Paul's Journal

05/26/2008 12:33 #44454

Canoeing on Oak Orchard Creek in Medina
Category: canoeing

Six of us went canoeing yesterday down the Oak Orchard Creek in Media. (e:matthew), (e:terry) and I, pat, terri and dave. Two canoes and two kayaks. Unfortunately, the one blow up Kayak had a funky oar. (e:terry) decided to just paddle with it take apart which is a little different than you would normally kayak.

::Download Flash Video::

We made a couple of stops along the way to play frizzby, reshuffle beer, etc

At one of stops there was this beer tree and I asked Dave if he thought it was inspired by the beer tree at St. Patrick's Day beer tree (e:paul,43734) and he said that, that particular beer tree was there for at least 10 years. So now I have to ask myself - is this a coincidence or did this beer tree inspire the other one - or are beer trees, a dime a dozen and I just never saw one.

Dave in the creek.

(e:terry) with some fancy rolled shorts

I found some clam shells that looked way prettier in the sunshine of real life than in this pic.

Most of my trip looked like this:

::Download Flash Video::

(e:terry) decided to test out standing up in the canoe when dave shouted drop your shorts and (e:terry) mooned the whole gang.

There were lots of other canoers during most of the trip and you can see from this pic that Terri - not (e:terry) - had no shirt on, which was of major interest to the straight canoer guys we past.

This tree house on the water, was the coolest one I eve saw. The one disappointing feature of our house is the lack of tree-house capable trees. This means we will need a cottage at some point.

We are almost at the end of the road.

Between hiking, tree chopping, refrigerator moving and canoeing, my body is so sore. Now we have to get the new refrigerator in place, argh.

leetee - 05/26/08 18:56
Ah, the beginning of the naked (e:PMT) season. Known elsewhere as summer...

05/25/2008 11:03 #44444

Niagara Gorge Hiking Trip
Category: hiking

Yesterday, in lieu of setting up the refrigerator we decided to chop down some dead trees in the backyard and go hiking at the Gorge. Today, after some seriously axing yesterday morning - my hands are killing me.

Here is (e:matthew) climbing in the tree and breaking off branches before we cut it down.

Basra is a bit obsessed with getting his face in the sprinkler from the sprinkler system. It is so cute, I should have taken a video.

On the way to the Gorge, (e:james) got all crumbtastic with some yum yums from the coop.

Like they throb a ton and I can't even hold the toothbrush right when brushing my teeth. Thanks to my stupid crohn's I never take pain meds which should make our canoe trip today fun. At least I will be outside.

Once we got down there, (e:matthew) threw a rock at my head. Luckily, I survived.

Just kidding, it is a rust puddle. (e:terry) love to perch on rocks

and he also loves caves. So finding this river cave was like a dream cme true for him.

(e:james) and (e:terry)

What I want to know is, who the fuck is Kyle?

These pictures of Sea Weed remind me of the "painting with light" pictures I used to do (e:paul),/32329 with the nokkia 7710 with the slow shutter speed.

There are all these awesome little pools filled with water.

(e:terry) love being on the most dangerous edges.

After the hiking trip we went to One Eyed Jack's in Lockport. Their smoked wings are awesome. On the way there we stopped at Smoking Joe's to get gas. It is not much cheaper than the $4.01 in America.

james - 05/25/08 20:24
Paul, you are a photo ninja. I didn't see you with your camera at all except for the crummy gut picture.

metalpeter - 05/25/08 12:35
Nice pictures thanks for sharing them. Sorry I can't help you with who kyle is I wonder if that terry is a boy or a girl. On that note Terry seems like he likes to rock climb and it looks fun but it isn't my cup of tea, that water really looks pretty rough, looks like a great time, hope the rest of the weekend is good.

05/21/2008 23:28 #44415

So much for the parking guard
Category: linwood

After all the drama with the driveway and the parking situation, some parked in our driveway again. There was no one monitoring the situation like they promised. The woman got out of her car and went into the church for about 10 minutes before coming out and driving away.

Its so frustrating because I really do not know what to do anymore. Imagine if you neighbor just started having guests over that parked in your driveway all the time. This woman wasn't even hovering, she just parked and got out.

metalpeter - 05/23/08 18:21
(e:matt)

You mentioned one thing that I didn't think about bur it really is true. That is the safety issue. I think the policy that the parent (or who ever drops off and picks up) needs to come to the door to get the kid and drop them off. The example you gave is a perfect example of why that is a good idea. Lets face it kids get snatched up everyday in this country . what if you guys were not home then or what if the kid would have went to a house of someone who has a thing for kids it could have been a lot worse. Not only that but what if there is a parental dispute and the parent who isn't supposed to have the kid that day gets there first and the kid doesn't think anything of it and just hopes in the car. Maybe presenting the church with the fact that what they are not doing isn't safe might be a good idea, even if it doesn't help with the drive way and the traffic problems (and it could help you guys also). In terms of the term Fagot try not to let in bother you to much. If they know you are gay and say it that is one thing. But often "Us stights" use that term as a way of putting someone down when we assume someone isn't because to someone who isn't it is a big insult. I myself think there is nothing wrong with being gay but if some else does to call them that really gets them upset. I don't really have any other advise for you guys but I do wish you luck in finding a way to solve this with out fist fights.

matthew - 05/22/08 22:26
Okay, I'll admit the "Walgreen's" example didn't make much sense. My real point should have been that there is much more to this situation than just "i don't want you in my driveway". Much more than a sign or a fence will solve.

I've been trying to have a good neighborly relationship with the church from the beginning. We understood it takes a lot of patience living next to a large organization like the church. especially one with no parking. So I've felt in the last two years living at 24 Linwood that keeping an open conversation with the church "leaders" was best. I've talked many times with the grounds keeper about not just this problem but all the problems concerning us and the church. He told me he'd continue to talk with father Armand. So when the father's latest response to paul was that we are trying to make this a "racial situation" based on paul's (e:strip) journals, i was beyond personally offended. You need to know someone pretty god damn well before you accuse them of being a racist. After that, I truly hoped the church would find a solution to their problem on their own. They didn't.

i have a lot of experience in large children's organizations that require a parent drop off -pick up situation like the Chruch's Dance Camp needs. i worked at the JCC just down the street that had this exact problem. So i can see the problem from both points of view. The difference here is A. the JCC had actual parking, and B. The JCC had a policy that the parents must walk their children to the door. This is such a reasonable idea for an urban children's program! The church's dance camps current policy seems to be - stop in the street at the busy intersection of North and Linwood ave (or the private driveway at neighboring 24 Linwood)with your flashers on (while traffic piles up behing you) and let you kid jump out of the car and run to the church's door about 80 feet away. Sometime up to 50 families on a weekend. Anyone besides me see a lot of problems with this? Not just trespassing but safety. One time last year a parent belonging to the dance camp let their 5 or 6 year old out at the street and pulled away before their child got to the door. It turned out that there was NO dance Camp on this particular day. So who has to deal with the crying 5 year old who is scarred and wants their mommy?? answer is... Me and my friend holly, who found the right phone numbers, where able to contact the church who then contacted the dance camp to deal with their problem a few hours later.

If you have no parking maybe you should work with the city of Buffalo and declare you need a designated street spot marked by signs as a drop-off children's zone. or maybe the church should seek tenants other than the dance camp. One , maybe, that doesn't need parking that the church doesn't have. Like the AA meetings. Or maybe the church can put in their own driveway with their own entrance. What crazy solutions, i know. Instead, i'm told there is nothing the church can do and to call the police if the problem continues. Hmmm, looking back maybe i should have just called the cops on that 5 year old and let them deal with it. That's the churches current answer, right? JUST TALK TO THE FREAKIN" PARENTS YOURSELF! Don't they want a safe solution as well? gosh.

I'd also like to point out that this is not just 24 Linwood's complaint. I've talked with the other neighbors on my block and many of them agree or have their own set of problems with the traffic vioalations the church creates. (also the litter problem, but that's a whole other story.) I'm thinking i should write a formal letter of complaint and have the agreeing residents sign it and send it directly to city hall. If the church won't listen to us we'll step above them.

I don't know. I really think there are reasonable solutions that will make all party's happy. But the church really hasn't been helpful.

Finally, I'm tired of being called "faggot" when i ask the people not to park in the driveway. "You better watch you're back" and "we obviously know where you live" are some of my other favorite threats. I don't want these people to become my enemies. I don't deserve harassment for having a private driveway that happens to be next to the church. Maybe I'll just continue to turn my back, close my ears, and water my lawn and trust that the church has the neighborhoods best interest in mind with their dance camp drop off pick up policy in my driveway. BLAH!

i have so much more to say, maybe i'll bring this topic to my own journal. Thanks for listening.

drew - 05/22/08 20:49
yeah. I know you shouldn't have to come up with solutions, but it has been fun.

Anyway, they will regret telling you to take matters in your own hands if you bring a lawsuit against the church.

And I promise, that is the last solution I will offer.

metalpeter - 05/22/08 19:58
Hi Matt

First of all sorry about all the problems with the parking there. I think that since it is a church they should tell the people not to park in or blocking the driveway. That being said I will use walgreens as an example. If people at the lenox or that other hotel were to park at walgreens then walgreens would have to call the tow trucks themselves and would have to be the ones to go out and tell people to leave. Yes I would agree that those two places should explain if we are out of spots and you go to walgreens to park they will tow your car. I think the real problem is that the people (or some of them) who park in your driveway or who block it will continue to do so. They are not willing to take the extra time to find a real spot when they can just run in real quickly.

This is one of those tricky spots where what one should do is not what one is responsible for. I think the church should tell people not to park there. But really it is your property all they can really do is call the cops if they see something. Or do what ever they can so people know the driveway isn't theres. But again since it is your property they can't really do much. But the flip side to that is I'm sure the church could do a lot more then what they are doing by saying listen if you don't follow parking laws we don't want you here. But I'm sure they would rather have the people mad at you then at the church, they don't want to lose any Business.

I'm sorry you guys are still dealing with this, you shouldn't have to. Maybe the class will end soon and the issue will go away for sometime, I wish you luck.

matthew - 05/22/08 19:43
"private drive" not private job. sorry fot the typo

matthew - 05/22/08 19:35
I live at 24 Linwood also. All of the comments on this journal are great ideas and suggestions. Thanks guys. But the underlining issue here is not that we don't know what to do about the people parking in and blocking our driveway, it's that it should be the chruch of th ascension's responsibility to deal with the problem.

They Do understand the problem (or at least we've made it pretty clear to them that there IS a problem and, as (e:paul)'s journal shows, given them reports and photos) and yet they haven't taken any actions to alleviate the problem. They have instead basically told us to deal with it our selves. Washing their hands clean of the situation. We were told by the church to "call the cops" if it happens again. Why can't the church make it clear to their own customers that 24 Linwood's private driveway is NOT for their use BEFORE we are forced to call the cops? Let the angry drivers be angry with the church, not us. Why not let the church call the cops on their customers who are breaking the law?

If we lived next to a Walgreen's whose costumers kept parking on our private land, shouldn't any signs or fences keeping customers out be placed on the Walgreen's parking lot, and put there by Walgreen's themselves? (sorry Walgreen's, don't mean to drag you into the middle of this.) I feel the church, as the landlords, should take responsibility. I have a bunch of ideas on how the problem can be solved, but the church hasn't showed us that they are really interested or even listening to our complaints. I've talked personally with the Head of the dance camp whose parents are the the repeat parking offenders, I've talked to father Armand of the church of the ascension, and I've talked to the women who represent the church at the Linwood preservations block club meaning about the problem. I have even talked to the people who park in my driveway themselves, and i won't begin to list the derogatory names I've been called and the threats I've been given for politely asking someone to "please not park here, it's a private job." I'm sick of dealing with it myself without the church's help. I really have to say that I'm extremely surprised and disappointed by the lack of maturity on the churches part in dealing with their neighborhood.

Sorry, just wanted to get this off my chest. Thanks

mike - 05/22/08 18:54
really i think a lot of people may not know. not the repeat offenders but a lot of people prolly do not know they cannot park there. Can't you put a sign on your garage that says no parking in front of here. That can't be against the preservation thing cuz your garage door is already there.

uncutsaniflush - 05/22/08 17:01
They say that fences make good neighbors; you could put up a fence with a gate to prevent people from using your driveway. Assuming, of course, this would be legal in a preservation district.

One of the less permanent things you could do is use orange traffic cones and/or construction type barricades :::link:::
or :::link:::
along with a no parking private parking sign.

Not particularly elegant but effective.

drew - 05/22/08 13:26
This is mean to the kids, and possibly illegal, but it would work and be funny.

Do you still have that box of porn from the church trash cans? Tape the most offensive stuff to each car that parks in your driveway.

chico - 05/22/08 13:10
What about printing up a notice that says something like,

YOUR VEHICLE IS PARKED ON PRIVATE PROPERTY. PARKING A VEHICLE HERE CONSTITUTES TRESPASSING.

TRESPASSING IS ILLEGAL.

YOUR VEHICLE'S LICENSE PLATE NUMBER HAS BEEN RECORDED. FUTURE VIOLATIONS WILL BE REPORTED TO THE POLICE.

Leave a blank spot for the date and time; when someone parks in your driveway and you see the car there, fill in the date and time, and place the "ticket" on the windshield of the car.

Write down the license plate number on a list, along with make and model for future reference.

ajay - 05/22/08 12:26
Print out some "parking tickets" and put them on the windshields of the perps.
Charge them $50 for parking there.

Maybe you can make some money out of this thing.

ps: I'll only charge you 10% commission for this advice.

On a more serious note: you could just print out "No loitering: Private Property" signs and put them in a visible place.

paul - 05/22/08 12:24
We are limited as to what we can do because it is a preservation district. We are not allow to have big signs/banners. I am thinking a video surveillance system that just takes pictures of all the cars that go in and out and posts it to a blog so I can create a giant evidence trails of all the trespassing. Followed by one of the one way tire spike things. But damn they cost like $500 and people will surely retaliate.

fing - 05/22/08 12:14
Do these people really think that maybe this is part of the church? I would post a sign saying private property. You could also put Video Surveillance in use or something similar. They don't know if any one is really watching. Perhaps a banner that stretches the width of the driveway but up high so you can still park.

jason - 05/22/08 12:14
I think a human being sitting out there with a shotgun would be a pretty good deterrent.

fellyconnelly - 05/22/08 11:34
whenever somebody comes and parks in your driveway, move your car and block them in!
THEN call the police.

hodown - 05/22/08 10:00
I say nails in the drive way.

kara - 05/22/08 08:19
Have you thought about posting a sign warning people that you're taking down their license plate numbers or something?

What about putting some (heavy, weighted with stones) garbage cans in the driveway?

Inconsiderate people like that are one of the reasons we've moved out of the city. best of luck to you.

paul - 05/22/08 00:12
Ya, the problem is the people know where we live. So if we do something like spike strip, baracade, call the police they are just going to retaliate.

james - 05/22/08 00:09
Could you make a barricade of some sort? One that would block the person from leaving while the cops arrived?

05/23/2008 22:36 #44434

An Awesome Day In Buffalo
Category: buffalo

The parking Story Ending
(e:matthew) and (e:terry) got to talk with the priest from the church who was unaware of the property lines and other drama according to (e:matthew). Apparently, everything worked out great and they are moving the dance camp pick up/drop off to the North St side of the church which solves the problem for us!

Work
Work was great. I did a successful demo of two projects to two VPs, the time lines for the projects seem realistic right now, we are getting two new people and the two people we are thinking about going with seem great so far - according to (e:mrdeadlier).

Food
Then after work (e:terry), (e:matthew) and I went out to lunch at Saigon on Elmwood where I had the most delicious pork chop/shrimp combo. It was only like $8.00 and quite filling.

Shopping and workout
After that we decided to stop by Home Depot to look at refrigerators. You guys might remember that I wanted to get this one Jenn Air Model (e:paul,44379). So we went to go see if they had it at Home Depot.

I can't believe anyone really needs an oven in their grill, seriously.

(e:terry) made it clear we were just looking and not buying one. The didn't have the Jenn Air, but to our surprise they had a floor model that was very similar (minus vacation mode and open door alarm)

for super sale. (e:enknots) friend Jake was our sales guy and he managed to get us an even better deal plus 10% off as it was 10% off appliances over $399 day. Which means we ended up with a $1699.00 refrigerator for $1068 which is quite awesome deal. The one hitch was that, because it was a floor model they don't offer shipping.

So we rented a truck form Home Depot. Has anyone else done this. their truck rental is awesome. It is only $19.99 and unlike Uhaul, there are not 106 extra fees that bring it to like $100. However, it is only for 75 minutes but if you are just moving stuff around the city, that is usually enough.

It was a rough operation considering that it weighed 320 lbs and we barely weight that much between the 3 of us. Somehow, we managed to get it home and into the foyer. Because it is so deep we had to take it a apart a bit to fit it in the doors. Then we deiced to break for the day and deal with getting the old one out tomorrow.

Linwood and the red sqaure
I wondered what was up with this red square on this empty house on the 400 block of Linwood. At the block club meeting the building inspector explained that the fire dept put this symbol on all the houses that were abandoned, to let other firefighters know. Unfortunately, the housing dept also put this exact same symbol, in the same color on all the houses scheduled for demolition which cause a lot a drama - as you can imagine. The building inspector said they were going to have a meeting to discuss this issue. It seems so insane that they didn't work together on that. Shows you that all government is disorganized.

He also said that now that people know this is the symbol for houses to be demolished some overzealous block clubs began to pain tthe symbol on houses they wanted to get rid of. I am sure this house is worth around $300,000+ - I hope they can get it on the market ASAP and turn it back into a house.

random pics
Totally unrelated pictures from my camera.

What the heck is up with the scientologists and their extreme paper waste. Its like every surface is covered with Scientology propaganda. Here you can see a flyer on the ground in the parking lot at the corner of North and Main.

This morning there was something crazy going on at the Salvation Army on Main. There were at least five police cars pulle dup to it as I walked to work.

What are all the religious symbols on this coexist bumper sticker?"

I forgot to post this before but when we went to go see the (e:paul,44413) Death Note movie, at the end the screen became a windows desktop. I guess they just palyed a DVD or something. It was weird to see the start menu so giant at the regal.

lilho - 05/24/08 11:18
how fancay, a lovely new fridge! congratulations. and the thai thingy looks yum.

fellyconnelly - 05/24/08 10:44
saw that truck at your house yesterday as i was driving down to class and said 'wonder what them boys are up to now?'

james - 05/24/08 01:15
That coexist bumper sticker is put out by Dr.Bronner's soap.

:::link:::

I will have to keep an eye on that house.

imk2 - 05/23/08 23:14
isn't that how all digital movies are being played at theaters? i think the big movies are still on reels, but the small indie movies are digital these days.

05/21/2008 23:04 #44413

Death Note
Category: movies

I went to go see Death Note with (e:imk2), (e:metalpeter), (e:jenks), (e:tibruon1724), dan, and faben. It was pretty great. Poor (e:enknot) - he missed it but he would have freakin loved it. I think it is the first time I have ever been to a movie with such a jazzed up fan base.

The storyline was pretty good. It was like a live action. I would suggest seeing it tomorrow if you can.

Wikipedia link:

Anime Site:

Live Action Movie:

There is a sequel coming out and there is even a prequel about L who was by far the hotest of the main characters:

metalpeter - 05/22/08 17:09
The movie was really good. I really liked how L was so much like his character with all his odd movements the foot thing and phone come to mind. It is easy to lose those little details. You have to give it fans who scream when their favorite character comes on screen the people in fron to us where very interesting.

imk2 - 05/22/08 10:32
hey faben has an estrip name it's (e:limsey)! although she's lame and never posts

mrmike - 05/22/08 07:54
Should have bailed on my meeting and gone