First, I would like to state that I accidentally dumped about a cup of water directly onto my Mac keyboard and it still works and all hail the power of Apple’s dark sorcery.
You might have noticed I took a week off from the newsletter last week, or maybe you didn’t notice and this popped into your inbox today and you were all, “Oh, it’s this bitch again.” Screw you.
A few of you reached out to me and honestly, I’ll likely rarely inform via this vehicle when things come up causing me to miss a week. Your best bet is to check my Twitter profile because that’s where I’ll say things like, “The world is too heavy. The murder of nearly two dozen children yesterday is too much for me. I can’t be in a position where I have to find the words because maybe we don’t deserve the words and maybe we don’t deserve the comfort that those words will give us. Maybe the words aren’t mine to find. Maybe we shouldn’t look for the words that will make it make sense, because they don’t exist, and maybe we shouldn’t look for the other words that will make us forget even just for a bit, because we don’t deserve to forget. It’s selfish of us to try so soon.” So that’s where I was last week. I was, like you, in mourning and lost and confused and honestly, feeling like it’s hopeless. Nothing will change because the bodies of murdered children have never changed anything before. So it feels like you and I are going to sit here and just wait for the next time to come using the same gun purchased the same way and the politicians will say the same thing and we’ll start the cycle again because everyone has become so entrenched in their beliefs that they won’t bend even a little to at least TRY to change SOMETHING so that this will have a lesser chance of happening again. But in America, right now, we just keep doing the same thing and hoping for different results. Even robots know better, but good luck to us.
Whew! Enough of that stuff for now. But, yes, that’s why I was quiet last week. Just couldn’t bring myself to make the jokes.
Now, when I wrote the PREVIOUS week’s newsletter, I was Covid-positive and feeling like my brains were addled, my sinuses stuffed with Play-Doh, and my ears clogged just enough to make me worry that the virus had come to take even more of my hearing than I’ve already lost by just existing at the mercy of my gene pool. Listen: I CANNOT AFFORD TO LOSE ANY MORE PRECIOUS DECIBELS. My case was mild, but it was the three-day migraine from whose clutches I was freed thanks to more Advil than is recommended by medical science (thoughts and prayers to my kidneys and liver and stomach lining), and the blasted brain fog that drove me batty.
It got so bad that I was writing that newsletter very aware that I might forget words and call a bridge a water straddle or a tunnel a car noodle or a pierogi a potato puffy or a Dr. Oz a quackadoodledoo. I think I’m fully healed from the fog, but one thing’s for sure, if I call broccoli “a broccoli,” please call an ambulance. My brain done up and died.
Let’s talk Pittsburgh.
1. Let’s start it off with an easy one
I’m CRYING. But also, yesterday Kennywood absolutely looked like Disney:
I have been to Kennywood dozens and dozens and dozens of times in my life. School days. Church picnic days. Eat’n Park employee days. You name it. I have never ever seen the entrance like that. My daughter and I had plans to go, sat in an hour of traffic on a trip that normally takes us 20 minutes, just to get to a 45-minute wait to get into the parking lot. Child, when I tell you we said, “Hell to the no,” and went to the mall.
Anyway, “Duquesne Disney” LOL. I'll approve it. But I still refuse to approve calling the Cathedral of Learning “The Cathy” or “Cathy.” Stop it. But I’ll accept your bribes to change my mind. Reminder, I am partial to yachts.
2. Speaking of Kennywood
A few days earlier, the Aero-360 ride, which I’ve never ridden (rode? brain fog. A broccoli.) one single time because I like my stomach contents to remain firmly planted in selfsame stomach, got stuck and left riders dangling upside down for five minutes, which really encourages the involuntary removal of stomach contents.
This video makes me want to scream out “nope!” in every language on the planet and even a few fake languages like Na’vi, Dothraki, Elvish, Klingon and Minionese—which I imagine is something like “no-poop banananaaaaa.”
Also, this story sent me on a hunt for the 80s tales us Gen-Xers tell of the Laser Loop getting stuck upside-down at Kennywood, and of the Laser Loop’s brakes giving out and the thing running and running and running. Alas, I’m starting to wonder if they’re urban legends because I can’t find any news articles about either incident and now I’m questioning everything I “remember” from my childhood. Was Hills REALLY where all the toys were??
I’m not so sure now. If you have some sort of proof that the Laser Loop got stuck, please email me.
I never rode the Laser Loop, probably because of the urban legends, but if you still have a hankering to ride it, get thee to Grand Island, New York, where Niagara Amusement Park & Splash World have purchased it from the park in Mexico City that bought it from Kennywood.
I’m probably going to make the trip to ride it just so I can check it off the bucket list since I was too scared when I was little. But so help me if it gets stuck, you will hear me screaming “no-poop bananananaaaaaaa” all the way in London.
3. Speaking of “no-poop bananananaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa”
Last Friday, a semi lost its load on I-70 near Rostraver and the load that it lost was this:
And what that is is …
Due to the violent stopping motion of (the tractor trailer) … the trailer became dislodged, causing approximately 15,000 pounds of hot dog filler to catapult on to the roadway
Sometimes the curtain should just not be pulled back but should be superglued shut and then stapled with spaceship-grade fasteners because what the hell are we encasing into tubes and putting in our bodies that looks like silly putty?
Obviously it goes without saying that I’m never eating another hot dog as long as I live and 15,000 Pounds of Hot Dog Filler is my new band name. Or maybe Catapulted Hot Dog Filler. Decisions. Decisions.
4. Just a little politics
Guys, “JFK Jr.” won his committee position by actually getting the most votes and LOL what are you even doing, District 43 Republicans?
We are living in the stupidest most looney tunes times ever. I would have literally written in any name I could think of to avoid voting for him and his dangerous behavior (Walter White. Your mom. Darth Vader. Dr. Oz.). If you don’t think his scam is dangerous, please revisit this post of mine. He is not harmless.
It’s also kind of hilarious that the man who some believe is the great savior of the Republican party, the second coming of John F. Kennedy Jr., the supposed future president of the United States, has been relegated to a county district party committee position. That’s only like 14 million steps away from the presidency.
5. As to the giant bait hook, it’s a no from me, dawg.
The Mount Washington Community Development Corporation thought it had a winning idea on its hands, namely the proposed installation of a 7-foot tall “Jane Seymour open hearts statue” along Grandview Avenue on one of the city overlooks.
As you can see, the statue, one of which already exists in Bradenton, Florida, is a replica of her jewelry design, so literally an advertisement for a product, and the MWCDC thought, “Winner!”
Their selling points:
The size (seven feet in height) and location (on a Grandview Avenue overlook) of the sculpture create a sense of place that promotes interaction with the sculpture
From an economic development perspective, the celebrity nature of the artist will generate new tourism opportunities that people will associate with the City of Pittsburgh and Mount Washington.
The proposed location is well-recognized as one of the most romantic places in western Pennsylvania
“Mama! Let’s take a trip to Pittsburgh and visit the Jane Seymour jewelry statue!” is something no human would have ever uttered except for maybe Jane Seymour’s children.
The MWCDC soon discovered they were very very wrong that Pittsburgh would embrace the statue, as you cannot find a single soul who thought this was a good idea, except for the city of Bradenton who clearly wants us cursed with this statue as they are, the anonymous donor willing to pay for it, and [checks notes] KDKA’s Larry Richert.
Project partners and interested parties include Pittsburgh’s sister city of Bradenton, Florida; Larry Richert, local media personality; and the anonymous donor, who is providing $125,000 for sculpture fabrication and transportation
How random. The best part is that the community development corporation tasked with improving the Mount Washington area decided a good selling point for the installation of the sculpture would be to point out how shitty the place looks as is:
But Mr. Panza pushed back against some of the community critics. He said he never thought the sculpture would end up being so controversial. MWCDC officials noted that it would not prevent people from accessing or enjoying the overlook.
“I can assure you the intention was to just add some beautification to a very blighted and neglected tourist attraction on Grandview Avenue with crumbling sidewalks, rusted railings with graffiti all over them, smashed up garbage cans,” he said.
Bold move. Luckily the proposal failed and we will not be getting a British actress’ giant sculpture of her bait-hook-looking signature jewelry on our precious Mount Washington—or as the MWCDC would call it, a crumbling graffiti-riddled rusted-out blighted trashy place.
6. Welcome, Refugees!
When JFCS, Pittsburgh’s leading refugee resettlement organization, reached out to me recently to ask me to partner with them to help get the word out about the upcoming World Refugee Day celebration, I did not hesitate to say, “HECK YES.”
Over the next week or so, I’ll be visiting some of Pittsburgh’s refugee-owned restaurants, eating their delicious foods, and sharing my experiences with you on my Twitter and Instagram accounts. I’ll also be sharing some fun facts about the places from which our refugee neighbors come, as well as their cultures and languages.
Make plans to attend the event on Monday, June 20 so you too can let our refugee neighbors know we welcome them and consider them an important part of Pittsburgh. This is a great event to expose your children to as well, as it broadens their perspective of who their neighbors are, outside of the people on their street and in their school.
7. That’s all, folkyinz! Have a great week! Avoid Covid like the plague lest you too have your brain fog over and you start rifling through your fridge crisper for a broccoli. And if you’re mad that I criticized the MWCDC, you can send those complaints to … this guy at 1-800-BANANAA
It might sound like he’s laughing at you, but I swear he’ll give me the message along with a hundred photocopies of his butt.