Daily Archives: July 24, 2012

Driveby Beat, Hawaiian Style: Thanks for sharing, Burl!

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On a previous post, I noted that years ago I lobbied for creation of a “driveby beat” at The State — to have a reporter dedicated to answering people’s understandable curiosity about things they drove by and wondered about in the Midlands. It would have been a wonderful way to root the paper and readers solidly in the community, aside from telling people something they actually wanted, and occasionally perhaps even needed, to know.

Also, it would satisfy my own curiosity about a lot of things, which to my mind was, to a great extent, what reporters were for. There was always that.

Anyway, it never happened — although I saw that today, The State actually did have a story about what was going on at the State Fairgrounds, which I had driven by and wondered about just yesterday.

Anyway, when I brought it up, Burl Burlingame noted that he actually used to have such a beat, which was his idea (it must have been subliminal planted in both our brains at Radford High School) at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. Here and here and here are some links.

And here’s an excerpt from his “Wat Dat” (I don’t think I’ll have to translate that pidgin for you) feature:

Somebody whose name we can’t read – but who does draw a nice map – was curious about a brown statue or chimney standing at the end of row of trees just north of the Mililani exit.
It is a statue, and it’s of a tree trunk, rising more than 30 feet above a circular grassy platform, which is in turn surrounded by a large gravel walkway, which is atop a tall wall – kind of a rounded ziggurat – which is accessed by a grand tile stairway, which is approached by carefully tended Japanese gardens, which are guarded by carefully repaired antique marble Chinese lions, which are flanked by enormous granite slabs, which cap hobbit-like stools and benches that seem to be made out of logs but are really cast cement, which are parked beneath a series of carefully tended trees, which have the names of local politicians inscribed upon signs at the foot of each.

The area is grand and imposing, and at the same time intimate and quiet. It’s also generally deserted, which adds to the otherworldly experience.

This is one of the WatDatiest of WatDats to come along in some time!

The site is the local mission of the Honbushin Honbu, a Shinto religious sect with nearly a million followers, mostly in Japan. There is also a mission in China…

The “sculpture” is a koa log that seems to be protected by a coat of brown paint. It’s called “GENTEN,” which, translated from Japanese, means roughly “starting point” or “origin.”

The sculpture represents nature and the unity of hearts, religions and countries that work toward peace. Honbushin missionaries regularly gather around the genten and pray…

Of course, in Hawaii, the stuff you drive by and wonder about has a tendency to be slightly more exotic than what we have around here…

Take it from me, based on personal experience: Time travel’s just not worth the hassle

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I had a time-travel dream last night.

This is a first for me, which is sort of odd, given what a popular theme that is in movies. I’ve had dreams before in which I encounter people such as my grandparents who’ve been gone 40 years and more, but never a dream in which I was conscious of the fact that I, a denizen of the 21st century, was in another time.

What confirmed it this time was the price of gasoline: In the dream, it was 26 cents a gallon. Which means I landed somewhere between 1949 and 1959. I had a sense that it was within my lifetime, and a time I would have remembered, so we’re talking toward the last two or three years of that period. And no, I don’t remember what I was driving, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a DeLorean. It was probably something that didn’t look out of place.

That’s really all I can remember of the dream, but I recall a number of details about this gas station stop. I don’t specifically remember the attendants surrounding my vehicle to pump the gas, check the oil, clean the windshield, etc. I just remember staring at that pump price, and marveling at it.

Of course, it was the old-style pump, and the gauge had the old digital-yet-analog numbers — white on a black background — that physically clicked over to tote up the price as you pumped. The pumps looked kind of like the ones in this picture — the kind with rounded corners, like an old refrigerator, or a car from the early ’50s — only brand-new. The enamel paint on them was shiny white. I don’t recall the brand.

As it happened, my tank was almost full, to the point that I just needed slightly more than a gallon. My total was 35 cents. I felt this great disappointment that I hadn’t had an empty tank, so I could have the pleasure of filling it up for less than five bucks. I wondered whether I could spare the time to drive around a few hours and come back, just to experience that, before having to be wherever I had to be.

But then I realized I had a bigger problem than frivolous disappointment. I had no way of paying the 35 cents.

Out of habit, I was holding a debit card in my hand. I suddenly realized that not only was it useless — no way to swipe it — but I couldn’t let anybody see it, or it would raise questions I couldn’t answer: What’s this strip like recording tape on the back? What’s this shiny square that looks like a mirror, with the shifting image in it?…

I slipped the card into my pants pocket, and even before I started to feel around for change, I realized that even if I had some, none of it would pass a close look — or even the briefest glance, or touch, for that matter. Post-1964 “silver” coins are a different color from coins before that date, and feel different in the hand. They would look like what they are — cheap imitations of real silver. Never mind what would happen if somebody looked at the date, or if it were one of those quarters with the 50-states theme on the back: What’re you tryin’ to pull, Future-Boy?…

Without looking, I knew there was close to zero chance that I’d find a coin that would pass muster. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a pre-1964 quarter outside of a numismatist’s blue book? You still run across dimes and nickels that old, but they’re rare as hen’s teeth.

And don’t even think about trying to pass modern paper money. The shape, the color, the size of the presidents…

I started wondering whether the station manager would take barter (in which case, what did I have to trade that wouldn’t be suspicious?), or trust me for it while I tried to go scrounge the tiny amount I owed him, somehow. It was a tight spot.

And you know what? I’m not sure what I could have done to avoid this problem. I suppose I could have bought the coins from a collector before leaving the present, which would have totally ruined the joy of buying cheap gas, since the coins would have cost me many times their face value.

It’s all just a huge hassle. So take my advice, based on bitter experience: Forget about time travel. Just stay here in good ol’ 2012. Going back’s just not worth the trouble.

Shawarma: The lunch of superheroes

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The above sign, spotted today at Al Amir on Main St., got me to thinking of “The Avengers.”

Tony Stark: You ever try shawarma?

SPOILER ALERT! OK, not really, because it reveals nothing about the plot, although it will ruin a tiny little fun surprise. It’s just one of those little lagniappe things at the end of the credits. Although, come to think of it, this does tell you that all the heroes survive the movie, so SPOILER ALERT!

At the end of the climactic battle, as he’s lying dazed among the rubble, Robert Downey Jr., who as Iron Man has 90 percent of the movie’s good lines, reassures his comrades that he is alive by saying offhandedly, “You ever try shawarma? There’s a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don’t know what it is, but I wanna try it.”

Then, the fun part: After all the credits — apparently, Joss Whedon needed the help of about 3.7 million people to make this flick — you see the exhausted heroes lounging, disheveled, around a table in the shawarma joint, slowly munching away in complete silence. This continues for more than 30 seconds, as a restaurant employee sweeps up in the background.

This sort of backhanded, non-branded little product placement has apparently launched a bit of a shawarma craze:

Those of you still reading will likely recall Tony Stark’s fascination with shawarma toward the end of the film. During the climactic battle, Stark suggests the team adjourn to a nearby restaurant to try the dish, which Wikipedia describes as “a pita bread sandwich or wrap” filled with spit-roasted meat (commonly lamb, goat, chicken or a mixture of various meats). At the very, very end of the film, after the credits have rolled, we witness the superhero team sitting at a table, silently eating their shawarma for a surprisingly long amount of time.

Now, based on that short in-joke, TMZ claims that the Los Angeles shawarma industry has seen a massive spike in popularity since the release of the film. “At Ro Ro’s Chicken — a famed Lebanese joint in Hollywood — the manager says shawarma sales jumped 80% in the days after the movie opened,” the gossip site claims, while saying that a number of other Lebanese restaurants offered similar results…

That’s fine. Just as long as they don’t start rebranding it the Super-Gyro…

Haley suspended mayor who allegedly hired son

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Catching up with e-mail (my inbox is down to 296!), I came across one from several days back, from one of a number of readers who remain puzzled as to why The State still hasn’t published Gina Smith’s now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t story about Nikki Haley’s daughter getting a job working for an agency she supervises.

I wonder about it myself. But that’s not what this post is about. What it’s about is something else I had missed, and which this reader was attempting to bring to my attention:

The Associated Press

NORWAY, S.C. — The mayor of the Orangeburg County town of Norway has been indicted on charges of misconduct in office and nepotism.

Gov. Nikki Haley has suspended Jim Preacher from office while the charges are pending.

The indictment says Preacher gave himself a raise without the approval of the town council and hired his son at the town’s water treatment department…

There was more to it than that, including a bizarre alleged interaction between the mayor and a state trooper. One senses that more than nepotism brought the mayor to this pass. But what struck me was the irony that the governor has suspended this guy who among other things is charged of providing his son with a job in a department that apparently is under his purview.

Yet, in the story that briefly appeared in the Rock Hill Herald before disappearing, we found this:

State law prohibits public officials from causing the employment of a family member to a position they supervise or manage, according to the State Elections Commission. However, Haley does not supervise the gift shop; she supervises the agency that operates it, making the teen’s summer job permissible, an attorney with the commission said.

Really? So we’re to suppose that the governor’s position had nothing to do with an agency that reports to her deciding to hire a 14-year-old child?

This is a strange little story. To quote Jubal Harshaw, “this has more aspects than a cat has hair.”