Category Archives: Unpacking

Kick That Block; Block That Kick ► Unpacking the Writer

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I am in the middle of the worst case of Writer’s Block in my lifetime.

I’ve been through this before and it usually dissipates naturally without my having to work it it. This one hasn’t and only seems to have gotten stronger the more I kick at it. In an effort to kick it to the curb, let’s talk about some of the reasons why this might be happening.

1). To begin with, I actually write every day . . . In my head while UberLyfting. I am on the road for hours and hours on end. During that time I write paragraph after paragraph in my head. This article, for example, has already been written dozens of times. I have, in my head on any number of occasions, reordered these paragraphs and come up with certain wording and bullet points. Writing so much in my head, by the time I get home to my keyboard it already feels finished, so I don’t bother to put it down digitally.

2). Speaking of when I get home: I sit down at the PC —with the tee vee on in the background— and start reading the news of the day on the various websites I haunt. Then I start farting around on the facebookery. By the time I next look at the clock it’s 3 or 4 in the afternoon and I no longer feel like writing.

3). Speaking of the afternoon: This is somewhat difficult for me to admit, being as how I’ve been a professional writer my entire adult life, but I stopped being able to write in the afternoons. It used to be that I could write day or night. I would wake up at any hour and start pounding on a keyboard, creating legible sentences and paragraphs. Writing was something that I had to do, not necessarily something I wanted to do, altho’ I did. Words were always pouring out of me in one form or another.

However, I noticed a number of years ago (about 5, if I had to estimate) that, while I could write up a storm in the mornings, any word craft later in the day was junk. All my articles for NewsHounds and PoliticusUSA were written early in the morning. Most (if not all) of my posts at Not Now Silly were written in the morning. If I tried to write in the afternoons, it came slowly, if it came at all. And, what I produced was of such poor quality that I’d often scrap it entirely or spend so much time editing it into shape that I may as well have scrapped it and started over. That may have been easier and faster.

4). I used to set aside time every day to write because I had assignments due, or a post I was compelled to write. Lately, I don’t seem to have anything I really want to write about, so I make posts on the facebooky, as if that’s really writing at all.

5). One of the heavier things weighing on my mind (but not the most) is this: If you’ve been following along at home, you’ll know how I’ve been writing about Coconut Grove for the last decade; first trying to save the E.W.F. Stirrup House (a battle lost, as the house has now been replicated, not renovated) and then moving on to fight the runaway gentrification on Charles Avenue. My last article on that topic was Rapacious Developers Are Destroying A Historic Black Neighbourhood.

Not to put too fine a point on it, no one shared this article. I’ve checked every corner of the internet I could shine a light into. I could not find a single instance of it being shared. None of the stakeholders in Coconut Grove seemed to care enough to share it. No one who professes love for Charles Avenue shared it. I couldn’t get the Miami Herald to look into it and no other pundit or publication showed a scintilla of interest.

It was a severe blow to my ego.

“Why the fuck should I knock myself out?”, I started to ask myself in the way one asks questions in your head during moments of self-doubt. I don’t live in Miami. I don’t even live in that county. The E.W.F. Stirrup House is 37.2, 40.1, or 41.2 miles away from me (depending on which highway I take). On a good day I can be there in an hour. On a bad day it’s take 3 hours. Three fucking hours on I-95 that could be better spent, even if it’s just cleaning lint out of my navel or farting around on the facebookery.

Why should I spend all that time, all that gas, all that energy, all that money on FOIA requests, when the efforts of my research are not appreciated by those I thought I was helping?

And, that particular thought bothers me as well. Was I doing this because it was the right thing to do? Or was it because I was trying to impress people in Coconut Grove? I thought it was the former, but this question preying on me makes me think that maybe it was the latter.

6). Here’s a larger data point looming within my Writers’ Block: While trying to get over this hump, I started writing an intensely personal confession about something from my past. It’s actually something I had been working on for decades, but —again— only in my head. Without going into detail (because that’s what that post would have done and will still do once [if?] I get back to it), I have recovered a childhood memory that has me questioning WTF?

Then I began the slow and emotionally difficult process of writing an article about it. I was making incremental progress on it, despite having to kick against the writers’ block. And then: Disaster!

As odd as it seems, the news of the day made me question whether I should finish and publish the article. It’s not that I couldn’t make this confession. It was more that I couldn’t make it at that time. It would have appeared as if I was jumping onto a bandwagon, trying to make something that was not about me all about me.

Consequently, I shelved the article to the point of deleting the draft I has been working on. It’s gone and, if I ever want to finish it, I will have to start it all over again.

It’s something I need to write eventually (if only for my sanity), but don’t know how much time will be needed before it no longer appears that I’m just trying to shine by reflection of other people’s difficulties.

7). Last, but certainly not least, because it’s really the #1 reason I am going through this: I feel like I’m losing my ability to rite gud. Whether it’s because the lack of use has atrophied my writing muscle or because my brain is not firing the way it used to. When I do try to write I occasionally get lost in the paragraph. I hit a dead end and no longer remember where I was going. Then I have to sit and reread what’s there before I can find the roadmap that gets me out of there. Occasionally, I’ll even lose my place in the middle of a word.

There’s no GPS system for getting lost like that. I have to find my way out of the maze on my own and there are times it’s a struggle.

For all these reasons I have been having trouble getting words down lately. The only saving grace is that this article came relatively easy and quickly. That may be because I’ve written it in my head many times already. Or, maybe, hopefully, fingers crossed, I am getting over this hump.

An Open Email to the Miami Herald

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From: Headly Westerfield
To: List of Herald names
Date: Aug 8, 2018, 9:06 AM
Subject: He fought historic designation on his property. Now, he’s on the preservation board

This concerns the article “He fought historic designation on his property. Now, he’s on the preservation board“.

I have been writing about the subject of Demolition by Neglect on Charles Avenue for the last 9 years. I have also tried to interest the Herald in some of the shenanigans I have uncovered to no avail.

It puzzles me that Rasken and De La Paz were able to get a story which went into their specific complaints and yet accuse others of planting the story, with no evidence whatsoever.

Meanwhile, this morning I published a story on my little old blog — which keeps fighting gentrification in West Grove — that is a much bigger story about Charles Avenue and its continued destruction. I hope you will find it newsworthy enough to actually do an article on it.

Rapacious Developers Are Destroying A Historic Black Neighbourhood

I would be happy to talk to anyone who would like to follow up on this story, or any of the others I have written about what’s been happening on Charles Avenue over the last decade. Feel free to call anytime: 954-XXX-XXXX

While this story is best told in situ, so one can see all the players and how all of these properties and machinations connect, I am leaving for a 3 week road trip early Friday morning. However, I will be glad to meet with someone any time today or tomorrow if they would like a small tour. I live in Sunrise up in Broward, so I would need an hour’s notice.

Rapacious Developers Are Destroying A Historic Black Neighbourhood

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The Charles Avenue Historic Marker the first time this author saw it.

In 2012 the city designated Charles Avenue, one of the oldest — if not the oldest — street in Miami, a Historic Roadway. 

The Not Now Silly Newsroom has documented time and again how developers around Charles Avenue have done nothing but obliterate that history.

The latest outrage is the most massive attempt at gentrification in West Grove since the last outrage, which was the Grove Gardens Residence Condominiums (which this reporter calls The Monstrosity). First a quick course in a century plus of West Grove history.

In the late 1800s, as cities in the north were already metropolises, Coconut Grove was still a mix of swamp and dry land, just getting started. Its settlement pre-dates the City of Miami, which grew faster and taller.

Commodore Ralph Monroe, one of the earliest residents, advertised in the north to his rich industrialist friends. He offered a totally immersive rustic experience at Camp Biscayne, where people could fish, hunt, and sail. This was before any roads could bring tourists to South Florida. Boats were the only way in. South Florida’s tourist boom — now its biggest industry — begins there and then.

The earliest gathering of what could be considered a community in Coconut Grove were the Bahamians that drifted up through Key West looking for work. Mariah Brown (known as Mary the Washerwoman at the Peacock Inn) was able to buy a small plot of land on what would become Evangelist Street and, later, Charles Avenue. [Her house on Charles Avenue is now a replica.] Eventually a gentleman by the name of Ebenezer Woodbury Franklin Stirrup became the largest landholder in Coconut Grove, and one of Florida’s first Black millionaires.

E.W.F. Stirrup had a crazy idea that would have got him lynched anywhere else in the south. He thought that growing Black families needed Black home ownership. As more people moved to the area for work, Stirrup built more than 100 houses with his own hands on land he owned in Coconut Grove. These simple shotgun and Conch-style homes were sold, rented, and bartered to the hardworking men and women who really built Coconut Grove — and greater Miami — out of the swamp.

Read more about E.W.F. Stirrup here.

That simple fact made Coconut Grove a unique place in this country. Before it was swallowed by Miami (in an illegal annexation that could never happen today), it had the highest percentage of Black home ownership than anywhere else in the country.

Skip ahead a bunch of decades. The neighbourhood remained, for the most part, cohesively Black, as Black districts often do, because White folk won’t live there. And, as Black districts often are, this one was poor; the average wage was less and, therefore, the ability to get home loans was decreased, if the people weren’t redlined altogether. The neighbourhood slid into a slow, inevitable decline. However, the area that surrounded this enclave became one of the most exclusive in in this entire country. The Black pioneers, and their descendants who continued to own the houses, became land rich and cash poor. That’s why West Grove (as distinguished from White Grove, to be blunt) was ripe for gentrification.

Read about the wall Miami mandated built to separate the Black
and White communities in Coconut Grove: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

If one drives around the neighbourhood, you’d see how, on lands that once belonged to Stirrup (and his descendants), properties have been bought, combined, developed, and walled off. These very small gated communities along Franklin — of 4-12 units — were the first beachheads into what has become over the years runaway gentrification. Grand Avenue, once the thriving Black business district, is undergoing its own challenges through gentrification, but that’s another story for another day.

I digress. Here’s some more recent history.

Approximately 15 years ago someone amassed several contiguous properties on Main Highway at the corner of Franklin Avenue. A developer bought the package and built The Monstrosity.

I entered the picture afterwards, in February of 2009. I remember returning from that first visit to Coconut Grove and telling several friends that I wasn’t sure what I had discovered, but I thought there was a story to be written. I was wrong. There have now been many stories written.

On the day this writer discovered the Charles Avenue Historic Marker — and the E.W.F. Stirrup House — it was my very first time in the neighbourhood. And, coincidentally, it was these 2 properties immediately behind the historic marker — 3227 and 3247 Charles Avenue — that provided the first mystery to be solved. That day I rushed home to look Charles Avenue up on Google Earth. Despite these lots being empty earlier in the day, Google Maps had a small house on each lot; one a shotgun, the other a Conch style, if I recall correctly.

Where did these houses go and why?

In a coconut shell, here’s a short history of these 2 properties:

They had been in the Stirrup Family for a few generations. When the rapacious developer showed up to build the Monstrosity, he entered into a complicated property swap with the Stirrup descendants. In exchange for 2 brand new condos in The Monstrosity — and $10 to make it all legal — they would give the developer these 2 properties on the north side of Charles Avenue and a 50-year lease on the historic E.W.F. Stirrup House.

Almost as an aside, this writer spent almost a decade trying to save the E.W.F. Stirrup House from Demolition by Neglect, despite it being designated historic in 2004. That fight was lost and is told elsewhere in these pages. Long story short: That house is now  replica after the same developer used Demolition by Neglect (nearly a decade of open windows on a wood frame house) to argue in front of Miami’s Historic Preservation Board the house was too far gone to be saved. In other words: They used the conditions they created to successfully argue they no longer had an obligation to restore the house, instead building a recreation.

Read more about the E.W.F. Stirrup House.

Would this have been the fate of the E.W.F. Stirrup House if it had been owned by the White pioneers of Coconut Grove? One needs only look to the Barnacle State Park, where Commodore Monroe’s house was saved, for your answer. E.W.F. Stirrup was his friend and contemporary.

But, back to these 2 houses. Where did they go?

The developer knocked them down to use the lots as a marshalling yard to build The Monstrosity. That neatly solved a construction problem. Crews were able to use the Stirrup property as a pass-through, as opposed to having to use the busier Main Highway. However, the neighbourhood lost 2 affordable houses of “vernacular style”. Ironically, the city of Miami successfully passed a law to save these “vernacular” houses recently, saving these last few shotgun and Conch-style homes. Had this law been in place, I would have had a greater shot at saving the Stirrup House and the developer never would have been able to knock down the 2 houses across the street.

What happened to these 2 properties after that? Financial jigger-pokery, if you believe blogger Heinz Deiter (and I do). Deiter alleged that the developer valued the 2 condos in the not-yet built Monstrosity at $500,000 each, which was a huge stretch. Then he went to the bank and claimed he now owned $1,000,000 worth of property on the north side of Charles Avenue. Despite prevailing property values to the contrary, the bank took his word for it.

He was able to obtain a bank loan using those properties as collateral. Once these properties were no longer needed for this grand scheme of building the Monstrosity, the developers had a new scheme. They simply stopped paying off the bank loan and allowed the properties to go into foreclosure. The bank repossessed, put the properties up for auction, and they were bought by a company whose owner was a partner in other companies with the developer who had just defaulted. Then, through some more LLC jiggery-pokery, these properties were conveyed back to the same developer.

Bank distress auctions are supposed to be arm’s length. This one was not. By my estimate the bank took a $750,000 bath on these properties. When I tried to interest the bank in what I considered to be a fraud upon it, they were very incurious and didn’t seem to care at all. After all, it’s only money.

Not Now Silly has written other stories about these 2 properties, like the night valets from Commodore Plaza were illegally using them for overflow parking at $6 a car, ripping off the city of Miami and creating chaos on a residential street.

Read more about the Night of the Mad Valets.

Which gets us to the real topic of this post after all that preamble. These 2 properties, combined with several others, both on Charles and William Avenue, will be turned into what appears to be a 30 room, 2 story hotel.

Back in 2016 I worked on a secret project, which was an attempt to connect all the various rapacious developers in Coconut Grove with all the properties they owned, or controlled, along Grand Avenue. I created a map, which I colour-coded by property ownership. It was during the making of this gentrification map that I accidentally discovered that Peter Gardiner (of the Pointe Group) had not only bought into the redevelopment project at the E.W.F. Stirrup House B&B, but had purchased these 2 properties under discussion at $1,000,000 a piece.

I booked an appointment to interview Gardiner, knowing I was going to pull a massive Bait & Switch.

We started our discussion with the Stirrup House and he assured me that as a lifelong Coconut Grove resident, he wants nothing but the best for Coconut Grove. Whenever he said that, and he said it several times, I heard, “Nothing but the best for White Grove.” He talked about what a wonderful steward his companies will be in Coconut Grove.

When I thought we had exhausted that topic, I pulled out my colour-coded map of Grand Avenue. I told him that these properties along Grand — including ones he owned through Pointe Group — have now been flipped so many times that the properties can no longer pay for themselves. Property is a machine that has to pay for itself. These properties along Grand will never pay for themselves unless Miami upzones the properties allowing for heights and densities greater than the 5 storeys allowed in the Miami 21 plan.

Read more about Grand Avenue here and of a 16-year old
Grand Avenue improvement plan that never happened here.

Then I also let him know that I knew he had recently bought these 2 properties on the north side of Charles Avenue. I laid out the history of these properties, including the suspected fraud upon the bank, and his only reaction was that maybe he hadn’t done his due diligence on these properties. Ya think?

Keep in mind that these 2 properties were overvalued at $500,000 each when they were traded for condos in the Monstrosity. They sold in 2015 for $1 million each, a markup of 100% on properties that were valued by the owner himself. However, Heagrand Inc, bought them for a mere $215,000 at the bank’s distress auction just 4 years earlier.

These properties (and all of the others that will need to be combined to build this hotel) are zoned Single Family. However, based upon the price paid, they will NEVER be able to make back their money by building a single family home on any of these lots, and a few of them still have houses on them.

I made it clear to Peter Gardiner in 2016 that I would fight him tooth and nail on any upzoning effort and that was 2 years before I saw this hotel rendering.

These developers have property flipped themselves into a corner. They now have land that can never pay for itself. The only way they can make any money whatsoever is by building big and building up. By building a hotel on these properties, as a matter of fact.

Something I’ve learned: Developers have better lawyers than the city. They tend to get whatever they want. Something else I’ve discovered through this process of investigating properties is that developers plan for the long game, sometimes decades in advance. This plan has been in the works since the beginning. I heard talk of it 9 years ago, but dismissed it as a fantasy. But the fantasy now has an architect’s rendering.

CROSSING THE LINE FROM JOURNALIST TO ACTIVIST

Recently I did something I’ve never done before as an advocacy journalist. Normally I research a story, write it up, publish it, and then promote the finished article. This time, while still researching this article, I went to the neighbourhood Homeowners’ Association [HOATA] and passed around the architectural rendering you see here. I challenged them to fight this project with everything they have otherwise the gentrifiers win and the neighbourhood loses.

PREDICTIONS:

  • The developers will use conditions it created — just like they did on the Stirrup House — as the reason to argue for redeveloping these fallow lots;
  • The developers will use the height of the Monstrosity to argue this hotel is not too big for the community;
  • The developers will argue they need not plan for on-site parking because the Miami Parking Authority is planning a huge, honking parking garage right next door as part of the Coconut Grove Playhouse redevelopment project;
  • People [that I won’t name yet] who claim to protect the neighbourhood will come out in support of this massive development (if they haven’t already in secret talks) because they have dealings with these developers in other parts of Coconut Grove;
  • Miami-Dade County, which is redeveloping the Playhouse property, will come out in favour of this massive development (if it hasn’t already in secret talks);
  • Gable Stage, expected to occupy a redeveloped Playhouse, will come out in favour of this project (if it hasn’t already in secret talks);
  • Community activists will fail to mount a successful fight to block this project;
  • Miami’s Planning and Zoning Board will approve this upzoning because, again, developers always seems to get what they want;
  • Miami Commissioners will fail to stop the project (if they haven’t already given tacit approval in secret talks);
  • Miami Commissioners will attempt to squeeze community concessions out of the developers — which will be small potatoes, unenforceable, and forgotten soon after — once they realize this is a runaway train.

To sum up: This battle is already lost unless the community fights the upzoning at the Planning and Zoning Board, to put the kibosh on building a hotel for rich White Folk, so that other rich White folk make a small fortune in a historic Black neighbourhood.

Because, make no mistake, at the core of every story about Coconut Grove is a story about Racism. 

This Toxic Timebomb Could Blow Up Soccer In Miami

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Everything old is new again.

David Beckham, who has been trying to bring Major League Soccer to Miami for the last 5 years, has run headlong into an issue that roiled the city just a few years ago: Toxic soil.

Soilgate was a stain upon the City of Miami’s reputation and is a hidden aspect of racism that remains, pretty much, still hidden to this day. For 70 years Old Smokey, the incinerator situated in the Black neighbourhood of West Grove, belched out smoke and suspected carcinogens settling on everything from houses to playgrounds to fresh laundry drying on the line.

Despite decades of local complaints Old Smokey was only shuttered after White parents complained. Because of desegregation their children had been transferred to a nearby school. As time went on, people simply forgot about Old Smokey as the property was turned into a training facility for the Miami Fire Rescue Training Center.

That toxic soil timebomb eventually exploded when — after covering it up for 2 years — the City of Miami announced the closing of 8 parks due to the discovery of toxic soil. The toxic soil came from toxic fill from Old Smokey. The city was simply giving it away by the truckload, as well as using it for parks.

► Read more about Old Smokey from the Old Smokey Steering Committee
► Read more about a class action suit against the City of Miami by West Grove residents
► Read more about Soilgate in the Not Now Silly Newsroom

While the parks were eventually remediated (but not to everyone’s satisfaction) and reopened, no one really knows how well the remediation plan of removal and seal will hold up over time.

Meanwhile, Beckham and the Mas brothers are hot to bring football — as it’s known everywhere but here — to Miami. To that end they’ve already tried two previous locations which fell apart over different issues. Team Beckham is hoping the 3rd time’s the charm. The new location is Melreese Country Club.

It won’t be easy. The golf course is the only City of Miami owned golf course in the city, it is loved by people across the spectrum, and is home to The First Tee, a children’s charity whose mission statement is “To impact the lives of young people by providing educational programs that build character, instill life-enhancing values and promote healthy choices through the game of golf.” Hardest of all: Approving the Beckham site would require the city to accept this no bid plan and doing so would require a change to the city by-laws to accept a non-competitive plan.

However, it was also discovered that Melreese is another Miami location filled with toxic soil. The location was previously a dump site and fill from Old Smokey may have been used here as well. According to Miami New Times:

The county first realized it might have a toxic problem in Melreese in early 2005 when it started digging in Grapeland Park, a smaller public plot that borders Melreese’s southeastern corner. Beneath a water park in Grapeland, its engineers discovered a serious issue: “Incinerator ash material was found in a layer at least two-feet thick” beneath Grapeland’s soil, according to a DERM report.

In October 2015, DERM hired a firm to drill soil samples and test water at nearby Melreese, a 154-acre course that opened in the 1960s, to see if it also was contaminated. The short answer: most definitely.

The company dug 50 holes up to three feet deep around the course and, in 36 of them, immediately found clear evidence of toxic ash. The ash was silty, “dark gray to black in color” with “brownish-red nodules” and plenty of burnt glass and metal shards, a sure sign of the waste. The thickness varied, but in some places “exceeded four feet in thickness.”

Since Grapeland was in use as a water park, county officials decided the toxic ash had to be removed ASAP. The process wasn’t cheap. In 2006, contractors quietly hauled away 86,000 tons of toxic soil at a reported cost of nearly $10 million. Grapeland is a fraction of the size of Melreese.

Last week Beckham’s boys put on their dog & pony show for the Miami City Commission to vote in favour of approving the referendum question for November’s ballot which would change the city’s charter to accept the no bid contract. However, before they got a chance to reveal their plan there was almost 4 hours of public comment, both for and against bringing soccer to Melreese, to be renamed Freedom Park.

In the end the city decided to punt the issue to another meeting this week after Commissioner Ken Russell* said there were still outstanding issues that need to be addressed, the least of which is the toxic soil on this location and who will pay for the remediation.

It’s supremely ironic that it was Russell who put the kibosh on this plan. Russell ‘made his bones’ over the issue of toxic soil. Russell woke up one morning to find the park across teh street from his house was fenced off and closed without warning. This is where he and his children played. After some investigation he discovered it was due to toxic soil from Old Smokey. Further investigation revealed a remediation plan, which had been worked out in the backrooms of Miami City Hall without any public consultation whatsoever, would be totally inadequate for the job required and would destroy much of Merrie Christmas park in the process. Russell took his fight to City Hall and won. A year later he became the dark horse winner in the race to replace the termed-out commissioner.

Not Now Silly is agnostic on the issue of Freedom Park provided 2 important conditions are met:

  • No taxpayer money is spent to build it, support it, or remediate it;
  • All concessions will be required to sell Freedom Fries instead of French Fries.

* FULL DISCLOSURE: I have been working on a book with, and about, Ken Russell, which may never see the light of day.

Developers Continue To Destroy Charles Avenue

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The 2 side-by-side shotgun homes at 3295 and 3297 Charles Avenue

As Miami City Hall develops a plan to save the historic homes in West Grove, one man is fighting to knock down 2 of them, which is 4% of what remains.

Andrew Rasken is a real estate agent/developer who already owns several properties in Coconut Grove. Recently he purchased — through a shell corporation — two of the historic shotgun houses on Charles Avenue, directly across the street from the replicated Mariah Brown house. Now he’s petitioning Miami to knock them down to build what he claims will be his family home. There are several reasons to suspect that he just wants to flip these properties after he builds some kind Big White Box mega-home on the lot.

There is also reason to suspect that he’s taken Demolition by Neglect to an entirely new level.

According to an anonymous source Rasken [allegedly] had some workmen remove a support pillar behind the house. Then he got the city’s Unsafe Structures Section to declare it an unsafe structure.

In addition, recent pictures of the house by this writer shows brand new damage where the siding has been ripped away in some spots on the sides and back of the house. This will only allow further wood rot and weather damage. Maybe we should call this Demolition by Demolition.

Now Rasken finds himself in a Catch 22: He wants a demolition permit to tear down the houses, but Miami refuses to issue one until the city decides the fate of all the historic homes in the West Grove, of which these are two. Meanwhile, Miami’s code compliance department is ordering him (or his corporation) to bring the houses up to city code.

One reason to suspect Rasken’s motives can be found in the pages of the Miami Herald under this headline:

A developer wanted to raze a 99-year-old Grove cottage. Then came a shocking ruling.

The article describes a pitched battle between residents of Coconut Grove and the very same Andrew Rasken, developer.

In lushly verdant Coconut Grove, where a wave of ungainly residential redevelopment has mowed down trees and homes by the score, at least one house — late local legend Charlie Cinnamon’s century-old cottage — is still standing, at least for now. To nearly everyone’s surprise, the tiny wooden house has survived the first attempt at demolition by a developer.

In a rare and unexpected move, Miami’s zoning board blocked demolition of Cinnamon’s 1919 cottage, which sits at the edge of an expansive tree-covered property where a developer hopes to build a large house.

It’s unclear whether the board’s decision will survive an almost-certain appeal by the developer, Andrew Raskin [sic]. But Thursday night’s 5-3 vote has heartened Grove residents fighting back against what they contend is the city’s failure to enforce zoning rules amid an onslaught by developers that’s stripping the village’s residential neighborhoods, Miami’s oldest, of their historic look and feel.

According to the Herald article the Cinnamon house only occupies 1,000 square feet of a 14,000 square foot lot, leaving loads of room for Rasken to build his house. However, another wrinkle in his plans are that the neighbours will also resist the building of anything that doesn’t reflect the historic composition and architecture of the Grove. In other words: A Big White Box.

The assumption is that Rasken also wants to build a Big White Box on Charles Avenue, which has been designated a Historic Road as the oldest street in Miami.

Here are some of the other pictures I took yesterday.

We’re Getting the Band Back Together ► Unpacking The Writer

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11/25/15: When Ken Russell arrives to take the oath of office, his spot is already reserved.

Hello again, Not Now Silly fans. Did you miss me? I missed you.

When we last spoke with any regularity, I was in the process of mothballing the Not Now Silly Newsroom. For those who missed it. I put this blog on hiatus after I signed a non-disclosure agreement with Miami District 2 Commissioner Ken Russell.

[Yes, that’s right. I have something in common with Stormy Daniels.]

I had approached him, pitching the idea of a book. I believe Russell’s story is one of those quintessential ‘Merkin stories: Young family man wakes up to city-made environmental disaster right outside his front door, fights inadequate backroom city hall remediation, effects adequate clean-up, gets bitten by the civic improvement bug, runs for public office a year later, and is elected to replace the [allegedly] corrupt Miami Commissioner with whom he battled. Of course I would have fleshed it out a little, starting with his father’s patent for mass producing the famous Russell Yo-Yo, which has been licensed by everybody from Sprite to Daft Punk.

After kicking around several ideas we both had — and various formats we could shoe-horn them into — Russell agreed to collaborate with me on a book. That’s when we signed the non-disclosure agreement that said I couldn’t reveal anything I learned from Russell until an eventual book came out. He couldn’t reveal anything I told him either, but what could I tell him?

Something that began to drive me nuts: This was the first time in all my years as an investigative journalist when I had some great, inside information, but couldn’t report on it due to the NDA. Russell called it the price of access. I called it an itch I couldn’t scratch.

After we agreed to this book project, Russell announced he was running for Florida Congressional District 27. Suddenly the stakes for the eventual book became a whole lot higher. I was gratified he trusted me enough to write his official biography, but knew the project had just become a whole lot more daunting and important.

Since then I’ve done hours and hours of interviews with Russell [every Sunday at 1PM for months], embedded with him on various civic duties, and talked to many people about him. As my research continued, the contours of the book began to take shape. However, I still had a long way to go; and the time in which to do it. The primary wouldn’t be until the summer and, if Russell won that, the general election in November. That would be the obvious place(s) to end any such a book, even though it wasn’t what I envisioned when I originally had this idea.

A rare quiet moment at the 2nd Annual Hash Bash Cup

While returning from a recent Road Trip [to Ann Arbor to cover the 2nd Annual Hash Bash Cup, which will eventually be part of a much larger article here], I decided to detour slightly to Covington, KY. Covington is just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati, but — more importantly — Covington is where Ken Russell’s father, Luther Jackson “Jack” Russell grew up in the ’20s and ’30s, almost a century ago. I wanted to see if I could find the Five & Dime in which Russell’s father demonstrated Yo-Yos as a teen for cigarette money.

Because I wasn’t sure I’d have time for this side trip, I didn’t tell Russell until it was confirmed in the itinerary. Here’s our text exchange:

ME: Hey there! Remember me? [Every one of my texts to him start the same way.] I have the opportunity to go Covington Kentucky tomorrow. It will add about a half a day to my trip. So, what’s new with you?
KR: I just quit the congressional run. I’m sticking around. Sorry I couldn’t tell you earlier, but I just decided yesterday.

IRONY ALERT: I didn’t know Russell had just announced he was withdrawing from the race when I asked, “So, what’s new with you?”

IRONY ALERT #2: I sent my text to him earlier that morning. By the time Russell responded I was in Elyria, Ohio, explaining to painter David Pavlak about the book I was writing about a politician. Pavlak saw the book project fall apart in real time as I was telling him how excited I was to be writing the book.

So . . . all that to explain why I’m kick-starting the Not Now Silly Newsroom. I wouldn’t be surprised if the engine runs a little rough for the next little while. It’s probably going to need points and plugs, and other enginey things that I can only imagine (because I’m not mechanical and rusty on metaphor).

I have a few ideas for some investigative stories, some of which have been percolating for a long time. I will also be relaunching UpLyfting Thoughts as UberLyfting Thoughts, adding new Throwback Thursdays and Saturday Morning Cartoons to the mix, and dropping new posts under the various other rubrics here.

Stay tuned, folks, and welcome back.

Crespogram, Coconut Grove, and Charles Avenue

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Those who follow me on social media know I love to share the heat from the Crespogram Report.

FULL DISCLOSURE: A while back I recused myself from commenting on Miami politics because I am currently writing the biography of Ken Russell, Commissioner in Miami’s District 2, now running for Congress in Miami’s District 27. Therefore, take whatever I write with however many grains of salt you need in order to make this post palatable.

Let me first put a fine point on it: While Al Crespo is — hands down — the best of the Miami muckrakers, his post of this morning is a total misfire.

What I have always loved about Crespo is how he backs up his accusations with facts and the official documents. He publishes them to prove his assertions and prove that Miami politicians are lying scumbags.

Not today.

Today he published a letter from Guillermo de la Paz and says about it:

It’s pretty self-explanatory, and raises a very serious question about how Andy Parrish stays on the City of Miami’s Planning and Zoning Board if, in fact de la Paz’s accusations are true.

If true.

Remember, it was only last week people were saying “If true, Roy Moore should step down.”

If true!!!

It may very well be true. I don’t know and I don’t really care. I’m not concerned with that.

Here’s what I do know: Guillermo de la Paz is lashing out because he’s been under continued scrutiny and criticism ever since he built his block-busting Big White Box on Charles Avenue. He’s referencing an article in the Miami Herald and his letter quotes several people out of context on what they think of the Big White Box style of domicile.

The only thing left of the designated historic E.W.F. Stirrup House is the roof. Every other stick of wood in the structure was replaced after a rapacious developer allowed it to undergo nearly a decade of DEMOLITION BY NEGLECT.

Longtime readers of Not Now Silly will remember my 8-year failed attempt to save the E.W.F. Stirrup House — the oldest house on the oldest street in Miami — from DEMOLITION BY NEGLECT. Charles Avenue was once called Evangelist Street and was laid out by the very same E.W.F. Stirrup on a slight angle because he was not a surveyor. It was designated a Historic Roadway by the city of Miami in 2012. Even that was not enough to save the Stirrup House and keep de la Paz’s Big White Box off Charles.

Let me state up front that de la Paz didn’t break any laws or build anything without the appropriate permits. The argument is whether Miami’s Planning and Zoning department dropped the ball in allowing any of this to happen in the first place. Charles Avenue is in the NCD-2 [Neighborhood (sic) Conservation District overlay #2]. The NCD-2, as opposed to the NCD-3 (on the opposite side of Grand Avenue, f’rinstance), calls for architecture with a Bahamian feel to reflect the rich history of this unique enclave.

There’s nothing Bahamian about the Big White Box that de la Paz built. FULL DISCLOSURE #2: That’s what its detractors call them, and I count myself among them. In fact, I call them dentist’s offices. They are cold and sterile and I don’t understand the esthetic that finds these structures beautiful. However, taste is subjective. The NCD-2 shouldn’t be. It’s all black and white, no pun intended.

I call Guillermo’s house a block-buster because it was the first Big White Box on Charles. Now there are others that came later and more are proposed. It opened the door for anyone to now say, “If he can build one, why can’t I?” It’s the very definition of block-busting, if you discount the definition of blockbuster bombs dropped in WWII.

Ironically, it’s not the racially weighted historic definition of days gone by either. That’s when a real estate agent — seeing opportunity and dollars — would sell a house to that first Black family in order to bust the block. White folks would suddenly sell out in droves and that real estate agent would generally reap the profits. But I digress.

I was talking about the Big White Box, which in all its various formations are cropping up all over Coconut Grove and elsewhere in Miami. Architects tell me they are inexpensive to build, heat, and cool. They’re just ugly.

I quoted Crespo’s article’s 2nd paragraph above which “raises a very serious question” about Andy Parrish, if true, if true, if true. However, here’s the first paragraph in which Crespo takes gratuitous slaps at Ken Russell:

I’ve not written a lot about the goings on in Coconut Grove as it relates to the battles between developers, self-entitled rich folks, what’s left of the Black folks from the Bahamas who traditionally considered the West Grove to be their little piece of America and the lying weasel dick City Commissioner Ken “Selfie Boy” Russell, who shuck and jived a lot of those Black folks into thinking he was not going to be another in a long line of lying white politicians, when in fact that’s just what he turned out to be, but I got a copy of this letter that a guy named Guillermo de la Paz, sent on on Sunday night.

SHAKE SALT HERE: I’ve been writing about the shady Planning and Zoning department in Miami for years. However, I stopped chasing that story when the former District 2 Commissioner, [allegedly] corrupt Marc D. Sarnoff, was termed out and his wife lost the election to the aforementioned Ken Russell. [Maybe I should revive my Freedom of Information request that I hand delivered to the Planning and Zoning Department. I allowed it to go unfulfilled when I was unable to land my Great White Whale: Sarnoff.]

Crespo’s ire should be directed towards towards the Miami Planning and Zoning Department and/or Andy Parrish, if true, if true, if true.

Al Crespo has behaved like a spurned lover ever since he caught Russell failing to document gift baskets sent to the Commissioner in his first few weeks in office. Long before signing a non-disclosure agreement in order to write this biography, I said as much to anyone who would listen. [More on this topic will be explored in the book. Stay tuned.]

Regardless, unlike Crespo I have written a lot about the “goings on in Coconut Grove as it relates to the battles between developers, self-entitled rich folks, what’s left of the Black folks from the Bahamas who traditionally considered the West Grove to be their little piece of America…” What I have documented at Now Now Silly is how that little piece of ‘Merka that the Bahamians owned made it a unique community because Coconut Grove once had the highest percentage of Black home ownership than anywhere else in this country.

For a number of decades systemic racism kept these property values low because: Black neighbourhood and all that it entails. Other socioeconomic circumstances [read: institutionalized racism] kept the owners wages low and the possibility of home loans to fix up their properties merely a pipe dream. The neighbourhood continued to deteriorate as families passed these houses down the generations, like White families pass down the family jewels.

Now that Coconut Grove has become one of the most desired communities in South Florida, that historic Black community is being chipped away by gentrification. These folks have now become land rich, but cash poor. They are selling out and people are buying the properties to knock down the historic homes — many of them built by E.W.F. Stirrup himself — to build Big White Boxes.

Guillermo de la Paz is the poster child for the Big White Box style of gentrification that is currently roiling the neighbourhood. And, he’s become more and more defensive about it.

The Sins of the Father ► A Pastoral Letter

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Pastor Kenny Pastorizing his flock

Dear Pastor Kenny:

It was great seeing you last month, as unexpected as it was. Almost immediately after the Not Now Silly Newsroom officially announced there would be no Sunrise to Canton Road Trip for Research this year …. What’s that old Jewish expression? “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

Since God and I are not on speaking terms, I have absolutely no idea how He might have learned of my plans to stay home this year. Unless He reads my facebookery.

When I made my announcement, I obviously didn’t know that Hurricane Irma would force a Road Trip on me. However, by the time I finally made the decision to flee, Irma was headed straight for the condo as a Category 5. Originally, I was only going to go to as far as Pensacola to get out of her path. However, in the final analysis that wouldn’t have done any good. Irma curved to the west side of the state. I’d either have had to continue north or make a left in the panhandle and head west towards Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana.

At the last minute, however, a facefriend of some years standing, whom I had never met, suggested we hightail it to Michigan, where he also has relatives. At first I resisted, then changed my mind. In the end that proved to be the least expensive option. Driving anywhere else would have required us to spring for hotel/motel fees, more meals in restaurants, and other accessories.

Talk about your synchronicity: It was only when I was finally in Ohio, traveling north along I-75, I asked Siri to call you. Siri didn’t know your number because it was in my old Windows Phone, where Cortana ruled the roost. Not long afterwards — at the very next rest stop, in fact — I opened up my facebookery and the top post on my timeline was one of your infrequent (compared to me) ones.

That’s when I facebooked you and we set up our time together. This year we spent more time together than any previous year. I especially enjoyed visiting the old neighbourhood with you:

https://www.facebook.com/headly.westerfield/videos/1054733027995662/

FULL CONFESSION: I only really think of sin when I’m writing to you. Otherwise, I just carry on day to day without a single thought of eternal damnation whatsoever.

Of course, Jews don’t really believe in Heaven. Nor Hell. To bastardize Woody Allen’s joke: I’m a Reformed Jew. I’m so Reformed, I’m a Atheist.


♫ ♪ ♫ Knock, knock knockin’ on h— WAIT!!! WHAT???

Regardless, in “Heaven and Hell in Jewish Tradition“, at the Jewish Learning website, it says (among a bunch of other stuff worth reading):

What the next world is, however, is far from clear. The rabbis use the term Olam Ha-Ba to refer to a heaven-like afterlife as well as to the messianic era or the age of resurrection, and it is often difficult to know which one is being referred to. When the Talmud does speak of Olam Ha-Ba in connection to the afterlife, it often uses it interchangeably with the term Gan Eden (“the Garden of Eden”), referring to a heavenly realm where souls reside after physical death.

The use of the term Gan Eden to describe “heaven” suggests that the rabbis conceived of the afterlife as a return to the blissful existence of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before the “fall.” It is generally believed that in Gan Eden the human soul exists in a disembodied state until the time of bodily resurrection in the days of the Messiah.

One interesting talmudic story, in which the World to Come almost certainly refers to a heavenly afterlife, tells of Rabbi Joseph, the son of Rabbi Joshua ben Levi, who dies and returns back to life.

“His father asked him, ‘What did you see?’ He replied, ‘I beheld a world the reverse of this one; those who are on top here were below there, and vice versa.’ He [Joshua ben Levi] said to him, ‘My son, you have seen a corrected world.’”

Ken, anything you can add to this internal discussion is always welcome, but it occurred to me a long time ago that I’m really writing to myself. These Pastoral Letters, as you know, are a self-examination of my spirituality, or — to put it into other terms — my relationship with a non-God.

Anyway, as I say, my mind jumps to sin at times like these. Having actually never done so, I decided to use Der Googleizer. Who knew there were so many kinds of sin?

There’s Mortal Sin,, when you’re going to straight to Hell, do not pass GO, do not collect $200. Venial Sin, in which you’re surely testing the limits of your relationship with God, but you know in the back of your mind that all you have to do is beg forgiveness, and BINGO! It’s a done deal. In fact, the same goes for Mortal Sins. That’s why confession is good for the soul. Because it lets one off the hook.

Then there are the Seven Deadly Sins, which is what people tend to think of when they think of sin. The WikiWackyWoo suggests the Seven Deadly Sins should not be confused with Mortal Sin. It adds:

The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices or cardinal sins, is a grouping and classification of Christian origin, of vices.[1] Behaviours or habits are classified under this category if they directly give birth to other immoralities.[2] According to the standard list, they are pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath and sloth,[2] which are also contrary to the seven virtues. These sins are often thought to be abuses or excessive versions of one’s natural faculties or passions (for example, gluttony abuses one’s desire to eat).

But later, just to confuse the issue, the Wiki also says:

The seven deadly sins in their current form are not found in the Bible, however there are biblical antecedents. One such antecedent is found in the Book of Proverbs 6:16–19, however only in the Masoretic Text (the earlier translated Septuagint version of this passage lacks a clear preface and lists only five). Among the verses traditionally associated with King Solomon, it states that the Lord specifically regards “six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto Him”, namely:[6]

  1. A proud (vain) look
  2. A lying tongue.
  3. Hands that shed innocent blood
  4. A heart that deviseth wicked acts
  5. Feet that be swift in running to mischief
  6. A false witness that speaketh lies
  7. He that soweth discord among brethren[7]

Another list,[8] given this time by the Epistle to the Galatians (Galatians 5:19–21), includes more of the traditional seven, although the list is substantially longer: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, “and such like”.[9] Since the apostle Paul goes on to say that the persons who practice these sins “shall not inherit the Kingdom of God”, such sins are usually listed as mortal sins (unless sufficient reflection and deliberate consent are not present) rather than capital vices.[10]

Who’s got time to keep track of all those sins? Especially the “and such like” category, in which you can lump just about anything? Instead, let’s (quickly) take the Cardinal Sins one by one.

  • Lust. Most people think this means “sex”, but there is lust for things as well: money, status, and respect. Personally, I lust after nice pieces of brass.Meanwhile, sexual lust can’t be evil. Otherwise, only a practical joker of a God would have hardwired it into us. It’s what one does with that sexual lust that can be evil — or illegal, for that matter.
  • Gluttony. This week I ate a quart of ice cream by myself, but for the most part I’m not a glutton, except for punishment.
  • Greed. The unfettered acquisition of money has never been one of my problems. In fact, had it been one of my problems, I’d have fewer problems.
  • Sloth. It comes and goes. I can be real lazy when I set my mind to it. But a sin? Not to me.
  • Wrath. I get angry, but can blow & go; get pissed off about something and then forget all about it after the volcano erupts. But, I never take it out on people that don’t deserve it, if that helps.Yet I also recognize that there are some people on my shit list that I will take pot shots at again and again, and never forgive.
  • Pride. Like jingoistic flag-waving? Not my problem. However, there’s some things I justifiably take pride in. Is it Foolish Pride? Just crank it up and D A N C E ! ! !

  • Envy.

Envy? You ask.

DING! DING!! DING!!! Oh yeah, that’s the one. I’ve long recognized it’s my biggest fault; my biggest sin.

Now, I’m not envious of people’s money, or the things they have acquired [see above]. I’m envious of people’s situations, which is really hard to explain. The story I told you about pretending to be on the Safety Patrol (way back when) must have been born from my envy of you.

Here’s how sick I really am (and I’m not talking about this vaguebooking): I have a dear friend, who happened to fit incredibly comfortably into a situation, due to an introduction I made. At the very same time a brass ring I had been reaching for receded well beyond my reach and was denied me. Thru’ the facebookery, I am forced to confront both of these things simultaneously. I should be happy for my friend for the former, but I am nothing but envious due to the latter.

Read “Facebook, the “spiral of envy,” and our Botox Life“

Since I returned from Michigan, I even started to envy you, Ken.

As you know I offended one of your parishioners deeply. When I apologized and asked for her forgiveness, she replied that she had, but only because I’m an old friend of yours. I envy that relationship you have with her; instead of having her accuse me — in the same sentence — of both mansplaining and whitesplaining. She would never accuse you of Pastorsplaining. She would have listened.

I’ve always said that the most important thing to remember in discussions about race is that White folk need to listen when Black folks speak about Racism. I still believe that. They’re on the front lines. They have the experience(s). However, it wouldn’t hurt Black folks to listen once in a while. I may not be totally woke, but I’ve been wiping the sleep from my eyes about Race Relations since I was a teenager working in Pops’ store on 12th Street, now known as Rosa Parks Boulevard. I feel I have something to contribute to the discussion and to use terms like whitesplaining and mansplaining is not designed to have a dialogue, only to turn one into a pillar of salt.

TO BE FAIR: She was not wrong to be offended. I used an offensive word. But, here’s the thing, Ken: Pops never said “the N-Word” in his life. Pops said “nigger”. I’m not going to WHITEwash what Pops said, as ugly as it was. This is the titular “Sins of the Father“. I don’t let Pops off the hook just because he’s 1). Dead; 2). My father. Using the word when appropriate is just an extension of my essay, which predates our reunion, “A Reasoned Defense of the Word Nigger“. Furthermore, I see no contradiction in using the word and being sorry that I did.

If you think of it, Ken, please show this essay to her. Not to offend her all over again, because I truly fell in love with her. But, to offer her as much space in rebuttal as she’d like to take. I promise to print every word.

As always, the same goes for you.

I’ll sign off here, Ken, as this Pastoral Letter is long enough already. As they often do, this one went to places I never intended when I started and I’ve had enough self-examination for one day.

With all my love,
From your oldest friend in the world,

Marc Slootsky

A Hurricane Refugee Unpacks ► Unpacking The Writer

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Apologies to my faithful readers. I know the Not Now Silly Newsroom has been idle lately. To start I’ve needed to Lyft to keep up with my bills. Then along comes Hurricane Irma, which I fled before she ever arrived.

I lived through Hurricane Wilma, which was a Cat 2. Irma was a monster which, at one point, was a Cat 5 and headed straight for the condo. I decided that I didn’t want to see a 5. I had my hurricane fun during Wilma. So I fucked off, in the vernacular.

Drove to the Detroit area, where I have family and friends. Shared driving and expenses with a fellow I’ve known as a facefriend for several years, but we’ve never met before. I packed Marley up, picked Steve up in Boca Raton, and we headed north where we had adventures on the roads. This includes 18 hours trying to get out of Florida in bumper-to-bumper traffic with gas availability troubles. But, we got to Michigan eventually.

This is what they do when Rest Areas have no power. Welcome to the New World Order.

These ROAD TRIP stories go into the pipeline, if I ever get to them.

Click to read about previous Road Trips.

Definitely in the pipeline is a new Pastoral Letter, for those that enjoy that series.

I had been banging away at one in a desultory fashion before I left. However, on this trip to Michigan I took another drive to Ann Arbor. This time I had the honour to watch Pastor Ken Pastorize his flock at Blue Ocean Faith.

That was followed by lunch with several of Ken’s parishioners, one of whom I may have made hate me. That’s a story I will definitely write about. Stay tuned.

Then I convinced Ken to visit the old neighbourhood in Detroit, some of which I posted on the LIVE facebookery. [Trying to figure out how to post those here.] All of this time spent with my oldest friend in the world not only focused my thoughts on the next Pastoral Letter, but has also given me insight on many of the other topics the Not Now Silly Newsroom tends to commission from me. So, look for some of that sooner rather than later.

Meanwhile, here’s Pastor Ken Wilson giving me a Shout Out and then going on to talk about his struggle in finding his place within Jesus Christ. I’ve probably described it wrong, but I found it fascinating. Your mileage may vary.

10 Sep 2017—Blue Ocean Faith Ann Arbor Celebration
from Blue Ocean Faith Ann Arbor on Vimeo.

ALSO: I think I’ve figured out a way to go back to writing about Miami politics. Therefore, consider my recusal a partial recusal. I just have to find the exact right wording. So, you can also look for that.

Taking Marley on a Road Trip was an experience. I’ve never traveled with a cat before and Marley has never spent much time in a car before. I hope The Traveling Cat is a post I can eventually get around to. Suffice to say for now: Marley did wonderfully in the car for all those hours. She got to the point where she wandered around the car at will, including on my lap and under my feet, while I was driving. Ahem.

A shameless plug for my other traveling companion:

Steve Dibert is a Mortgage Fraud Investigator.

Altho’ we’ve been facefriends for several years, we had never met. After almost 50 hours together in a car, we’re tight now and he knows enough to blackmail me. He tolerated Marley, even tho’ he’s allergic. He tolerated all my stupid stories. He tolerated all of my tunes without complaint, including — and especially — the hours and hours of Frank Zappa. [No exaggeration. Not only did we hear nearly 8 hours of Frank Zappa, but I explained everything I knew about every one of the songs.] And, after all of that, he didn’t kill me.

If you need some mortgage fraud investigation, give MFI Miami a try.

I went to a great Drum Circle at this place [pic to the right]. It’s the 2nd time I’ve been there over the years, and I will write a little bit about it eventually. I want to compare it to Drum Circles I know.

While in Michigan (as I always do) I talked to marijuana enthusiasts and learned more about the Michigan MMJ laws. This will eventually be published as a long-form article, but I’ve been adding to my knowledge and connections for years.

As well, I made a business connection on this trip which could put me on ground floor of a start-up [tangentially] in that field. You’ll be the first to know when I can announce that. However, I don’t want to be on the ground floor. I want to be on the elevator to the penthouse. Rub your lucky rabbit foot.

There’s more in the pipeline, but here’s the bottom line, literally: 10 days away from my Lyfting — and the gas money and other associated expenses of running away — has really put a hurt on my bank account. I’ll try to post a few quick one-offs in the coming week, but I’m really going to have to hunker down behind the wheel of the Grey Ghost and grind out the Lyfts. If I can drive to Michigan and back, this should be a cinch.

See you on the flip flop.

Toupee Or Not Toupee ► Throwback Thursday

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While the Not Now Silly Newsroom is now a mix of digital and analog, there was a time when it was 100% analog.

As a semi-hoarder, I still have most of the paper I generated during The Analog Years, a 3-decade period when I did a lot of freelance writing. It’s all in a 4-drawer, forest green file cabinet, which stands 53 inches tall, 14.25″ wide and 24″ deep, stuffed to the gills.

I say “all”, but it’s only been like that as of yesterday because for the last 12 years I’ve not had access to my file cabinet. During that time I just chunked all my research — and ephemera — into 2 big banker’s boxes. Because I could no longer find what I needed in those boxes, I decided to finally file all that paper where it truly belonged.

Consequently, last week I spent 2 hours integrating one of the banker’s boxes into the file cabinet into alphabetical order. Yesterday I spent another 2 hours with the 2nd banker’s box. Now all my files are integrated again. Peace reigns again over the kingdom.

While filing all of these documents I came across some real treasures and some real oddities, both of which reflect my obsessions. In the treasures category are pictures that my children drew. After they left from a weekend visit, I always collected every scribble they and dropped it into a file under N, for NOSTALGIA.

However, the NOSTALGIA file has far more than children’s drawings. There are many magazines I’ve saved, from those with Barack Obama on the cover, to magazines with obituaries of my favorite artists.

However, it’s the oddities that I plan to highlight over several Throwback Thursdays, because they illuminate some of my more bizarre obsessions.

First up this Thursday:

The TOUPEE File

I have been fascinated by toupees as long as I can remember. At one time I collected everything I could find on toupees, even to the point of corresponding with a variety of hair-piece companies. I attempted to sell a freelance article on “Toupees and the Men Who Wear Them”, or “Hair Today; Gone Tomorrow”, or “Toupee Or Not Toupee”. It didn’t matter what I called it; I could never convince a single publication that it would be freelance dollars well-spent for this kind of insightful material.

I’m convinced all those editors had a really bad rug and didn’t want to insult them.

Regardless, the file eventually grew to be an inch thick. Clipped to the outside was a running tally of every Hollywood star who wore a rug. There’s enough material in this file that I might be able to sell an article on toupees after all. Here’s just a small sample of the material, because I couldn’t include it all.