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  1. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    A student of the evolution of the shopping mall might look to Northgate in Seattle, which proclaimed itself the first post-War mall of its type, opening in 1950. (I take such claims with a grain of salt. I ain’t saying they’re wrong, but I’m guessing others might make similar assertions, perhaps...
  2. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    Most Americans live in communities that grew up around the personal automobile, for better or for worse. It’s not that we don’t have smaller towns and in-city districts where small independently owned stores and eateries and such predominate, but I’d wager that the amount of revenue changing...
  3. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    ^^^^^^ “Mall walking” had its heyday around here a couple decades back. Oldsters donned their walking shoes and joined up with likeminded contemporaries to get in a bit of light exercise along those level, climate-controlled corridors. But, as recently discussed in another thread, more malls...
  4. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    As to the “ethanol-scented mumblings of some guy at the far end of the bar … “ I’d never deny that different people have different mental capacities, but still, most concepts aren’t beyond the comprehension of most people. It’s not that many matters aren’t complex and that deep understanding...
  5. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    ^^^^^^ “Confirmation bias” may have entered the popular lexicon only recently, but there’s nothing new in the phenomenon. What is new is the ready access to “information” in support of whatever crockpot notion the crackpot holds dear. What’s all the worse is what appears to be an increasing...
  7. tonyb

    Tourist cabins, auto and motor courts

  8. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    ^^^^^ Yeah, but on the other hand, a person can’t retain information s/he never acquired in the first place. The problem (or, more accurately, my problem, and a problem I strongly suspect afflicts many others) is that the information that matters can get all but lost in that pile of stuff that...
  9. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    I believe it’s something akin to a biological imperative that children admire, literally “look up to,” their parents. Kids sense on a primal level how dependent and vulnerable they truly are, and cleave to that which offers them at least some security. I wanted to be proud of my stepdad. He...
  10. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    My grandfather routinely worked the kill line. (I appreciate the plain-spokenness of calling it exactly that, for that is exactly what happens there.) I’ll always remember him telling my brother and me, when our stepdad was giving my brother grief over quitting his job, that we shouldn’t fall...
  11. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    My first car was a ’58 Karmann Ghia with no reverse gear. I paid either 35 or 65 bucks for it (it’s getting to be a quite distant memory so I can’t attest to the particulars with confidence).
  13. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    My grandfather was a blue collar worker with an eighth grade education but whose union job at the packing plant afforded him a decent home and four well-fed progeny and a new Ford (or Mercury; he was partial to Ford products) every couple three or four years. His biography was fairly typical...
  14. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    I had cheap electricity when I lived in Seattle. Lotsa hydro projects out that way. Seattle City Light owns outright three dams on the Skagit River. And if not for those Depression era projects on the Columbia and Snake rivers, the agricultural Mecca east of the Cascades would be barren desert...
  15. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    This morning’s news includes a report of a teenage male shot dead at that above-referenced mall on Saturday. The shooter is still at large as of this morning.
  16. tonyb

    You know you are getting old when:

    ^^^^^^ I attribute that to having too much information so readily accessible. There are always at least a couple-three things about which I am sufficiently curious to bother looking up, but at least one of those items is forgotten by the time I get around to it, only to reappear when I’m about...
  17. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    ^^^^^^ It’ll be interesting to see what becomes of these suburban malls. I’m guessing that some will become warehouses/fulfillment centers, what with all that acreage and their locations near major highways and population centers. The mall nearest me, maybe three miles away, is still doing...
  19. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    ^^^^^ I’m reserving judgement on the rules changes taking effect this season until we have some history with them. But I don’t expect to ever favor the pitch clock. Part of the game’s appeal is the absence of a clock. Still, though, I understand the thinking behind the changes. Baseball hasn’t...
  20. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    We took steps toward installing rooftop photovoltaic panels a few months back, but backed out when the price we were quoted wasn’t the price on the proposed contract. Turns out they had, um, “overlooked” a couple things when they made the initial bid. It would take at least a decade for the...
  21. tonyb

    Vintage Things That Have Disappeared In Your Lifetime?

    I recently had a cheap (relatively) Edison base LED fail after seven years or so of nonstop use. It was in a shed, in a cheap IKEA plastic shop reflector, hanging near a window, so as to softly illuminate a path and to keep me from tripping over the stuff I keep in that shed. The LED was...
  22. tonyb

    So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

    And … I habitually check that my wallet and keys and iPhone are on my person. It is that habit that had me aware that I had left the phone in that restroom. Losing any of those items becomes a royal PITA and prevents a person from tending to other matters. People too often let themselves get...
  23. tonyb

    So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

    ^^^^^ A few months back I left my iPhone atop a toilet paper dispenser in a Starbucks restroom. But I became aware of that within a minute and went back to retrieve it. Starbucks restrooms are “one-holers” and many require a door code for entry. (And I managed not to forget the door code. Let’s...
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