Friggin' Events

My day, in review:

• 11:00 AM:Wake up after long night of planning for my radio show. (Yes, despite popular belief, I actually do plan it.) Find myself confronted by even more planning. I hate having a four-hour slot.
• 12:15 PM: After the usual morning routines, turn on radio to find out that I've missed out on a rare appearance of The Disco Desperado.
• 12:30 - 3:30 PM: Finish preparing for show, wrestle with Windows while getting files transferred to laptop.
• 3:45 PM: Leave for station.
• 3:51 PM: Car stalls out on Birney Ave. Manage to get it halfway pulled into Turkey Hill entrance. Thankfully, someone pulling in stops and helps me push it into the parking lot. He spent some time cursing fuel injection and the way everything on a car is run by computer today. After my experiences, I would have to agree.
• 3:55 PM: After fumbling through my backpack, realize that my cell phone, which I rarely use and had gotten specifically for this purpose, was in my jacket.
  
  
  
  
  
  Which was, of course, at home.
• 3:56 PM: Asked Turkey Hill cashier to break a $1 bill. Attempted to call AAA on payphone located five feet from the busiest road in lower Lackawanna County.
• 4:00 PM: Begin waiting for tow truck. AAA says that it sould be there in 20-30 minutes. It begins to rain lightly.
• 4:50 PM: Truck arrives.
• 5:35 PM Luckily, we arrive at the dealer just as they were cleaning up shop for the night. Get preliminary diagnosis (timing belt), paperwork done. Called station, hoping that somebody was still there who can give me a ride back into Scrantonia. Pete graciously agrees to clear out some space in his car for me.
• 5:50 PM: Somehow remember to separate car key from rest of key ring. I usually don't remember things like that until I find myself locked out of my house at 1 AM.
• 6:30 PM: Arrive at station, proceed to do quick filler show, as I don't feel like trotting out all my usual stuff just for an hour and a half. Lots of mock-French grunting ensues.
• 8:40 PM: Arrive home, thinking that this long day was finally behind me.
• 8:41 PM: Enter house, find out that my cat had died.

I was planning on actually getting some stuff done tonight, but now I think I'll just go to bed and hope that none of this really happened.

Pardon Meow

You know how sometimes, you'll be walking along, and see somebody coming the other way, so you move to one side to get around them. But they move to that side as well, so you move to the other side, but they move at the same time, and it takes you a few attempts to finally get around each other?

I just did that with my cat.

We get letters

And now, I'm going to answer some of the feedback I've gotten from people just like you over the last 3 years. Actually, I'm going to answer most of it. It's pretty hard not to, since only 8 people ever bothered to send anything. In fact, the feedback file contains more "script test" entries from myself than it does actual feedback. Sad, really. Anyway, on to the first message, from "meow.":

meow.

meow. meow meow meow. meow meow, meow meow meow? meow, meow meow. *sigh*

I'll let University of Scranton President Fr. Joseph McShane, S.J. handle this one. Fr. McShane?


Thank you, Fr. McShane. Our next letter comes from jerry. He writes:

It was great to see the Casey still stands; they've only had nearly 20 years to figure out what to do with it!

I attended the University of Scranton in 1984 and hoped to be able to see the inside of that buidling before it fell. Unfortunately, the city did not find the need to preserve it the way they did with the Scranton Dry Good building, which was empty but fully heated the last time I saw it.

I got this one back in 2000, when the Hotel Casey was indeed still standing. Unfortunately, it was demolished earlier this year to make way for a large hole in the ground:



Right now, they're in the process of building a brand new hotel and conference center across the street from the former site of the Casey. I don't know why. Who the hell would want to have a conference in Scranton, anyway? I'd say something about how the loss of the Casey is a very bad thing for the city, but Peter Hocking already handled that topic in the June 4 entry of his weblog thingamiwhoozit (No longer online. If you wanted to see it, too bad.). As for the Scranton Dry Good building, I think Scranton Prep bought it and is planning to tear that down, too. That might be another building I'm thinking of, though.

By the way, if you're interested in what the inside of the Hotel Casey looked like, you can check out this site, which contains many illegally-obtained photos. Trespassing: W00t! This has been a message from the National Trespassing Bureau.

(Oct 29, 2001 update: Unfortunately, this site appears to have vanished from the face of the Internet. If anybody knows of a new location or even has the pictures from it sitting on their harddrive someplace, please let me know. For those of you who are still wondering what the Casey looked like inside before it was torn down: take what's left of the Titanic, remove most of the water, and replace the fish with pigeons. For those of you who are wondering about what the Casey looked like inside after it was torn down: you *really* need to get out more.)

Our next letter, from Erica:

Um, I realize that I am a big loser for actually writing and the fact that I am from Scranton, PA; but I was looking at your ScrantonCam and the picture that is supposedly taken from the 6th floor of the Casey Hotel had some, I believe they were, Cacti? Now, as many people realize, Scranton is in the North Eastern section of the US where I really dont think that there are any cacti. I just thought I would tell you. Yes, you can rant and rave all you want because some chick from Scranton corrected your site but I am really friggen bored and this took about 10 minutes of my pathetically anal life to complete so thankyou for filling my life with wonderfful things to complain about. Okay...I am going now.

You... Nah, it's too easy. Next!

The UK's very own raziele chimes in with the following:

wot s this site about please send me death threats so I can send them around

Okay, so this person apparently found my feedback page while doing a search for "death threats". I don't know why, but for some reason I find the thought of somebody saying that with an English accent absolutely hilarious. Then again, I live in Scranton. You almost have to be easily amused in this town. Anybody who lives here will know exactly what I'm talking about. Well, anybody who isn't named Erica, anyway.

So that's it for the feedback. I'd answer more, but that would mean that I'd have to get more first. So send something. Please. And Be sure to tune in next time, when I'll don a skimpy Sailormoon costume and juggle morningstars with my nose while singing Oops, I Did It Again. Or maybe not...