Near Northsider – Houston

It seems like it’s been raining all night. Maybe it has. At least it’s not so hot yet. Once it gets to be mid day and if there’s still a little rain coming down, then it’ll just make it more humid. ew.

My Camera blew up the other day. Sort of. All of a sudden, while I was shooting, it started taking pictures that were only blue and white horizintal lines! I’ve only had the camera since 2004! and it’s supposed to be a good one! Man I was pissed, but what can you do? so now I’m trying a few things out – resetting to the factory defaults and going over my extended warranty info. This might be a bad sign for digital photography.

One time I was photographing a weding and the shutter on my SLR got stuck in the closed position. I was able to save the film I had already exposed, open the camera, and open the shutter again with a toothpick. The shutter hasn’t given me aninymore trouble since. That’s the kind of manual fix that I really appreciate about film cameras and that I truly miss when I’m using a digital one.

Today we went to the new Target store on Shearn near I-10 and Taylor. It was the grand opening, but there didn’t seem to be too much of a big deal. I didn’t see any clowns or balloons or anything like that. But it WAS a big deal. At least it was to us. To us it means that developers and retailers are making the move back into the city which would mean more options as consumers. Rather than having to take a day-trip from the Northside to San Felipe and 6-10 to get Lansinoh baby wipes (the only wipes that appear not to give our son a rash and that we so far have only been able to find at Target), all we have to do is take a short trip – possibly a bike-ride – down Crocket street for access to goods that we previously only found in the suburbs or around the Galleria.

This now brings up an issue which would cause a conflict between my desire for neighborhood improvement and my consumerist behavior: How much of this type of development is too much? Will more retail chain stores make this area more liveable, or will it drive out the character of our neighborhood that has been able to survive economic neglect for 30 years? As much as I would like to see an Old Navy or Chipotle within walking distance from my home, I would also be mornful if the Sand dollar Thrift Store or the Houston Bakery lost business to these other national chains. In fact, I would really like to see more small neighborhood business be created as a result of more economic activity, but I’m afraid I’m being too optimistic. Is there a balance that can be reached here?

Tonight is the opening reception for Lawndale Art Center’s The Big Show! The opening is from 6:30 – 8:30pm. I’ll be there, of course (working). It’s one of the biggest events at Lawndale, so I hope to see a big turn-out.

It’s been a busy summer. Not just at work, but at home and all around us.

Things at Lawndale go through busy periods just like anything else. Now is time for the Big Show and that takes about three weeks of constant hard work to get that show ready.

Eli is our main focus at home, so sometimes things around the house don’t get done when they should. Sometimes my clothes are dirtier than they should be when I wear them. Sometimes I don’t get to shower for a few days. Sometimes Sarah doesn’t get much sleep and has to go into work early the next morning. There are even times when neither of us get to do anything because Eli just doesn’t feel like going to sleep or being put down. But we love Eli more than anything, so we live with our messy house and our front yard with the long grass that looks like our house has been deserted for weeks.

Out in the ‘hood, Urban Living is getting busy in the Northside. They’ve got at least three developments all at Hogan and Fletcher: Hogan Street Townhomes, Hogan’s Glenn, and Hogan’s Square”. All these developments are priced from 100k-200k which is the lowest price range in their list of developments. I hope that’s not what they consider to be affordable housing. I think these developments were set here on Hogan partly because of the anticipated phase II light rail extension and the hope that the proximity to downtown would cause property values to rise. However, the plans for rail keep changing, so we’ll see what happens. I just hope the neighborhood doesn’t get stuck with a few random townhomes in an otherwise wood-frame cottage area because the lightrail plans degrade to a “guided lane” bus.

I heard a knock on the door yesterday and it turned out to be Shady Eddie who dropped by on his Segway. He rides his Segway around the Northside looking for stray cans to collect and recycle. He’s had a Segway for about three years now and he started collecting aluminium cans, he said, to save up to buy another one. Well, I didn’t realize it at first, but sure enough, the Segway he was riding was new! and it carried the same grabbing-extension arm that he uses to pick up cans, and a few cans in a plastic Fiesta bag slung around the handle bars.