Remember the pilgrim

Excuse any sassiness or unpleasantness of tone in the last post. I'd just taken my first stroll down Electric Avenue (KC Live, Power & Light, whatever the hell it's supposed to be called) and I wasn't quite sure what to make of the whole thing. Initially I was just relieved that they let me in with just my blue v-neck tee and flip-flops. The place was pretty cool, in that it's outside and crowded, but I don't know that I'll be going back anytime soon. The music is the same tired playlist I've been hearing at frat bars and skating rinks since the beginning of time (or at least 1986). And the DJ up in the booth didn't even have a Mac. He had a Dell.

But I do wish downtown the best, even if its new bars and fancy backdrop don't interest me in the slightest. It's trying its hardest, much like the sub-par/past-her-prime beauty who slaps on too much makeup in hopes that people will notice her again. Just flash a sad smile and walk on by.

The light rail thing, on the other hand. Now that could be fun, especially if they allow you to carry drinks around the way you can at Power & Light. I'll definitely ride it around and I'm sure lots of other people will, too.

I drive around as much as anyone, and it's hard not to feel a slight bit of panic or at least anxiety about skyrocketing gas prices... But after I watched this lady struggle to see over the dashboard of her giant land-cruiser the other day in the Half Price books parking lot, oblivious to the cars whose paths she was blocking, I found it hard to muster up too much sorrow about the twilight of our gas-guzzling glory days. It'll be uncomfortable not to have the same cheapness of mobility we've always enjoyed, but on the other hand, good riddance to all the diminutive Hausfraus powering along in their "urban combat vehicles," as my track coach King Karl used to call them.

King Karl also once said, in the middle of class, "By the time you guys are my age you'll be running around with a computer up your butt telling you what to do every 14 seconds." If you look at the advances in hand-held technology, I think he might have been right -- mostly. Another, perhaps more accurate, way to look at it would be to say, "By the time you guys are my age, you'll be running around telling a computer what you did every 14 seconds." All of you with twitter accounts probably know what I'm talking about.

Still, there's something to be said for regularity, and one of my old years resolutions was to either cancel this thing or post on a regular basis. So I'm going to try and do that, although the regularity will probably cancel out any coherence I might have achieved when this blogging thing was still a bright new country and not some tired electronic wasteland. We'll still have fun, as long as some of you comment once in a while. I don't ask for much, like real names or anything of substance, so what's the harm?

Well it's almost midnight so I'm going to finish up my Shock Top Belgian-style ale, brought to you by the St. Louis InBev subsidiary, Anheuser-Busch (don't get all up in arms, St. Louis factory workers, I didn't realize what I was buying until it was too late -- I just saw the logo of the orange peel with the mohawk and I couldn't resist).

If any of you see King Leopold's ghost paddling down the Mississippi, throw a drink on him for me.

In the meantime, check out this amazing series of deconstructed toys put together by whiz-bang designer Matt Kirkland, my old roommate at the hallowed halls of Grace Pearson.