respublica

The sad loss of local news

Ever since the Collinsville Herald and it's descendant, the Herald-Journal, (for all intents and purposes) went out of the local news business, it's been difficult for area residents to know what's going on around town. Yes, there are websites and Facebook, but not everyone heads to those places and often the sites aren't complete with up to the week news.

And so it happened yesterday that many Collinsville people were surprised that there was a Memorial Day parade and ceremony. The VFW was the sponsoring Veteran's entity in partnership with the Legion as they do every year. But because of IDOT work on 159 the past two years the parades had been cancelled. This year the parade returned but the news did not get out much and what did get out was garbled. The time was 11. No, the beginning time was 10:30. It would begin at Wickliffe and march to the VFW. No. It would begin at Woodland Park and travel south.

The Collinsville Conncection Facebook page which had images of the parade took a number of people by surprise that there even was a parade. I guess living by the two veterans buildings makes us more aware than folks who live in other parts of town and we take these things as a given. But it is too bad we don't have something like the Herald or Herald Journal anymore to keep us up to date on everything and anything that happens in Collinsville.

It's the same, or worse in Clayton. No one knows anything that goes on in Clayton, no news, no local politics, nothing. At least in Collinsville you can watch city council meetings live or later digitally. That's not really all we need, though. I miss the papers.

Carpet through a dog's eyes

I often take Ferdie into various campus buildings when I have to drop things off or pick up things and each building has commercial carpet squares in the public areas. The carpet pattern is different in each place but basically brown/dark gray in color and Ferdie balks each time we go in. He has to be coaxed to move through the hallways. I finally realized his eyesight sees the carpet differently than we do and it seems like he believes he will fall into a hole when on the carpets. Then i saw this photo last night and I'd be willing to bet this is exactly how our dog sees the carpet squares and I don't blame him for not wanting to move.

A couple of "So True" items

Came across a couple of things yesterday, one was kind of funny and so true, the other very serious but also true. 

1. 

So many of those old movies and tv shows had a quicksand episode and to this day I often think about getting sucked down.

2. 

Ready for Memorial Day

The Collinsville VFW and American Legion have finished their annual "Flags In" in preparation for tomorrow's Memorial Day observance. Flags In is a tradition during the days before Memorial Day as military and retired military place small flags in the ground in memory of those who died in war.

 

Flags and Poppies

Memorial Day weekend at Concordia Seminary. It's very quiet around here today, most everyone has left the campus, but the Poppies are thick and the flags are waving. Many many people from the surrounding Clayton neighborhood are on the campus taking walks, walking their dogs, jogging, biking. Many stop and sit by the flowers, flags or fountain.

And Ferdie sits by the front door watching.

How big is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway?

The Indy 500 is Sunday. How big a racing oval is this track? it's so big it fits all of these things inside of it with room to spare.

Just a bit of weekend trivia, click to enlarge to see what's in it.

Go away Cortana

The new Windows 10 showed up unbidden on another of our computers yesterday and I've been trying my best to get a handle on this system but it is so crammed with boxes and icons and advice and new ways of doing things that I'm wasting a lot of time on this. The one thing I absolutely do not like is the "assistant" Cortana. She is intrusive and pops up constantly telling me she'd like to help. So I did a Google search to see if there was a way of disabling her. Here's the list of answers, few of which are understandable or helpful. There were 435,000 search items for this questions so I'm not the only one wanting to rid my computer of her.

Here's the first answer from Google: "Bring up the Start menu and start typing. Click on the "hamburger" icon in the left sidebar and choose "Settings". From there, you can turn off Cortana. To clear Cortana from the PC memory, either reboot or open task manager and kill Cortana."

Frankly, I never saw a hamburger icon and it's absurd anyway. So I kept going. I still have no idea if I've shut her off permanently or just for today.

Memorial Day

Memorial Day is celebrated on the last Monday in May and originated after the Civil War to honor those who died in that war. First named Decoration Day because graves were decorated with flowers and flags. It was traditionally observed on May 30, but with the National Holiday Act of 1971 passed by Congress, Memorial Day is the last Monday of that month. This act ensured 3 days weekends for Federal workers. 

This history made me think of Jesse Watters and his weekly Watters World segments in which he goes out in public and asks random people questions about history or culture or politics. It is more than a bit shocking and embarrassing to watch what looks like fairly intelligent/educated Americans not know the answer to questions most of us would consider obvious. Here's last night's Watter's World in which he asked a number of questions about various American Wars. Question such as, "Why do we observe Memorial Day? Who did we fight in the Revolutionary War."

We watch and wonder about just what these people were doing during their school days. 

As if the storm weren't enough to shut down traffic

A funny, unless you're stuck here, tweet from Y98 traffic reporter Lance Hildebrand and a commuter this morning.

"storms..hail...power outages...and THIS to contend with on the roads thanks Karen!"

"there is a family of geese crossing the road on eager between brentwood & 170. Drivers b careful"

Eager Road is crazy enough during non rush times of day so this must really be something.

Sluggish iPhone?

My iPhone isn't acting sluggish, but if it does happen, this is advice from a New York Times tech story will be a good thing to try.

1. Close out all the apps you may have running. I do this at the end of every day or when I put the phone on the charger. Click the iPhone’s Home button twice to see smaller preview windows of all your open programs. Swipe up on each one or whichever ones you want to close them. Just x'ing them out when you're done doesn't really shut them down

2. This is the one that surprised me. Clear the memory. "Open to the home screen, then hold down the power button on the top or side of the device. When you see the “Slide to Power Off” screen appear, let go of the power button and press the Home button on the bottom edge of the screen for a few seconds. Stop pressing the button when the iPhone’s home screen reappears. Its memory should now be refreshed and any open apps will reload themselves."