Lincolnite

It's "Lincoln's Best" week here at Lincolnite. Let's start with parks. What are Lincoln's five best parks? What makes them the best?

Halloween is fast approaching. What are Lincoln's best locations for Halloween festivities? Perhaps the most obvious answer, for families with children anyway, is Boo at the Zoo (October 26-30, 5:30pm - 8:00pm). Any other suggestions?

Criticizing is easy and commonplace, but giving credit is rare. Kudos to the LJS for running a front page story today on Hispanic-owned businesses in Crete, AND for a front page photo with an interracial couple. That obviously raised some eyebrows from the old guard as evidenced from the comments. This country is about to hit 300 million, one in three of which is a racial minority (By the way....welcome to the "real world" George Allen).

Based on the ingredients and nutrition facts, can you identify what I ate for lunch today? Ingredients:

• pork livers
• pork
• calcium reduced (?!) dried skim milk
• salt
• corn syrup
• water
• sugar
• ...and a bunch of preservatives

Nutrition facts per 2 oz. serving:

• Calories: 200
• Calories from fat: 160
• Total fat: 18g (28%)
• Saturdated fat: 6g (30%)
• Cholesterol: 85mg (28%)
• Sodium: 640mg (27%)
• Total carbohydrates: 2g (1%)
• Protein: 8g
• Vitamin A: 240%
• Iron: 30%

And by the way, it was goooood.

I was very disappointed in this morning's Journal Star editorial. Titled "Counseling for gay youths worth funding", I thought the LJS would take Robin Eschliman and Bob Workman to task for their boneheadedness. Instead, readers were handed an example of weak-kneed journalism that packed as much sting as a glob of Cool-Whip. I wasn't expecting an all-out assault, mind you, nor was one necessary. But if that's the best they could come up with, they should not have even bothered stirring up the masses again. At least I can still count on Neal Obermeyer to spice things up.

I'm going to give the Downtown location of Taco del Mar a try today because I have five buy-one-get-one coupons sitting on my desk. Anybody care to bogo with me over the noon hour?

The Mayor's arena task force has recommended a location for a new arena behind (west of) Lincoln Station in the Haymarket. It's a good location, but I'm left with one question: how in the world can the area roads be reconfigured to accommodate 10,000+ arena-goers? Traffic can get snarled today even with just a few hundred Haymarket-goers. Folks put up with massive traffic jams on Husker game days because, well, that's what you do. But that won't be tolerated with an arena. It's a very solvable problem, but I'm curious which options are on the table, and which are definitely out.

It's the Friday Five, paraskavedekatriaphobic edition. In honor of Friday the 13th, here are five places in Lincoln I'm afraid to go:

1. Standing next to the Sower. But if the opportunity arose, I'd do it anyway.
2. Robber's Cave without lights. After being closed for years, who knows what unpleasantries lie in the dark.
3. Any Lincoln middle school. Middle schoolers scare the crap out of me.
4. Amigo's. After ragging on Amigo's for so long, being seen there could ruin my reputation. And besides, who knows what the workers would do to my food in retalliation.
5. The kitchen at Lee's Chicken. Some things are better left unknown.

We are about a month away from election day. The polls say Ben leads Pete 55% to 32%. Does Pete have a shot, or is he dead in the water? If Pete is out of contention, does that mean Ben is unbeatable, or has the GOP just not found the right opponent yet? Discuss. (In other news, the Guv leads David Hahn 72% to 18%. Yeouch.)

What's with all the big fireworks going off right now? What did I miss?

A student came up to The Missus today and asked if he could borrow a pencil. She told him "Sure, if you hand over some collateral." So he reached into his pocket and pulled out the only thing in there. A condom. Ahh, the joys of teaching America's youth. On the plus side, at least he wears a helmet whle riding the village bicycle.

Robert slept eight straight hours last night, for a total of ten hours of restful slumber. Needless to say, mom and dad woke up very happy this morning.

Is it worth $1,500 to help prevent youth suicide? Most people, I think, would say that $1,500 is peanuts, and that of course saving a life is worth such a paltry sum. So why are folks' panties in a bunch over a suicide prevention grant discussed before the City Council and County Board this week? Because the grant's target is gay youths. The explicit message from Robin Eschliman, Bob Workman, and others, is that if you're gay, your life isn't worth a measly 1,500 bucks. It might "cause grief", as Ms. Eschliman put it. I'll bet a dead son or daughter would cause a lot of grief, too, gay or not. Amusingly, the grant's funds originate from keno proceeds. No word yet from the "family values" crowd on why it's OK to celebrate the fruits of that vice while rallying against another.

If you had to create new LPS student transfer policies, what would they look like? How would you balance the district's needs to prevent overcrowding, with families' needs to maintain continuity in their children's education?

Some of you may have noticed some odd goings-on in the Forums lately. In particular, there are five little stars above each post. If you are logged in, you can rate each post on a 1-5 scale. The feature is part of a project I'm working on for a client. I'd appreciate if you give it a try and let me know how it works for you. FYI, I don't plan to keep the rating system around once I wrap up the project for the client. If you want to convince me otherwise, feel free to give it a go.