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Archive for the 'Akron' Category

How cabbies get a bad rap

Friday, December 15th, 2006

My father is a cab driver in Akron. He’s been driving cab for most of his life and all of mine. (In fact, he met my mother when she was a dispatcher at the cab company.)

So, today when I read “Cab slams into downtown restaurant” in the Beacon, I didn’t even finish reading the story. I just called him up to find out what happened.

That photo is crazy. The cab was apparently hit by someone who ran a red light and thrown through the window of the restaurant. And the witness said it sounded like “a bomb going off.”

When I asked my dad about it, he just laughed. The driver, a friend of his, is OK. Apparently though, he was joking with her earlier about the accident. After checking to see if she was OK, he asked if she wanted to go to lunch, he heard there was a new drive-in restaurant downtown. Hehe. That’s my father for you. I definitely inherited his sense of sarcasm.

If nothing else, the driver has another great story for her kids/friends. One of the best parts about having a cab driver for a father is the awesome stories he hears and the things he sees. Seriously. If you wanted to do participatory journalism and write a book about a city, becoming a cab driver would be a great way to do it. You get to mingle with everyone from coked out professionals to drunk college students to the normal working class people. Hmm. If I had the guts to be a cab driver (and I didn’t think my parents would kill me for considering it), that would actually make a great book.

Smoking ban goes up in, well, smoke?

Wednesday, December 13th, 2006

As this Beacon story (Smoking drifts back into area businesses) notes, several area establishments have quite literally been ignoring the new statewide smoking ban, which went into effect last Thursday.

I actually debated this with my father on Sunday. He (a smoker) pointed out that everyone was (and will continue) just ignoring the ban, so it didn’t even matter. Apparently, the bowling alley I used to work at (which was always a sort of shady place) is just telling smokers to pack the back party room and smoke there because they don’t want snow being trampled in all night. The smoke in the bowling alley alone probably took a year or two off MY life just because I had to breathe it constantly every night I worked. I remember guys would come up to the counter to smoke cigars. Cigars! I would literally choke while taking their order thinking “now, is that necessary?”

My father went on, “You think the bars in Kent are enforcing it? You’re wrong. Nobody is.” To wit I replied, “The ones I was in Thursday didn’t have a single smoker, and Ray’s yesterday and BW3’s today… nobody was smoking in any of them.” Perhaps because Kent was so close to its own ban, the bar owners resigned themselves to the inevitable. My dad’s argument to continue flaunting his cigarettes in public places was that it was a basic right. My reply? And not being exposed to pollutants that literally decrease the length and quality of my life, that’s not a right of mine? He then went into the old well “fast food is bad for people but they haven’t outlawed it” argument, and I quickly put that one to bed as well with a retort, “Well, if I chose to eat at McDonald’s then so I harm myself. I’m not hurting innocent bystanders or forcing it down anyone else’s throat.”

It’s not that my family and I don’t see eye to eye on most things, we do. It’s just that I am the one who sticks up for my position even when everyone else disagrees — probably because I’m the most informed. But seriously, as the article points out, enforcement or no enforcement, choosing to continue smoking is breaking the law.

In other unrelated news, this panda video is adorable.

Craigslist = fun stuff…

Sunday, December 10th, 2006

So, although I most certainly should be studying for the four finals I have in the next three days or practicing the piano for my piano final, I’m not. I’m not even doing laundry and packing my room up for my (temporary I hope) move back home this week. Nope, I’m surfing Craigslist and finding some interesting posts… including this one:

Student massage needed

Executive seeks non-pro massage — 1x week (1-2 hrs) for back/legs/shoulders. Legitimate. Good PT oppty. for student. Female only

Yeah. I don’t even want to comment on how creepy that is and how crazy you’d have to be to actually do that.

This one‘s subject is funny, the job is legit and probably a pretty easy, albeit annoying, way to make some quick cash, but I know people who’ve done similar work and at least the company is legit unlike the above posting.

Enjoy Passing Out Flyers Door To Door? Check This Out!
The Mugzee’s Street Team Members… – Must have own transportation. – Must have cell phone. – Must be self motivated. – Must show up on time and ready to flyer the city of Kent. We’ll pay you $7.00 per hour to simply pass out our flyers DOOR to DOOR and in apartment complexes. Interested? Call 216-402-0289 or write an email

The title just makes me laugh because nobody wakes up and thinks, gee, you know what I want to do today? I want to pass out fliers door to door! That sounds like so much fun! That and their use of the spelling “flyers” make me smile.

And all of these almost outrage me because I don’t care how bad your kid wants the new PS3, it is NOT WORTH $2,100, $1,500, $1,200, $1,050, $950, $875 or even $700. No game system is, even if it’s bundled with controllers and games. It’s just a game system. And if your kid/boyfriend/husband/friend wants it so bad, tell them to wait until next year when the price and demand goes down…. Although these prices seem insane to me, a quick google news search tells me that people are even crazier than I thought, apparently one of these PS3s actually sold for $9,000… others sold for, get this, $15,000 and $15,099 (two at this price!) — for those of you keeping track at home, those bidders paid what I pay for a YEAR’S TUITION for a PS3!

There were other postings that amused me and some that I think would make for interesting stories. (Including perhaps the apparent wide-open reseller market for PS3s and idiots willing to pay for them.) That, my friends, is the real reason I like to randomly surf Craigslist. You can find some interesting people and some interesting postings.