Search Results for: graffiti

Found 22 search results for graffiti (this is page 2 of 3).

There are two Americas, and one of them is stupid

Courtesy of TeeShopUSA.Com. Buy their stuff!

I was doing some online searching for a friend with whom I worked a long time ago, so I put her name into The Facebook to see if she was around. A woman with the same name came up in the search results. She was about the same age, listed as “retired,” and looked somewhat similar to how I imagined my friend to look now that twenty-five years have passed since I saw her last. Perusing this woman’s post soon convinced me this wasn’t the old friend I was looking for. In fact, there was this galling comment on this news story that made my jaw drop. It was on this BBC news story about the Lincoln Memorial being vandalized:

“What more do they want?”

“This is getting ridiculous,” she writes. “Lincoln freed the slaves – what more do they want? Oh I know – to erase America’s history!”

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Spain, Part I

At the end of a long journey on the way to Madrid.

I am writing this on one of Spain’s impressive high-speed trains, leaving Barcelona for Seville at 275 kph. It is 9:52 AM CET. We are on the home stretch of our trip to Spain, having spent the first four days in Madrid and the next four in Barcelona. After this six-hour-long train trip we will have a few days in Seville before returning to Madrid for the night.

Spain has been a wonderful experience, in spite of our not really speaking the language. We’ve soaked up the culture and the sights and walked many kilometers around the streets of Madrid and Barcelona. Now we head to what many call the most beautiful, most Spanish city: Seville.

Our trip began midafternoon on 21 December when we arrived at RDU for our flight. A lengthy wait at the Delta counter was rewarded with all four of us getting TSA Pre-flight status and bypassing the long, holiday security lines. Soon we were seated on our Boeing 757-200S for the long trip across the Atlantic.

I had my reservations about being crammed into a 757 for such a long flight but there were two things in our favor. First, it was a red-eye flight so my body would be somewhat used to being still. Second, the family had four seats right next to each other (1+3, right side). Kelly said up-front that she didn’t want the middle seat so I volunteered for it. Surprisingly, it was very comfortable. I got up once to use the lavatory and then used my travel pillow to get a few winks in here and there. Before I knew it we were cruising over the dark, sleeping hills of Ireland on our way to Paris.
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Confederate graves, Gov. Aycock marker vandalized at Oakwood Cemetery | News & Observer

Remember when I wrote about how the Confederate Memorial doesn’t belong on the State Capitol grounds? I suggested the memorial be moved to the Oakwood Cemetery, where it and the ideals behind it could be retired forever.

The only place racism belongs is in the cemetery. Racism deserves to be buried.

Sadly,  some misguilded individual doesn’t know the difference between a monument to racism celebrated with a position on public grounds and a monument on private grounds marking the graves of people who lived in those times.

This person has vandalized someone’s final resting place. This is shameful and disrespectful and off-limits. Let the racists rest in peace along with the misguided ideals by which they lived. Let everyone see that the legacy of racism ends in the cold damp earth of a cemetery.

Speak about out our contiuning to celebratie these legacies on public grounds while advocating that the proper place for these legacies is six feet under.

 

Vandals spray-painted anti-racist graffiti on nine monuments inside Raleigh’s Historic Oakwood Cemetery, mostly damaging the graves of high-ranking officers in the Confederate Army but also defacing the stone of North Carolina Gov. Charles Aycock, whose racial views in the early 1900s have found increasing criticism.

The attack caused roughly $20,000 in damage on Wednesday night and is thought to be the first of its kind on private property, said Robin Simonton, executive director at Oakwood. Cemetery officials reported the crime to Raleigh police during the weekend, hoping to spare further destruction during the holidays.

Source: Confederate graves, Gov. Aycock marker vandalized at Oakwood Cemetery | News & Observer

SeeClickFix user suggests beautifying greenway sewer pipes

I experienced the beauty of SeeClickFix today when an anonymous user suggested the city spiff up the ugly concrete sewer pipe towers along our city’s greenways:

The concrete sewage vents could use some beautifying. Maybe you could hire a graffiti artist to paint nature scenes?

Another citizen chimed in:

Juanita Martinez (Guest)

I agree! That’s a wonderful idea. These things are ugly, I know they are necessary, but painting some nature scenes or something unique to Raleigh on them would make them interesting. I bet you could even get folks to do it for free. Maybe you could have a contest too and offer a simple prize.

Then the city responded:

City of Raleigh

I’d recommend directing your suggestion to the Raleigh Arts Commission (http://www.raleighnc.gov/arts/content/BoardsCommissions/Articles/ArtsCommission.html). This citizen group can be helpful in developing this idea into a possible project. As with most things there is more than meets the eye in any project involving public property, but the Arts Commission is made up of citizens whose task it is to involve the arts in everything we do. They can be very helpful!

SeeClickFix can often be used to point out what’s wrong with the city. This ticket shows how the service can also act as a big suggestion box, allowing ordinary citizens a way to help shape our city. More of this, please!

Public personas

A few weeks ago I was running an errand around town when I happened to spot graffiti on a telephone pole. As I’ve done perhaps a hundred times, I whipped out my phone and dialed Raleigh’s Graffiti Hotline. After giving my name and the graffiti location, we got into an impromptu conversation.

“Hi Mark, this is Elaine. It’s been a while since we’ve talked.” I’ve often said half-jokingly that I’m on a first-name basis with the Graffiti Hotline staff but it’s becoming less of a joke. “How are you doing?” she asked. “Everything all right? Your job going well?”

“Oh, sure,” I answered. “I work from home now and love my job.”

“Oh, that’s good,” Elaine said. “I remember you had lost your job and I wondered how you were doing.”

I laughed, thanked her for her concern, and said goodbye. Afterward, though, I marveled at how Elaine had remembered that I’d lost my job. It was over two years ago but I obviously had mentioned it to her and it obviously had made an impression. It blew me away that someone I’ve never even met would care about that – about me and my welfare.
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Desert Storm 20 years later

USS Elliot (DD-967) in North Arabian Gulf, circa 1998


Sunday was the 20th anniversary of the start of Operation Desert Storm. Hard to believe it’s been that long.

When Desert Storm started, I was in the Navy and spending a week in training at NSGA Imperial Beach, which was far closer to vacation than war. My ship, the USS Elliot (DD-967), had just come out of the yards for long-needed maintenance so the ship was pierside at the time and the crew was taking advantage of the time ashore to do some training. Like a lot of Americans, my experience of the fighting came from CNN, though I had the advantage of being able to read classified intelligence reports as the war raged.
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Highlights of 2010: helping out the community

It was a productive year for helping out in the community.

The biggest and most rewarding thing I did as the CAC chair was help organize the first East Raleigh Community Day event along with Ronneil Robinson, Raleigh Police, Raleigh Parks, WakeMed, and others. It was so much fun seeing everyone out and having a good time. I had a silly grin on my face all day long.

Part of the Community Day celebrations included the grand opening of the Police Department Field Office in the Raleigh Boulevard Food Lion shopping center. This was the result of an initiative I took two years ago to work with the city and the property owner to get it done. Now the shopping center is thriving, new businesses moving in, and the neighborhood has a nice local place to shop.
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Bonner Gaylord: genius app developer?

The City of Raleigh sent out this breathless press release this week touting a new mobile application called SeeClickFix. People can use the service to report things around the city that need attention, such as a traffic light that needs replacing, graffiti that needs to be removed, etc. It’s a very useful service: one that I plan to use on a regular basis.

The only issue is the press release itself. It reads as if Bonner developed the whole thing himself:
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Raleigh’s untamed greenway: Walnut Creek Trail

Walnut Creek Greenway

The beautiful morning and the promise of a sunny afternoon in the mid 70s got us itching to go for another family bike ride. After considering a trip out to Durham’s American Tobacco Trail greenway, we opted instead to explore one greenway we’d never tried before, Southeast Raleigh’s Walnut Creek Trail.

Our goal was to start at the easternmost point possible and go as far west as we could. Worthdale Community Center seemed to be the trail’s official starting point but after reviewing the maps I decided the 8/10ths of a mile from there through the surrounding neighborhood to the paved greenway was not worth riding. I know what homes and sidewalks look like: I wans the trail!

We thus drove to the end of Little John Road and parked at its dead end. The residents of the house next to us gave us long looks through the storm door, making me think that they didn’t see many greenway users parking here. Though I felt the neighborhood was completely safe I decided that parking on the narrow neighborhood street was being too disruptive to the neighborhood. Next time I’ll look for a lot at one of the nearby community centers.
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The case of the pilfered pumpkin

I woke up to find one of our three foam pumpkin decorations had wandered off from the steps of our porch. Looking around I didn’t see any obvious place it could’ve rolled. It was just gone!

I stood there scratching my head, fuming that some neighborhood miscreant would walk off with my fake, two-dollar pumpkin. Then my neighbor walked by with her dog.
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