outskirts: life and times in charlottesville

Hmm…I see that the area now admits there are gangs in town. I wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that a “group of young people” has attacked at least one person on nine of the last ten weekends. C-Ville likes being #1, so I guess a 90% attack rate ranks it pretty high. At least I can go now go get educated on gangs. Did a gang fire at a passing car? I’m not smart enough to know.

Of course the big news around here is the good old Virginia boy called Oogie. What would TJ have thought of Oogie? I guess it is good when Virginia makes national headlines.

Today I noticed a good percentage of the public parking for the downtown area has been turned in to a Jeep sales fiasco with mini mountains and dozens of fake trees to make it seem as if you are out in the wilderness. How much did Jeep pay? How much gas will they waste to show you that a Jeep can climb up a hill made out of 2×4’s? If someone gets attacked because they couldn’t park as close to downtown as they wanted to who will get sued? If a tree falls in the woods with no one around…yada..yada..yada.

And with all this excitement in town you would think I could come home and watch some local HDTV. Instead I can watch a 24/7 local weather station. I’ve always wanted to know the weather in Crozet as compared to that in Ivy. Definitely necessary.

Where is local OTA HDTV? I think the local stations have been having just a bit too much fun with Comcast…if you know what I mean.

Time to take a break and head to the tropics…

I’ll get a few more shots up along with the summary of the event later this week…after my head stops spinning like these lit hula hoops.

I am still boggled by the number of smokers in this village. I’m sitting here watching four families, and all the parents are smoking. I wonder when the kids will start. I wonder if I’m already paying for their health problems. How dumb are the parents? How dumb am I for paying to eat at this place.

Is there even one restaurant in C-Ville that has banned outdoor smoking?

This village tries to pass itself off as a healthy lifestyle region, but they are sadly mistaken. This is not a healthy area. Obese smoking parents teaching the future generation of locals. Sad.

Ran out of alcohol by 11pm. Why did the locals pay $50?

More to follow after sober state kicks in…

Looks like eight straight weeks of gang attacks (no…we have no gang problems here in town) will get the cameras installed in the future (just like our stadium seating theaters?). From the tribal elder meeting…

If the cameras get the green light, councilors still have to decide how they will be used. Some in the community have suggested that a live stream should be available to all residents via the Internet. But councilors dismissed that idea, with Kendra Hamilton arguing that no one wants “the Real World Charlottesville.”

Since some of the great citizens suggested a live stream, doesn’t it seem like some want that option? Why does Kendra say no one wants it? Is Charlottesville part of the real world? Don’t our great citizens deserve some options? Or are we just a lot of smoking sheep dropping our butts in trash can?

I have a feeling a subscription site (or one just powered by Google Ads) that let you watch the ‘locals’ on the mall would bring in a lot of spare cash. Maybe even so much that you would be able to pay city bills with that modern doo-dangley thing called a credit card.

Cigarette disposal unit ignites. Authorities urged locals to remain calm. It is not associated with terrorist activity.

Money Magazine has picked the best 100 places to live in the US. This year they focused on smaller places that offered the best combination of economic opportunity, good schools, safe streets, things to do and a real sense of community. Most of those chosen had a population of 30-40k. If C-Ville fits in somewhere in this crazy world, this seems to be the right place…at least according to the locals. However, C-Ville did not make the Top 100. The best places to live in Virginia are Glen Allen, Mechanicsville, and Vienna.

Charlottesville was simply listed as a contender. C-Ville wants to be another Mechanicsville, but got stuck with a skunk load of problems. It was brought along too slow. C-Ville coulda been something, instead of a bum town, which is what it is.

Seems as if Blender has named Crapshaw as the 10th most influential person in web music. Why? Did that many fools like the Dump Bowel Movement band that they illegally downloaded the music and felt that was influential?

I’m so glad so many people have pumped so much money in to this area out of stupidity. At least 200k of the cash went in to environment education.

The curse of the sinkhole returns. Looks as though a twenty minute thunderstorm caused the ground to open up and try to swallow all those driving near Target. Long live the sinkhole. Bow down to the devil below Hollymead.

A bit t-storm is rolling through town. The north side of the historic downtown mall is without power. The windows of Five Guys has gone black. Maybe a good discount on a burger!

It seems as though this old boy town really is an old boy town. A report was released that shows Charlottesville is number one in the country in racial disparity, as well as not providing home lending to low- and moderate-income black borrowers. Does that surprise anyone that lives in this village?

In other local events, the dirty dozen are still running loose (although I didn’t hear of any attacks yet this weekend), but school resource officers (I don’t think they had those when I was in school) are now helping out on the gang-ish violence investigation. I hear the Crapshaw wants the building out of the area anyway, so he can charge people for being that close to the musical marshmallow. Go downtown, pay the crapper.

I may be old, but this story cracked me up. A guy walked out of a bar (no, this isn’t a joke) and got shot. The suspect was reported to be wearing “a white doo rag, a dark baggy T-shirt and dark baggy jeans.” What the hell is a doo rag, and why would anyone wear something with doo in it?

In terms of police reports per day, Lee Park seems to be a bit high. It is a tiny little one block park in a rather nice/expensive part of north downtown that has had 83 police reports in 71 days. Wow. It says, “police are requesting special permission from the city of Charlottesville to ban certain people…” I guess those certain people aren’t citizens, since Charlottesville is a great place to live for all our citizens. Just not certain ones. We need to get rid of those damn Morlocks.

Update: From an anonymous tipster,

There is just one African-American on the Commitment Taskforce of the Chief Justice’s Commission on Mental Health Law Reform. Out of 22 members the only African-American is a sheriff. The taskforce was picked by local UVA law school professor Richard Bonnie on a subject that disproportionately affects African-Americans in this countrym as they are more likely to be committed than whites. There are no Hispanics on the taskforce.

Picture of Lee Park