"In the Ghetto"...

Never thought I would find myself driving through it, but alas this morning as I rode MCTS for the very first time, I somehow wound up there.

Today started off really well; I enjoyed a nice walk through downtown this morning into work, and work was very pleasant. The problem, of course, arose in regards to public transit. This was my first time using the Milwaukee transit and I obviously am not very canny with the system yet (nor know my directions). Anyway, I was supposed to get on the Route 30 bus that would take me to UWM. Silly me, I took the "30 Florist" bus which is not only the wrong direction, but heads directly into Milwaukee's inner city--the "ghetto" as I say.

Though I hadn't been there previously, I will agree that the place is quite shady to say the least. I was a little freaked out when I realized that UWM was not going to be on the horizon. While on this "tour", I encountered several "interesting" people including a drunk man. Long story shorter and two and a half hours later, I finally arrived at my intended destination. As a result of this, I missed my first class (which fortunately the professor chuckled at what happened). The experience was an eye-opener to say the least!

#Spotted

Instead of having a separate blog for strange sightings, I thought I would simply update this post whenever one came up. If I did these all on twitter, my tweets would all be the same, so here it goes:

8/25: A Smart Car during rush hour. Probably one of the few times they hit the freeway because then they can drive their average speed of 25 mph and not get run over.

On Parades and the Crazy Traditions

Today is July 3rd. That means that it is time for the Fourth of July Parade in our town. It is a nice parade and there are organizations ranging from bands to dance crews to bible study marching down the street, showing their stuff.

I like the parade because for the most part, I don't really know what goes on in our town until they all come with their posters and candy to share (or buckets to collect). For instance, there are some fine bands, banjo players, dance crews, and clubs galore that I had no idea existed. Having been on both sides of watching and marching, I like both which fulfills my spectrum of the parade experience.

Now I understand the process and tradition of the parade, lining up, eating, drinking, collecting candy, etc. What I don't understand--and find equally entertaining as a result--is the unspoken tradition of the pre-parade, also known as-- The Stakeout.

I'm sure I don't have to explain what it means to stake out your territory. Well, (for our parade at least) families do just that. They come onto the boulevard (at who knows what time) with their blankets, chairs, trailers, coolers, stakes, rope, and caution tape and block out their space for the parade. I will admit that over the years the tradition has been cut back and restricted because of crazy people taking up space that they can't account for or use when the parade actually comes around.

So the day before the parade the boulevard is covered with many shapes and sizes of tape and rope--all for the sake of a good seat at the parade. As part of the other population, our family has never marked "our territory" and yet every year we manage to find a space to sit that allows us to see the people prancing by.

Another unspoken tradition in our parade involves the kids. Apparently the 4th of July holiday is the second Halloween. As someone who walked in parades, I saw kids come up to me with bags of candy asking me to put candy in their bags. Sure, let's give the kid with a bag of candy more of the same. However, I understand that there are some safety benefits to keeping a bag.

When I was little, the kids ran to the candy like they had never seen a tootsie roll before in their lives. Kids became vicious, snarling at the people walking with candy and telling them to throw candy in their direction (because clearly they didn't get enough). Now that they have the bags, I suppose that the angry sugar crazed children would no longer be as demanding. We'll leave that for future study. Thus we have another unspoken tradition for the parade scene.

I love traditions because if they're any good, they will never go away. And as much as some of these traditions are not the most humanitarian or moral, we keep them, accept them, and tweak them as needed.

Happy 4th Everyone!

Little Kids and their concept of age

I love kids. If you ever want to feel younger without going through botox or some other ungodly treatment that requires pokes, screws, stretches, and who knows what else, teach swim lessons.

The younger ones are best (under 5) because they have little or no concept of age. Now I'm not on my way to botox injections or any nonsense like that because I'm still young (22). However, when realizing that going from 18 to 21 took ten zillion years and 21 to 22 took 3 seconds, you start to realize that life after 21 goes way too fast.

I happen to teach swim lessons because it's enjoyable and relatively easy. During one of the lessons, I had an experience with little kids and age misconception that made my day:

A little girl (around 4) in my class asked if I was 14. I was flattered that I looked younger but 14? Not so much. I told her I was much older (ooo a whole 8 years!). So she guessed 16. She's like "you couldn't be older than that!". I told her I was, so she reached for the moon and guessed--wait for it--17. After I reminded her that I was much older still she guessed 63.

So we jumped a few decades. Eh whatever!