the fact there just wasn't a lot of vehicles going north. So I was able to get into the left hand lane and snap two one-handed somewhat unsteady shots -- though not a nice full frame full burning short at right angles:


Still, the fire department was on the scene spraying it down, orange flames shooting out and a great series of patches of scorched black grass on the hill grade to the entrance from 100th Street to US-131 southbound. The traffic southbound was backing up a couple of miles. And I had known that northbound was still open and able to breeze on by.

It's nice to have information.

Dr. Phil

Obama In K-zoo

I was reminded by an Anonymous commenter that in my pieces about Obama's visit to Kalamazoo Central High's graduation (here and here), that I didn't fully detail why the President was there. Yes, KCHS won the video competition sponsored by the White House as part of the Race to the Top educational reform program. But one of the reasons for KCHS's success was due to the Kalamazoo Promise. A pool of anonymous local donors ponied up the money to guarantee that every qualifying KCHS graduate would be able to attend a Michigan college or university -- 100% covered for those who spent K-12 in the KPS system, down to 65% for grades 9-12. Test scores are up since the program was announced in 2005, as are graduation rates and even enrollment. While other cities like Grand Rapids have been losing students, KPS schools are up 16%.

Yes, there are many ways to pay for college if you don't have the money. But think about it -- if you are the first person in your family who might go to college, which would you rather have? A system of forms and hoops and programs to try to qualify for, go through paperwork and deadlines, and wait for weeks or months to find out what aid your college application pool is offering... Or to know that 65-100% (and you'll know how much beforehand) of the cost of going to college is going to be covered. Flat out. All you have to do is graduate from high school and get into the Michigan school you want.

The program has been copied by other cities and Governor Granholm set up a Michigan Promise scholarship to provide some money statewide for students -- only budget cuts and fights with the legislature got that axed in the middle of the 2009-10 school year, leaving a lot of students with sudden extra tuition bills they weren't expecting. Nice.

So yeah, go Kalamazoo. You earned it.

Along the Highways

When you're commuting every day you see incremental changes, especially during the summer construction season. When you're coming down to office hours only once a week, changes sometimes hit you like a brick. M-45, Lake Michigan Drive, from Allendale to Standale, has had a fleet of orange cones along the eight miles or so. Some of it had to do with sidewalk upgrades -- new curbs with cutouts for wheelchairs at the intersections and plates with raised nubs so that the blind can find the corners without stepping into traffic. Between May 26th and June 2nd, they also managed to repave four of the five lanes along some stretches. And from June 2nd to today the 9th, they paved not only the center turn lane, but also did most of the right and left turn lanes along the boulevard section.

It's funny. Since I've traveling to/fro WMU in Kalamazoo for most of the past 18 years, that's a long enough time for some roads and expressways to be into their second major repaving cycle. Some stretches that I think of as "the new pavement" have been worn down by traffic and the brutal free/thaw late winter breakup seasons. If we'd had a kid when we moved down to West Michigan, they'd be graduating high school and starting college by now. That's plenty long enough to wear out a road. Yet the rolling circus of summer repaving projects sometimes feels like it never ends -- and it doesn't, because after many years you do have to go in and do it again.

Damn you, Entropy!

The Cost of Weather

I may have mentioned this, but Bill Steffen at Channel 8's column in the Sunday paper said that 23-30 May 2010 was eight days of weather above 85°F. Last year it took until 3 August 2009 to get to the 8th day of 85°F+ weather. Yeah, it was a coolish summer. Since we had 80s and 90s so often this early, one wonders what the rest of the summer is -- once summer officially gets here. However, this week has seen highs in the 60s, and the lows down to 46-50°F. It's made for some very pleasant days -- and then there have been the cold rainy ones. As we move into the weekend, it's supposed to leap up to 88°F+ and humid again. And thunderstorms.

You take the weather that you can.

Oh, THAT'S Who That Is

Yesterday I posted a review of the Alembical 2 SF/F novella anthology and talked about writer David D. Levine davidlevine. I noted that he'd won a second place finish in WOTF XVIII in 2002. Well, when I started spelunking around his website, I discovered that I'd already discovered David D. Levine years ago. His blog postings on attending Clarion West in 2000 and WOTF in 2002 had been crucial in providing his experiences and links to others which got me involved in applying to Clarion and to keep on submitting to WOTF. Oh, that David D. Levine. Actually, I wouldn't have paid attention to try to remembering the name back then -- I am very bad with names -- so his narratives would've been links and cut-and-paste bits stored in my working files. I'd even read his article "How the Future Predicts Science Fiction" in the last IROSF. (grin)

So I'm pleased to note that this writer whose story "Second Chance" had intrigued me so much was someone whom I had a passing Internet page acquaintance. There are times when I am so amazed at how small the SF writing community is and how amazing it is that I am a part of it. (grin)

Oh, and another reason to be jealous of David's successes? He spent two weeks on Mars this year. No, really.

How cool is that?

One More Thing

It was over a month ago on 2 May 2009 that I ranted about the BP oil spill. I wasn't optimistic then about BP closing that gusher off -- and sadly I was all too right. I'm sure I'll post more about that later.

Dr. Phil

Taking Out The Garbage

Last week the temps were in the 30s and 40s. This week the temps are in the 40s and 50s. Indeed, one road thermometer in K-zoo this afternoon was saying 58°F, though I consider it an anomaly. Still, a Grand Rapids billboard at US-131 and 84th Street read 51°F at 5:45pm.

Dragging the garbage can out to the road behind the Blazer's trailer hitch was so different. Last week the driveway was still a thick sheet of ice. This week? It's 85% clear and the last ice sheet, which hides in the shade of the big pine trees, is rotted with deep tire tracks and will melt up fast now that it's broken. I have to tell you, getting the gravel driveway redone with slag was such a great move. It drains really, really well and we don't have any worn low spots or standing water.

That Last Snow

The last serious snow we had began as freezing rain, so the bottom of the snow everywhere has this thick hard base. The interesting result is that vast expanses of snow away from the roadway has remained blazingly white all the way down to the hard base. Looks like thick frosting, rather than the usual sad end-of-the-snow. We had sun nearly all last week and the fields of white made it all even brighter, even with the lower sun angles of early March.

And After A Week Of Nice Weather...

Construction season has erupted in Michigan. Lane closures, road closures... with a major closure of I-196 east of downtown Grand Rapids happening in early April. Lovely. (grin)

And Yet...

M-43 West Main in Kalamazoo had a sea of vehicles and lane closures getting from US-131 to campus. They're stringing up new traffic lights. I'm assuming that they're putting up lightweight plastic housings with LED lamps. Saves a bundle on the energy costs. Unfortunately, they're discovering that since LEDs don't generate heat like incandescent bulbs, snow and ice don't melt off of these new traffic lights. So the brighter LED lights get obscured. And the weight of ice buildups either causes the traffic lights to come crashing down or for big ice chunks to come crashing down. Either way, cars are getting damaged because of the obsession with energy savings over any other criteria. Really? Thanks. Good engineering. Trying to get a job at Toyota?

Reminds me of the obsession with getting rid of those nasty incandescent light bulbs and replacing them with those lousy compact fluorescents. All without spending any more than lip service about the question of mercury. Come on guys! You break one of these CFL bulbs in a work place and it's considered a hazmat operation! Let's outlaw light bulbs BEFORE we address this issue! Good call! (not)

Am I the only person who is rational on this planet? (sigh) Oh wait -- this was supposed to be a nice piece on the nice weather and not a rant.

I really am in a pleasant mood. Really.

Dr. Phil

Road Traffic Up

Tuesday was the first day of public schools in Michigan -- they set up a law the other year to help out the tourist industry over Labor Day -- and also the first day of classes at WMU. Though I missed driving through any of the School Zones with their restricted speed limits, definitely the case that there was a lot of traffic on the roads today.

On the news last night was a story about a horrific fiery crash on I-196 over Chicago Drive in Grandville, right in the construction zone. Semi-truck filled with pies versus a Chevy Tahoe. People with fire extinguishers managed to save one of the two in the Tahoe. Most of the damage on I-196 was at the road's edge and they'd put up some concrete barriers to patch where the guardrails had been. Scary. Actual Michigan Labor Day weekend death toll down two from 2008.

Jerks

Sometimes you're driving along and you can see a spray engulfing a vehicle and you realize that it's running its windshield washers. So this morning, there's this silver Honda sedan which had passed me -- 70mph not being sufficient apparently -- and there was a huge spray on just the right side. About half a minute later it happened again. And again.

And I realized that there was a hand coming out of the right passenger window. And though they were ahead of me by quite a bit, I was getting a bit of spray on my windshield... and the unmistakeable smell of coffee. The bastards were dumping coffee -- a lot of coffee -- out the damned window in traffic at 70+mph.

What the hell is wrong with people? I don't even drink coffee!

Damn, The Students Are Back

Yeah, I know, that's a terrible attitude. But look at it from my perspective. It's tough coming back to the full regular semester after the summer. The Everett-Rood parking lot was FULL. Stuffed. No spaces left. There are not that many faculty with "R" stickers for those spaces. But the students know that they don't crack down and start towing for a week or two. So rather than park in the student places, they fill in the faculty spaces like mad. Eventually it will settle down, but it's stupid season right now.

Talked with a Parking Services Public Safety officer, who was busy writing tickets. He says that student infamously get indignant when told they can't park there and write letters to the President. "'Cause we paid our money!" Well, actually, you paid part of the cost of your classes. You didn't actually pay to park in those spaces, because they aren't for sale. "But can't you old fuddyduds (probably not the word in vogue today) just park elsewhere?" Sure, but we're old fuddyduds. And we're bringing stuff back and forth from home, because our workday doesn't end when we leave campus. And part of your money is paying me to teach your classes. So what good is all that if I can't get to my office and to our classroom? It's the difference between inconveniencing one person (you) from parking closer to the buildings and inconveniencing 128 people -- me and all my students.

Yay, The Students Are Back

Well, that's a better attitude. It was really quiet last week. And you never know how the first class is going to go, but I thought it went quite well. I have a few diversionary tactics to get everyone's attention in the first five minutes -- get the heart rates going and clear the cobwebs.

The problem with killing the lights in the lecture hall these days is that there's too much ambient light from laptops and cellphones being used. (grin) But my TITANIC model Acme Thunderer whistle wakes everyone up.

Did have some troubles making my syllabus. Twelve pages, a little short for me, but printed as 2-ups and copied double-sided, so I'm not really killing all the trees in North America. But the humidity was running so high that (a) my office LaserJet output got "eaten" by the document feeder on the copier, and I had to peel two pages off its rollers, make one copy of the six pages to get flatter masters. By then I'd lost most of my allotted copying time, so (b) I only had 65 of 130 sets made. Then (c) we ran out in the classroom after the secretary had brought the rest in because (d) the copier had actually jammed up and so the last 20-30 sets weren't actually in the pile. But it worked out in the end.

Ah, the joys of teaching. (double-trouble-grin)

Dr. Phil

First It Was Just A Big Hole In The Ground And Piles Of Dirt

Given that we live in the country, having the neighborhood going to hell, albeit in slow motion, was one thing. See, some developer decided that what Allendale needed was a set of rectangular artificial lakes to put houses up for a water skiing community. As if there are no lakes in Michigan for any sort of recreation.

The development has taken years of nothing going on punctuated by spurts of furious ground engineering. Eventually, last year, they started filling their lakes. For a development which has something like 60 lots on it, they've only built one spec house. In a sea of water surrounded by huge piles of dirt, it looks oddly apocalyptic sitting out there.

The other year they put up a sign with the name of the development -- Placid Waters. Funny, I don't think of the word "placid" in combination with jet skis and water skiing boats. But hey, a lot of Michigan boaters wanna have a place to play with their boats. And prior to the recession, building homes and condos for people who don't want to have to trailer their boats was probably a good investment, if you're into such things, I suppose...

Huh?

Yesterday I heard of some sort of international water skiing and wake boarding tournament that was coming to Placid Waters on 26-27 June 2009. Admission $10 a head. WTF? I thought this was supposed to be some sort of closed community. Now they're expecting a circus?

But Now We Learn Of Their Insidious Plans

So while paying for gas in town this morning, I saw a poster for this event and I decided I'd better Google Placid Waters when I got to work. And now I find not just their schedule of events, but also their evil master plans.

PLACID WATERS OF ALLENDALE FEATURES LAKE PLACID

Lake Placid is an engineered, tournament conditions lake. Six bays are connected for easy transit between your sessions. Three bays will feature permanent slalom courses. Two bays will be for board sports or trick skiing. One bay will be for board sports, trick skiing, and jumping. Expect to have the best in the world pay a visit a few times a year to test their skills against each other, and perhaps you—it will be your home water.

Placid Waters is organized as a Site Condominium project around Lake Placid. Once in full operation, the community will be self-governing. There are site and building restrictions to keep the value and standards of the community high. The entire property is private and golf carts will be the preferred mode of transportation.

...

June 26 and 27 is the Global Invitational (www.globalinvitational.com). Tickets are available at Action Watersports (616-896-3100). Sponsorship information is available by e-mailing info@placidwaters.com. We expect a big crowd for one of the very few pro tournaments this year. The competition should be fierce - and you can be close enough to feel the mist from the passing skier.

Sigh

All this takes place about two miles from our house, over on 84th Avenue. Why am I just learning of these tournament competition plans now? I don't recall any of the things I've seen in Allendale ever suggesting that Placid Waters was anything other than a recreational water community, with straight lakes as opposed to the two irregular ones in the development done on the other side of the Grand River from GVSU.

Lake Placid? With bread and circuses? Fuck no. I don't think they know what the word placid means. Sigh.

Dr. Phil