Lincolnite

• I survived the college soccer referee physical on Saturday. The physical consisted of four parts: (1) a 12-minute run; (2) a ten-meter "box drill" involving sprinting, sidestepping, and back-peddaling; (3) a linear sprint-sidestep-sprint-sidestep drill; and (4) a shuttle run requiring you to run 30-30-30 meters, rest for up to ten seconds, and then do another 30-30-30-30 meters. I only made it 2,750 meters in the 12-minute run, short of my goal of 3,000 meters, and I didn't do too hot in the box drill. But I broke the scale in the shuttle run. Overall I think I ended with either the highest or second-highest score. That says less about my fitness than it does about the other referees' fitness.
• Robert has been semi-regularly sleeping 6-7 hours at a stretch overnight. He has a ways to go, but he's getting closer to making in through the night.
• In other Robert news, he's still a big talker. Lately he has been adding many new sounds to his vocabulary, and sometimes you'd swear he's trying to mimic you.
• A good friend from high school is moving back to town after a few years in the D.C. area. Welcome back, Katie!
• On the other hand, another good friend is moving out west to Imperial. Sounds like he has a great job opportunity out there. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to say more than that, so I'll just stop there for now.
• The garden is pumping out veggies these days. Especially my two Hungarian yellow wax pepper plants; they're going nuts. Guess I'll have to whip up another batch of my stuffed peppers. Cream cheese, cheddar cheese, turkey sausage, and a blend of spices. Mmm.
• I need a big stump removed. Anybody have a recommendation for a good stump remover in town?

It's been a while since I last visited Ali Baba's Gyro joint with Mr. Wilson and Swoof. Today, I was pleased to see that Ali's has recently introduced a marinated beef kabob to its menu, and couldn't help but order this new item. Like their famed chicken kabob, for $5.99 you get the grilled, marinated beef kabob, a salad, bread, potatoes and dip. The heavenly scent emanating from the cellophane carton was driving me mad as I took this home, and someone I found the will power to take a snapshot of the meal before tearing into it. Verdict: The beef kabob - which was cooked to about medium - was very good, albeit not as tender as I would have liked. I am not sure what kind of marinade they use, but it gave the beef a nice hint of flavor. Perhaps a bit more salt could have been used to retain some of the natural juices. Regardless, it was pretty good and I am not unhappy for ordering this new item, and my coffee table now is littered with greasy napkins and the remnants of this fine meal. However, in my opinion Ali's chicken kabob (with the brushed on "tandoori" spice) is still the king of their menu.

I led a mass act of civil disobedience last night. About a dozen other Lincolnites and I all broke the law together. It was great. Highway 2 is being resurfaced, and portions of the road are closed from 6:00PM to 6:00AM. That's all fine and dandy. But as is typical of Lincoln's transportation planners, nobody bothers to change the timing of the traffic lights. The result? A backlog of vehicles on 27th Street at Highway 2 waiting for ... nobody. 27th Street traffic received 20 seconds of green light (I timed it), then sat around for 60 seconds while nobody traveled on Highway 2. After waiting through a few frustrating light cycles, I found myself at the front of the line waiting at a red light. Next to me was a large pickup. We apparently had the same idea at the same time, because we hit the gas simultaneously. What I saw next in my rear-view mirror was beautiful: car after car streamed through the intersection. It was civil disobedience at its finest. And amazingly, not a single vehicle was damaged by the non-oncoming non-traffic. Eventually two goody-goodies made their way to the front of the line and waited patiently at the red light. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. Seriously, though, what's the deal with leaving the traffic lights on their normal pattern? That just breeds disgust for road work, road workers, and transportation planning in general, and there's already plenty of that going on in Lincoln. Assuming that construction vehicles may have needed to cross the intersection occasionally, a four-way stop (flashing red all four directions) would have made the most sense.

July Jamm is done after this weekend. A lot of Lincolnites are mourning the loss of a big community event, but they don't mourn the loss of July Jamm itself. Why do you think that is? Why is July Jamm seen as unfriendly (admission fees, fences make attendees feel like cattle), while Ribfest remains so popular? And the big question: how would you design a community festival to replace July Jamm?

Five things Lincoln can do to begin moving up from sixtieth place:

1. Ditch the "we're Omaha's kid brother" mentality
2. Make economic investment in the community easier;
3. Actively promote and support local entrepreneurship;
4. Build feelings of ownership and responsibility for local (neighborhood) parks and other public goods;
5. Improve civic engagement and increase ownership of public decisions.

Those are just a start. What's on your list?

Does anybody remember the tamale lady? The Missus was telling me last night that when her family first came to Lincoln (circa 1992), they used to buy homemade tamales from a woman at Russ's on 33rd and Highway 2. But there was a catch: the tamale lady was a secret. She quite literally sold her goods out of the back of the store, and only at specific times. She quickly sold out to her regulars. Then one day the tamale lady disappeared without explanation. Russ's employees only said "She doesn't work here any more" when asked about her. Does anybody remember the tamale lady? What happened to her?

Inspectors have found fifty two problems with Lincoln's new fire trucks. Some of the problems are less serious than others. Hang on to your butts, the roller coaster continues. I wonder: why isn't it standard procedure for the actual instructions to the manufacturer to be sent to the City for verification? Seems like that could have headed off this problem. If Lincoln said to EDM, "Build it this way," but Lincoln found out immediately that EDM told the manufacturer "Build it some other way", alarms would have gone off. And if they didn't, well, the City should have been paying better attention. Or is that how things work and the process failed in this case?

Is it just me, or is Melissa Lee's celebration of Lincoln's sixtieth place finish in a CNNMoney poll of the best places to live a little ... off? Sixtieth place just doesn't sound all that exciting to me. It's not bad, mind you, but Ms. Lee's gloating seems a bit over the top. Actually, it sounds like another example of the Journal Star's ongoing insecurity over Lincoln in comparison to Omaha. Since Omaha was way down the list at 97, this gives the local rag a chance to strut. That's fine, I guess. (On second glance, Omaha isn't number 97 at all. Omaha came in 7th in the list of cities with a population over 300,000. To me that sounds like they scored better than Lincoln, not worse, although a direct comparison is difficult since we're talking about two different lists. Omaha typically scores better than Lincoln on these lists, so I'd be very surprised if Lincoln actually topped Omaha by 37 spots.) In any event, I'm not all that impressed by a Top-60 finish. Even though this is just a goofy little analysis with some arguable methodological decisions, it still is a decent rough indicator of how we're doing. I think it says we're doing OK. We can, and should, do better than OK. I'm not saying we have to hit #1, but reaching Casey Kasem territory would be nice, don't you think?

What do you keep your thermostat set at during these hot summer days? Some businesses keep their buildings really blasted cold, which makes me wonder if they are trying to freeze out their customers so they can all go home. It's the outdoor to indoor temperature difference that really gets me. For example, if it's 100 degrees outside and a business has their A/C set to 72 degrees, I darn near freeze my buns off. And I like to be cold. But give me a 30 degree temperature swing when I'm covered in sweat and I start to feel hypothermia coming on. The Missus and I keep our place at 78 degrees in the summer. That, plus a couple ceiling fans, keeps things comfortable (and affordable). What's your setting?

International adoption is so common these days that many people seem shocked that we adopted domestically. A typical conversation goes a little like this: Person: He's so cute! Where did you adopt him from? Me: Boston. Person: No, I mean which country was he born in? Me: The United States. Person: ... Really? I don't think folks mean to be so surprised. They are just so accustomed to children being adopted from Russia or China or, thanks to Angelina Jolie, Ethiopia. And indeed international adoption is almost the default these days. Some people do it because it is easier for them. (Older couples are welcomed by some countries, for example.) Some people do it because they are afraid of open adoption. (International adoptions are almost always closed.) Some people do it because they want a white baby. (Russia is popular for that reason.) Some even do it because they feel like the act of adoption from some countries is tantamount to offering humanitarian aid. And there are, of course, dozens of other reasons that motivate folks to adopt internationally. The Missus and I are in no position to question anybody's motives since we stated very clearly from the beginning that some of our motivations were very selfish. Still, it's sad to me that more people aren't willing to adopt domestically. I wonder why not? I suspect fear -- fear of legal hurdles, fear of a birth parent changing his/her mind, fear of the child seeking and finding his birth family and establishing a relationship -- plays a big role. Some of the fears are no doubt legitimate, but most are probably not. I know I began with a bunch of fears. Some of them could still happen. But so far all of my fears turned out to be rubbish. In any event, Robert is all American, born in the U.S.A. But I'll be honest, having spent almost two weeks in Boston, it's a lot like a foreign country. They speak funny, they drive funny, and they eat a lot of fish. To this midwestern boy that practically makes 'em European!

What cuts would you make in the city budget? Would you try to tackle all $4 million needed to keep property taxes from going up, or would you settle for less?

There are somewhere between zero and fifty problems with Lincoln's new fire trucks, depending on whom you ask. Here's a fun question to ponder: what if EDM, the trucks' manufacturer, is right, and the trucks do meet the city's specs, at least substantially? That'd be fun, wouldn't it? And by the way, it sure seems to me like a representative from the manufacturer should have been present for the inspections. As somebody involved in building the trucks, the rep might have been able to offer some valuable assistance. After all, the manufacturer will certainly want to counter with its own inspection anyway, if the City makes a formal complaint.

Clarence Osborn is the man. I feel all tingly inside every time I see him running. I hope I can still walk when I'm his age, much less run.

Lincoln is about to get 226 acres bigger at a cost of -$100,000 annually. That's not a bad deal. It isn't clear how many hidden costs are involved in the annexation of State Fair Park, but Lincoln will not take ownership of the buildings, infrastructure, or utilities.

The Lincoln Journal Star editors often get accused of being too liberal. Not today. Their chock-full-of-holes defense of the internet gambling ban reads like something straight from the pen of Bill O'Reilly. The editorial refers to "the problem" of internet gambling without ever explaining how they came to the conclusion that a problem exists, and their supporting arguments consist entirely of:

1. Some people misuse it;
2. Young people do it; and
3. People who make money off of it want to keep making money off of it.

Hardly the stuff Pulitzer Prizes are made of. The same arguments support banning, among countless other things, junk food. The nannies are all around us.