And we’re back! I am we. We is me. I am back. A day later than what I said, but you lived didn’t you? If you didn’t, RIP to you and please don’t haunt me; my grandmother already does. Let’s chat.
1. And the Lord saw that it was very very very … bad
The first thing we need to talk about is this unholy abomination. Reminder: I was a Bible scholar so I am qualified to classify things as both unholy and abominations. If you need me to let you know if things are ungodly (Parkway traffic, Route 28, the three parking spaces in front of Evergreen Cafe on busy Penn Avenue, pigeons, unprotected bike lanes, housing prices in Lawrenceville) just holler. The answer, by the way, to all of those is yes. Yes. Super ungodly. They should be launched into a lake of fire.
I’ve digressed—(title of my memoir). Behold French’s Ketchup Popsicles.
It looks like frozen blood. (Somewhere a vampire just said, “I just had the best idea for a dessert shop!”)
Now, my best friend in college was Canadian and she taught me and my narrow worldview so much. I learned how hair barrettes are called buckles, how napkins are serviettes, how you can deliberately trip a Canadian and they will apologize profusely for having not successfully avoided your jutting foot, how the hot Texas summer sun will literally melt a Canadian’s face off, and how ketchup is not meant just for french fries and picnic food. Her mother, you see, had sent a care package full of her favorite Canadian goodies and there in the box was a bag of Heinz ketchup-flavored potato chips and of course my first reaction was to begin screaming about abominations and wickedness. But she was like, “These are potatoes. Do you not eat ketchup on french fried potatoes?” And I had to just …
And I learned? That ketchup potato chips are exceedingly delicious and probably the snack food of heaven. Legit manna. I also learned that Smarties are a million times better than stupid m&ms. Fight me—(title of my memoir).
But ketchup-flavored potatoes make culinary sense. Ketchup-flavored POPSICLES? Repent and be baptized. Someone on Twitter said these popsicles should be made with Heinz instead of French’s (also an ungodly abomination), and I beg to differ. Ketchup-flavored popsicles are like sharp cheddar-flavored ice cream or asparagus-flavored birthday cake. (Somewhere in Lawrenceville, someone just said, “I just had the best idea for an overpriced bakery!”) Heinz should stay far far away.
Unholiness aside, I’m absolutely going to try one of these if I can get my hands on one when I go to Canada this summer. I’ll let you know whether my face melts off because of how good they are … or how bad they are. Either way, I’m coming home faceless and carting an entire suitcase of Smarties. TSA gonna shoot this piggy some very judgy looks.
Also, Abominations and Wickedness is my new band name. I can’t decide if we’re a Christian rock band or a Satanic rock band though.
Dear Dad, I am kidding. Go pray.
Title of my memoir.
2. Computers and bikes and materials failures, oh my!
The famous Chris Briem, he of everything local, has a thread on Twitter in which he reveals some of the more obscure museums in the Pittsburgh region and if you ever needed further proof that I don’t have my finger on the pulse of this city, I didn’t know about a single one of these.
Museum of Large Scale Systems in New Kensington for all you computer nerds
The Depreciation Lands Museum in Hampton. As a history nerd, I can’t believe I didn’t know about this one. For shame. Title of my memoir.
The Center for Postnatural History in Garfield is WILD and so legit that some of their stuff was loaned to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History for their We Are Nature exhibit a few years back.
Bicycle Heaven billed as the World’s Largest Bicycle Museum and Bike Shop. I’m sure you cyclists know about this one, but I’m not a cyclist because the last time I rode a bike I got hit by a car so I avoid that activity these days (well, more like a hundred-year-old lady in a Buick as big as a boat tried to pass me on a country road and drove up alongside me at 4 miles an hour and I fell against her car BUT I COULD HAVE DIED).
The Bayernhof Museum. Okay. Wait. I did know about this one. So that’s a point for me toward my Finger on the Pulse shit.
Braddock’s Battlefield History Center in North Braddock. Wow. Going for sure.
Photo Antiquities Museum of Photographic History on the North Side. WHAT.
The Matergenics Material's Museum if you wanted to learn about how shit just fails and fails and then fails some more.
The Donora Smog Museum are you kidding me?!? I need to do a future post explaining to you all about the Donora smog incident that killed two dozen Burghers in 1948 and gave thousands more respiratory distress. Pollution kills.
There are a few more mentioned in the replies to his thread. Go check them out. Also, Finger on the Pulse Shit is my new band name OR the title of my memoir. Maybe both.
3. Define “best”
Here’s a headline from travel site Jalopnik: THESE ARE THE BEST BRIDGES TO DRIVE ACROSS. And here’s the first bridge:
A bridge that offers a view that might be the best city entrance in the world? Sure. 100 as the kids say.
The best bridge to drive across? Oh, no no no no no. A three-lane bottleneck into a two-lane tunnel with perpetual traffic that spits you immediately into a four-lane jumbled-up nightmare where everyone has like ten yards to read two dozen signs to decide which lane they need to be in and then safely maneuver to BE in that lane by criss-crossing each other at 50 miles per hour lest they’re spit out toward Monroeville against their will?
Not best, Melania!
Politics. BOOM!
Title of my memoir.
4. A beautiful day indeed!
Let’s play pretend that I put this at number 3 and said, “Speaking of…,” because I have too little time to cut and past and rearrange my shit, you guys. A Twitter follower pointed this out to me: did you know there’s a 3-day kid-oriented driving excursion called The Fred Rogers Trail that highlights his life as well as various Fred Rogers-themed locations in the region?
It spends a day in Latrobe seeing his high school, his statue and his grave as well as a visit to Idlewild and lots of other great places. Then it heads to Pittsburgh and beyond for two days of museums and fun. What a great way to plan three days of your summer with your kids if you can get away from work and life.
Not only that, the last day takes you to Buttermilk Falls in Indiana County, the land once owned by the McFeely side of his family (that’s his maternal grandfather). It has trails featuring Fred’s quotes and pictures, all leading to a 45-foot waterfall. You can even visit the old McFeely family home. How cool!
5. Agree to disagree … you ghoul.
And here we have the County Executive applauding [checks notes] the gentrification of a once-affordable largely Black neighborhood.
Certainly wouldn’t and can’t be angry at a homeowner for selling their home for what the market will bear and we can’t know their true circumstances. I get that. I have no judgement on that end of things despite my super judgy nature—title of my memoir. But the lead politician in the county trying to paint this huge rise in housing prices in East Liberty as “creating wealth” when so many Black Pittsburghers were priced out of their community is tone-deaf, and I’m stunned the tweet is still up and no one in the County Executive’s office seems to realize how ghoulish he sounds.
I recently read a white paper (by a group with a horse in the race of course) claiming East Liberty’s metamorphosis was revitalization, not gentrification. Such a fine fine line, but a line nonetheless. And here’s the line as I see it in basic terms (YMMV)… revitalization helps everyone (think adding a grocery store to a food desert or truly affordable housing to a lower-income neighborhood—none of this “we are building 60 half-million-dollar condos where there once were $80,000 homes, but we will set aside four of them to be low-income and will sell them for only $400,000” garbage). On the other hand, gentrification benefits the wealthy and/or privileged. You’ll never convince me the former residents of East Liberty benefited from what happened.
This piece agrees with me and is a great read. There’s so much more we can dive into here such as property taxes and assessment values and stagnant income, but I don’t have the time or space now. Suffice it to say, get in the sea, Rich Fitzgerald or whoever on his social media team thought this was a Good Tweet. Gentrification is not “continued vibrancy.” It’s the gradual erasing of a once-proud affordable community of people who built it up in the first place.
6. BUT WHAT DOES DR. PEPPER HAVE TO SAY ABOUT THIS?!
North Hills High School is considering dropping their racist team name/mascot … the Indians. First, ask yourself this: does changing it in any way hurt you? No. Does NOT changing it in any way hurt or offend people and does it co-opt their proud, nearly- erased-via-violent-imperialism culture for amateur sports rah-rahs? Yes.
Therefore the verdict is … it should change, not because of “wokeism” or whatever dumb LGB term you’ve latched onto (everytime someone says “virtue signaling” I want to punch a pigeon out of the sky), but because that is what society does and has done for generations and centuries, despite attempts to squash it — it is called SOCIAL PROGRESS. Your grandparents experienced it. Your parents experienced it. You are experiencing it. Growing our empathy and understanding of those who have been marginalized and held down and held back, and then changing ourselves, our laws and our institutions so that those humans feel accepted and welcomed and loved equally is literally the very definition of true Christianity for those of you who claim to be such.
Susie Meister, Ph.D. of reality TV fame and podcast glory wrote about her time as the racist North Hills High School mascot and argued that it should be changed. Give it a read.
Anway, here’s a tweet:
Elon, you greedy market-manipulating own-mythology-believing asshole, send me to Mars.
I hate it here.
Title of my memoir.
7. And we’re done! Whew. Have a great week. I’ll be here next Wednesday as usual. If you want to shout at me that East Liberty was revitalized and not gentrified or if you think your life will be irretrievably broken if you can’t see a blue-eyed Native American cosplayer running around North Hills sporting events, please call the number on your screen:
Press 5 for “Mr. Pibb will listen to your ignorant whining now.”
(End note: I’m now including alt text on all included images for the visually impaired. I hope you’ll hover over that Ben Affleck picture to read how I described it.)