Life on State II

I think you will probably hear more about this Life on State project in the next few weeks/months than you really want to. But in 30 years, when State is a jewel in the Salt Lake Valley diadem you will appreciate it.

Anyway, the Midvale meeting was, to put it nicely, a bust. The South Salt Lake meeting, on the other hand, was a success. Because we are really, really excited about this project and we want a bucket of public input, we are having a couple more meetings

July 8
Jordan High School
6:00

July 9
Murray High School
6:00

Not only will these be exciting forays into the magical world of planning, but there will be ice cream (cus summer).

If you can't make it to the meetings (even if you can make it, actually) you can still help give us some direction by taking this survey. If you take the survey and want to give us some more input then email me cclifford@planningcenter.com.

I want a 10 gallon stetson and a horse that bears my brand

The other day Tasha asked where I would go if I could go back to any time period, any place. The answer, which shouldn't surprise anyone who knows me, is the southwest of the late 1800s. While the only things I have to show for my love of the southwest/cowboy/ranch ideal is a couple pairs of boots, a stetson, and some second hand cowboy shirts (which I'm too chubby to wear now, by the way), I would live that life in a heartbeat.

I wouldn't even have to go back in time. I drop everything to be a rancher/farmer (I know their is a big difference between the two) and never look back. Which is saying something because I really do love my job. I can easily see myself in just about any Marty Robbins song.

Anyway, that love was reaffirmed last week when I was scouring flickr for pictures of downtown Logan, Utah for a project a work. Amid the pictures of the Bluebird, Logan Canyon, Main Street, the tabernacle and the rest of the Logan landmarks I found this beautiful piece of cowboy poetry carved into the back of a headstone in the Logan cemetery.


I would have liked to know him in real life, I'm sure he had a wicked sense of humor.

Life on State

I think about three people read this blog. Since the three of you know me, you know that I am an urban planner. You know this because it is the only thing I talk about. Well, that and bikes. You also know about this project I am working on at work, the one about State Street, yep, that one. The one I've droned on and on about for months.

Well, it is in full swing now. We have a website (it will look much, much better in the near future), a facebook page, and we are even twittering (tweeting?)!

I think I may be the first person to get a facebook profile because my boss told me to.

Anyway, we are having two public meetings at the end of the month. These are the first two of the process and we are looking for a) a lot of people and b) a lot of input about State Street. We have done some existing conditions analysis (did you traffic volumes haven't changed much on State since 1970), but the process is still in its very early stages. These meetings are really going to be the jumping off point for our work in the next few months. And we do actually listen.

The meetings are:

May 26
Copperview Elementary
8449 South Monroe Street
Midvale
6:00 PM

or (because they will be the same meeting)

May 28
Columbus Center
2531 South 400 East
South Salt Lake
6:00 PM

You should come (and tell everyone you know to come) because it is one of the rare opportunities to get involved in the planning process at the beginning as opposed to right at the end when it is too late for your input to matter.

Tell us what is working on State, what isn't working, and how we should go about fixing it.

Oh, and there will be food.

There is a woman sitting in her car at my dad's house blasting Mormon pop with a gigantic plastic sack of bagles on her lap. So there's that.

The Garden, 2009

This year we are taking our little piece of land in a different direction - flowers. I love the idea of growing some of our own food, and our urban farm (in the smallest, loosest sense of the phrase) was my little baby last year. However, we just don't get the necessary sun to grow much food. So we are going to scale back the vegetables to a couple of tomatoes (not five like we had last year), some pepper plants (probably anahiem and jalapeno), and various herbs.

That said, our HOA decided to convert some of our common area into a community garden. So we might try our vegetable hand again.

Our little flower garden, on the other hand, will get the attention it deserves and has not gotten the past few summers. As most 20-something-environmentally-conscious-Obama-supporters-living-in-a-dry-climate do, we want to use mostly native, water-wise plants. At the same time we want some color and texture variety.

As much as I would like to think otherwise, my green is in the horns, not the thumb (a little gardening humor for you). So with the help of my mom and the landscape architect in my office we have a great starting place.

We are heading to the Red Butte Garden plant sale this weekend and the Wasatch Community Garden plant sale next weekend. Hopefully we will come back with a trunk of plants we wanted and a couple of surprises.

When I cleaned out and organized our little shed last weekend I discovered we have about a dozen pots of various sizes and quality. So our front door step will get a floral treatment and we will have a potted herb garden behind our house.

I am excited to get some plants into the ground. I'll post pictures and probably write geeked-out, step-by-step explanation of the process. I'm sure you can't wait.

The End of Days

Bikes, soda, me being fat, blah, blah, blah. I'll get to that later. Right now I want to talk about something that has been on my mind a lot lately - Zombie Apocalypse. Everybody has a zombie exit strategy, I don't care who you are, you have thought about it. Everybody has at least a cursory "I know the fastest way to the freeway so I can get the hell out of Dodge" type of plan. If you say you don't you are a liar.

Anyway, I am sure it will be a 28 Days Later type of outbreak. We will not be slowly chased by shambling, mindless hordes. It will be a virus, it will make fast, strong zombie warriors. And it will be bad.

Without going into too much detail I'll just say Tasha and I have non perishable food, easily accessible outdoor sportsman gear, and a 4-wheel drive vehicle that always has at least half a tank of gas. I am sure it will bite me that I don't own this yet, but I will get one, .357, of course. (If it's not too late. I'm looking for some power, and a longer barrel length increases accuracy, cus I want to hit those blood thirsty freaks from as far away as possible. This one wouldn't be a bad idea as a back up. Its handkerchief duel design is perfect for when zombies ambushe and I need to clear leather in a heartbeat.)

We will head south (viruses have a more difficult time in hot, dry climates) and stay away from cities. I'm confident in my hunting/fishing/survival skills, so we will wait it out in a defensible position with a (preferably) spring fed water supply. We will teach Morgan the old ways and tell him stories of sky scrapers and civilization.

Anyway, one detail I am ashamed to say I overlooked in our Zombie Apocalypse preparation are pandemic barriers. Coveralls, respirators, gloves, anti-viral hand gel, etc. Thanks to the Internets I can take care of that.

The most reassuring thing is that Tasha and I can protect Morgan too (at the bottom).

I can't believe I thought we could get out of the Zombie Apocalypse alive without pandemic kits! We will, however, put shoes and gloves on our zombie pandemic-escaping baby.

50%

I am two days into my "commute 15 times in 30 work days" self challenge. So far I'm right on schedule. I didn't ride yesterday, but I did today. Again, my math is not so good, but it seems like 15 is half of 30, and 1 is half of 2, so that is on schedule, right?

Well, it killed me. I'm not sure what has happened in the last couple of months, but I don't think 11 silly miles has been that hard for me in a long, long time. I am ashamed to say it, but I had to make use of the smaller of my two rings up front. It took me 20 minutes longer than it used to. What a sad sack I am.

As Tasha said, though, "[I'll] only get faster."

I imagine that is true. I like to think I have enough base miles in my legs that I will be back on track pretty soon. To ensure that happens, I have made some goals for myself.

Ride I Think I Canyons.
Not just plug along through it, actually ride it in a decent time. I don't know what a decent time is yet, I'll figure that out.

Get a top 10 finish in one of the local crit series races.
One top 10 might not seem like a serious goal, and it might not be. I raced a fair amount in high school, and I did ok a some of the races. But that was in high school and on a mountain bike, I haven't ever raced a road bike. I am also 25. I think most of the other 25 year olds who race the series think they are a few equipment upgrades away from going pro. I'll test the waters and adjust accordingly.

We will see how it goes.