This certainly has been a perfect spring for flowering trees, still exploding with color all over the near East Side. Here are some views at Lakeview Cemetery, where the plantings are exceptional any time of year, and especially about now. Check it out!

What is a "Green Roof" and what does it look like?

At the house on Roxbury, the green roof is where the raccoons still live.

Little Italy has always been core to my REAL NEO experience. From earliest childhood memories,  my family has always had many meals at various Little Italy restaurants, each year, as well as picking-up an occasional pizza (where else in NEO but Mama Santas or Valentino's... well, do try the Gelatoria at Fairhill). I also love getting Lemon Ice and other goodies at Corbos. with their unusual greeting of "Leave the gun, take the cannoli"... as authentic as life gets, in NEO. Last night, I noticed Corbos moved next door to their old home, to a remodeled new space (much as Prestis did, a few years ago) Little Italy has always been a great hyper-local neighborhood, where people live, work, eat and socialize together within, and interact well with the world without. There's always lots of private rehab and strong entrepreneurial business activity here, off the Med-O-Mart grid. Which makes me ask you, what matters to the hyper-local economy in your neighborhood, and how is that doing.

One great thing about a gravel driveway is you can hear them coming.

This afternoon, Claes and I were chilling at home in East Cleveland, minding our own business, when we heard that crunch of rocks under heavy tires. Then the slam of a car door, and heavy feet on the front porch... another drive-by had arrived. It's been happening regularly since we started renovating the house on Roxbury, late last Summer.... especially on a beautiful day like today.

So I am just back from 14 days in Japan.  Interesting to be on the sidelines as 3,000 Japanese police protect the olympic toarch from what I thought would be a calm, reserved crowd.  Dont get me wrong, I was not in Nagano, I was in Shibuya / Tokyo.. but it got a lot of attention.  Pro and anti China student groups and observers literally throwing punches, 70 year old Japanese men going to jail for throwing tomatoes in the face of the police protecting the toarch... etc.  It was akin to what I saw in the USA when the toarch came thru California.

by Jeremy Elton Jacquot, Los Angeles on 04.28.08

Good Video From The Article Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S6oyTdkOWc&eur

Let's start off this post with another round of good/bad news, shall we? The bad: According to new data from the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), the North Pole could become ice-free this summer because of a record low in ice formation. The good news: Its ice expanded at a greater rate this winter than it did in 2007, and there is the possibility that a milder, more cyclonic atmospheric pattern this summer could help preserve it.

As we begin a new Spring - a new beginning - what are you doing to green your republic?

Join us for the biggest gathering of cycling interests and activities ever in Northeast Ohio as we celebrate, educate and collaborate for a stronger cycling community. Whether you bicycle for transportation, recreation, health or sport, did in the past, or want to again in the future, we have something for you. Come join us for week-long activities during the month of May, national Bike Safety Month, including:

Built 40 years ago, according to the neighbors, only one of the two cooling towers has ever been put into use.  There appear to be two reactor vessel buildings (low dome roofs between cooling towers) also.   Again, the neighbors told me that the construction of the second cooling tower continued while permitting was being sought - and permitting for the second reactor never was obtained.  So the unused cooling tower is probably the largest monument to PPPP (poor prior planning involving a reference to the urinary tract) in the world.

April 1, 2008

LANSING -- The State of Michigan is examining a plan to sell about half of its share of the water in the Great Lakes over the next 20 years to drought-stricken areas in the Sunbelt states.