Hollywood Park

I heard recently that the Inglewood City Council is likely to vote to close Hollywood Park, and replace the racetrack with a 'Multi-use, residential, retail complex'.

My advise is don't do it. Once you do this, you'll never get it back. This is the type of short-sighted, misinformed thinking that got this country into the economic mess it's in right now.

My prediction is that this city council will commission some big study at great expense that will undoubtedly come to the conclusion that if they do all this fancy re-building like other cities have done over the past decade, that they will see this giant gain in tax revenue, and earn the eternal gratitude (and votes) of the people.

Except... that won't happen. Instead, we'll look back on this in twenty years and say, "Gee. How sad it is that the city of Inglewood decided to destroy the things that were unique, and gave it an identity. Didn't they see that at the end of the day they were trading that uniqueness for a sameness that could not compete?" Trying to be more like Santa Monica, Westminster, or El Segundo is a losing game for Inglewood. The forum will be gone, Hollywood Park will be gone, and with them any opportunity to preserve the thing that makes towns and cities great: uniqueness.

Seligman and Ashfork, AZ

I took some pictures as I drove through Ashfork. But nothing came out.

It was getting dark, and I’m a bit rushed since by this point I still haven’t figured out the whole plan. The other thing is that I’m still not sure what the goal is. Here in Arizona, I wish I were back in Erick, or Elk City. There’s this odd sense that I’ve been too antsy, too quick to move on that the next stretch of road and not spending enough time finding the interesting stuff in each place. Post trip research reveals that many of the buildings in Ashfork burned down in the 1970s.

In Seligman, I took some pictures of the Rusty Bolt and another building (I think) that sells souvenirs and groceries. I think that's the building pictured here.

Yikes! I forgot to get gas in William!

This damn-near ruins the whole thing. Here I am in the middle of the night, don’t know how far out of Seligman I am, and the gas light comes on. Since this is not my car, I have no idea how long I can drive without running out of gas. I’m going up and down some hills, so the light is on while I’m going up, off on the way down. I’m starting to wish that I’d done more paperwork and mileage checking. Nah, it’s sort of funny. Running out of gas would suck, but only because I’d feel so stupid. Fact is, I have clothes, cash, a phone, I’m on the interstate, and I’m not even very hungry. It could be a lot worse. I gotta figure you can go 50 miles once the light goes on solidly. That seems reasonable, and I figure it’s about 55 miles to Kingman. No towns that I know of between here and there, but there’s likely a truck stop. So, I could turn around at the next exit, but I don’t know how far I’ve come, and I’m can’t remember the last gas station - but it was some time ago.

Williams, AZ

I stopped for dinner at Rod’s Steak House. Rod’s is where I went with the family back in 1975 or so. I only recently learned that this is where my Dad always stopped on his way across country. Back in 1975, when we were driving through Williams, we had dinner there. The thing that stuck in my mind was that Dad always teased us (or, maybe just me…) about Rod’s. I have a vague memory of this night. What I remember most, is that someone (probably me) spilled a drink, or threw up or something. Anyway, the dinner was ruined, and from then on, Rod’s Steak House was synonymous with kids ruining dinner-out. Remind me not to make fun of my kids for the dumb stuff they do and spoil their childhood memories.

William is a cool little town. This is the place to spend the night. Next time, I won’t make that mistake.

Recession Babies

My dad was a Depression Baby. While I was born on the tail-end of the Baby Boom, Dad was born in 1930 – right at the start of the Great Depression. People who were kids in the 30s developed a certain perspective on spending and wastefulness. My parents carried those perspectives with them their whole lives. A lot of the clues to my parent's upbringing could be found in small gestures, like re-using paper towels, saving corks, and huge jars of nuts and bolts. There was another thing too... my parents were reluctant to spend money to fix non-essential features that broke on things. Like the channel knob on the TV set, or the antenna on the radio. If the back hatch on my dad's minivan wouldn’t stay up; Dad would have never dreamed of taking the car to the dealer and paying to have it fixed. Dad would have gone out to his work shed, found a length of 2x4, cut it to length, and tossed it in the back of the car so it would be there when he needed it. That’s the type of thinking that I think we need to get back to.

This weekend I replaced a set of struts in the car. Both my family and my neighbors expressed more than a little surprise that I would attempt my own automotive maintenance, particularly on something as seemingly (to them) as difficult as that. For the most part, many of my friends and associates come from a culture that sees nothing wasteful in paying someone to change a set of wiper blades or pump their gas. I’m all for supporting the local economy through spending money, but I need to save money as well. The decision to build/fix vs. buy/hire was probably much easier for me since I’m among the recently laid off. But I would argue that everyone should start considering taking steps like this... now. If you’re unemployed and living off your savings, you need to save your cash wherever you can. If you’re working, you might want to think about spending a weekend or evening saving some cash and adding it to your emergency fund. Plus you might be learning a skill that could help you save more if you find yourself out of work. I'm going to track the $ money I save on the car repairs and report back...

Meanwhile, I think I'll go out to Dad's shed and find those old black and white TVs with the vise-grip knob turners and take them to the e-waste center

The Wigwam

The cop who pulled me over in Holbrook gave me directions to the Wigwam Motel. It seems that I’d past the turn off. I also took some shots of the deserted Sun n’ Sand across from the wigwam.

Holbrook

I pulled into Holbrook just to see and photograph the Wigwam Motel. Just inside town, I saw this gas station and pulled over. What caught my eye are these pillars that seem to be painted to look like they were moved here from the nearby petrified forest. There was a man inside the fence who saw me stopping to take pictures of this abandoned gas station. I felt a bit like I was intruding since he kept looking my way with this angry scowl. As much as I wanted to go chat with him and find out the history of the place, I didn't get the sense that I was too welcome. I would love to hear the history of this place, and find pictures of the station at it's heyday. Since there's no signage it's hard to research from afar. Here's hoping to get some help from the web.

I'm getting the sense that there are some people on the road that feel they're being treated like animals in a zoo. Here I am, looking like a tourist with out of state plates, taking pictures of what looks like a failed business. So, I guess I can understand that.
Too much rubber-necking I guess because I was pulled over by a cop and warned… at least no budget-busting ticket for me. Hey, that might just be a first!

I should have thought to get the cop's picture.

Save Jobs, fire Kudlow

Once again old Larry Kudlow is eager to sacrifice jobs for bond holders, even if it means everyone loses. Isn't it odd how Kudlow never complains when average people lose money on dumb investments and scam artists, but he can't stand to see the little guy get a break. Now he's screaming about the bond holders of GM getting a worse deal than the unions. Hey Larry, why don't you and your rich friends go build cars instead of sit around and complaining if the auto workers have it so good? Oh, maybe you don't want to soil those expensive pinstripes....