On my way to Springfield to visit friends in ol' Pine Point the other day I ran into local photographer and former Pointer Fred Krug on the bus.
Next to the shuttered Friendly's on Berkshire is the Vietnamese Buddhist Association. It used to be a bank.
Across the street the former Mutual Ford is reverting to a weed-filled lot.
At least Napoli's is still in business.
When Napoli's opened back in the 60's the owner prayed to Jesus that if his shop was successful he would build a shrine. The business thrived and he erected this statue in the restaurant parking lot.
Pine Point businessman Tommy McCarthy is running against entrenched incumbent Gale Candaras.
Old glory on Coleman Street.
Stop snitchin'.
This stone structure at the Holyoke Reservoir was erected in 1887.
This Holyoke bar used to be owned by Mike Sullivan before he was elected mayor.
I'm sure there were many occasions at City Hall when he wished he was still a bar owner.
A face on the door of an Amherst partyhouse.
Bumpersticker on a car parked in Amherst.
Amherst writer Augusten Burroughs has a flickr account. It includes pictures from the serious to the whimsical, such as this posed shot meant to be him lying dead at the bottom of the stairs in his Amherst home.
There are a number of shots from Burrough's Amherst childhood as well as some arty pics of Amherst today. To check it all out click here.
I'm currently reading Amherst writer Augusten Burrough's hatchet job memoir of his late father, UMass philosophy professor John Robison, A Wolf at the Table. In it Augusten describes how he got his first apartment on Appleton Street in downtown Holyoke. He does not describe the city in flattering terms:
Once, Holyoke, Massachusetts, was a thriving industrial city on the banks of the Connecticut River. Settled originally in the early seventeenth century by Englishmen, Holyoke's very bones are British. Stand beside one of the old brick paper factories - its tapered, elegant smokestack reaching high into the sky - and squint, and you'd swear you were looking back in time at a factory along the River Thames. In the residential areas, wide boulevards are lined with old-growth oak and elm trees and mansions are set back from the street - Greek revival, Victorian, Tudor. These were the homes of the paper factory owners and managers. Glorious, stately structures decidedly European in their design and construction....
Holyoke could have become another Boston, or even a New York City, but instead, it stopped following the bread crumbs and lost its way. After the war, when the American economy moved away from manufacturing, Holyoke failed to reinvent itself. It just sat there and wondered where everybody went. And then it began to smell bad and its wounds became infected and it stopped bathing.
The city plunged into failure. It became the grimmest, poorest city in Massachusetts. A splotch of cancer in the center of the state. An entire brick factory, weeds sprouting from between the mortar, could be bought for tens of thousands of dollars. You could buy yourself a Craftsman home right near the river for under ten grand. But then, you'd have to live in it.
Latest Poll
There is both good news and bad for President Obama in the latest poll results, according to Politico:
Approval for the Afghanistan escalation is up by nine points in the past month -- voters now think the war is a good idea by a 57-to-35 percent margin.
A healthy 60 percent favor his new troop surge, according to the Quinnipiac survey, which has a two percent margin of error.
But only 26 percent think the president, who has been in office for less than a year, deserves to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Stormwatch
I voted this morning in the senatorial primary at this quaint New England house that serves as my polling place.
I was the 53rd voter, but I was told that in normal elections about 200 voters usually cast their ballots by the time I showed up.
In the antique shop across the street from Pops in downtown Northampton is this 1973 psychedelic Watergate poster for sale for 35 bucks.
There was snow on the pumpkins this morning, with more due tomorrow.
That means I may have to shovel at this Habitat for Humanity house in Hamp where I volunteer.
These are students who work on the house from Williston Academy in Easthampton.
Hopefully after I shovel no one will fall down like in this cartoon painted on a downtown bank.
Today's Music Video
Action speaks louder than words And I'm a man of great experience I know you've got another man But I can love you better than him
Amherst's literary homeboy Augusten "Running With Scissors" Burroughs is back in town from his national lecture tour. On his blog he tells how his first night back Burrough's dog did #2 in his bed - with Burroughs going to sleep without knowing it - and with predictably yucky results:
So yeah, home. The first night back, Bentley had a night-poo on the bed, which we of course did not see. Pity us restless sleepers. I will let your imagination fill in the sordid details. Take comfort knowing your imagination is dead right.
When not rolling in dogshit, the world famous literati has been drooling over wedding cakes, in particular this one:
I love the wedding cake above because, imagine bending over and opening your mouth right on the edge, on top of a clump of white frosting roses
Does this fascination with wedding cakes mean that Augusten and his longtime boyfriend Dennis have a forthcoming announcement to make? Anyway this is the cake I personally would like to have give me a sugar overdose by the same confectionery artist:
Always the contrarian, Burroughs defends sugar from modern society's attacks:
Our society's vigorous anti-sugar mentality, which is primitive and incorrect, only serves to incite prejudice and fear. If we must hate something, let's agree to hate yeast. Or ham.
When not salivating over cakes, Augusten and Dennis are trying to score a dinner date with national media personality (and former Pioneer Valley radio star) Rachel Maddow. So far it isn't going well:
Rachel Maddow and Bill Dwight
So four weeks ago, Dennis -who won't even let me use my name when making a restaurant reservation because he thinks it's pretentious and loathsome- made a special trip downstairs to my office and said, “You need to invite Rachel Maddow over for dinner.” He suggested I contact her “people.”
I just looked up at him and blinked.
And he asks me now each week, “So, how's that letter coming?” Meaning, my letter to Rachel Maddow inviting her to dinner.
I tell him, “I'm working on it, I haven't forgotten.” What I have not confessed is that each version of the letter begins like this:
“Dear Rachel, I know this is kind of creepy and stalkerish but I think we both live in the same general area of Massachusetts and...” So it's the “I'm your neighbor not your stalker!” approach. I just can't figure out the segue from “We're your neighbors” to “come over for dinner with your girlfriend.” No matter how I phrase it, it comes out sounding odious. Like I want to know her because she's famous or I want to be on her show.
To read more about the dinner date seduction of Rachel Maddow as well as more about our Valley's most eccentric author's opinions about dogs, pigs, cakes and other matters click here.
Bipartisan Guilt
Remember, everything Obama's doing, Bush started last year. If you're going to talk about big spending, the mistakes of the Bush administration last year are fully as bad as the mistakes of Obama's first two, three months. ... If the Republicans can't break out of being the right wing party of big government, then I think you would see a third party movement in 2012. ... The current system is so sick, so out of touch and so arrogant that you're going to have a nationwide rebellion at the polls of people in both parties who are just fed up."
-- former Congressman Newt Gingrich speaking at the College of the Ozarks in Missouri, March 31, 2009.
Remembrance
These flags appeared outside the Student Union today, each one representing 5,000 deaths in the Nazi Holocaust.
I think there should be a similar display commemorating those who died in the Socialist Holocaust. There would be at least ten times as many flags required.
Old Shirt
Here's an official UMass shirt from 1992. (courtesy of Andrea Murray)
New Pizza Joint
Hillside Organic Pizza has opened on Route Nine!
I predict it will be a big success.
Today's Video
Garcia near the end.
There were days and there were days and there were days between Summer flies and August dies the world grows dark and mean Comes the lighting of the moon on black infested trees the singing man is at his song the holy on their knees the reckless are out wrecking the timid plead their pleas No one knows much more of this than anyone can see anyone can see
There were days and there were days and there were days besides when phantom ships with phantom sails set to sea on phantom tides Comes the lightning of the sun on bright unfocused eyes the blue of yet another day a springtime wet with sighs a lonesome candle lingers in the land of lullabies where headless horsemen vanish with wild and lonely cries lonely cries
There were days and there were days and there were days I know when all we ever wanted was to learn and love and grow Once we grew into our shoes we told them where to go walked halfway around the world on promise of the glow stood upon a mountain top walked barefoot in the snow gave the best we had to give how much we'll never know we'll never know
There were days and there were days and there were days between polished like a golden bowl the finest ever seen Hearts of Summer held in trust still tender, young and green left on shelves collecting dust not knowing what they mean valentines of flesh and blood as soft as velveteen hoping love would not forsake the days that lie between lie between
