Traffic Changes

I've mentioned before that there is some traffic work planned along Culebra Road as well was Timber Path - the two roads I take to get out of the GNW and off to work. So far it has been just some prep-work, including closing off the turn-only lanes, effectively creating bottlenecks at the intersections of Culebra and 410 and in the other direction, Culebra and Potranco.

Prior to school starting back up, the traffic was just light enough that you could still get through with only minimal frustration. But now that school has started, it takes numerous cycles of the traffic lights to go what is really maybe a half mile.This was my view, sitting in the parking lot of Culebra at Potranco. I suspect it will only get worse.Oh, and remember when I mentioned that bad turn on Callahan Road near Southwest Research Institute? I guess this guy just didn't feel like taking the turn.

How's your traffic?

Bad Turn Report: Callahan Road...

When I was stationed in southern Italy, we had this bridge just outside the base on SS16 that was referred to as the "S" Bridge because along an otherwise straight roadway, they built a bridge over a railroad, but it was in the shape of an "S" (kinda). The road then continued straight there on. Who knows why? Supposedly, that stretch of road was one of the deadliest sections of highway in the country and in Southern Europe, or at least, that is what they told us.

Though not nearly as deadly, probably because the speed limit is only 40 as opposed to "whatever you can handle", I drive along a stretch of road here in San Antonio each day on my way to and from work, and seriously, there is a wreck there at least a several times a month. This is what Callahan Road between Culebra and Commerce looks like, just outside of Southwest Research Institute.And of course, today there was another mishap, though by normal standards, this was a mere "mishap". Usually, someone goes through the fence at SWRI, and a day or two later, it is repaired.Here is the ironic thing about it. The government pays SWRI millions of dollars a year to research various things, or private industry or organizations like Consumer Reports pays them to test all these different things. Why don't the fine folks at SWRI publish a paper on the obvious danger of Callahan Road just outside their fence line, and simply show the number of times each month cars fly through the fence? Wouldn't they have the receipts?

Further, perhaps they could come up with some form of government subsidy that I might qualify for to recover the amount of pain and suffering I endure each time my trip to or from work is delayed by these silly accidents. I'z gots ta get paid!

GNWCIA Meeting Report: My Notes...

A quick note: Sorry to be delinquent with the posts this week - I have been overwhelmed with watching TV now that many of my must see shows are on (Lost!) and I have also been doing some work which causes me to have a little less time to fritter away my life banging away notes into the computer and posting pictures of people being goofy. But, I will try to do better and provide those of you who make this Blog a daily visit on your Internet journey, a rewarding experience each day. No, I'm not running for any elected office.

So, then. My wife and I made the short trip down the street to the Lodge of the Great Northwest so we could attend at least the first hour and a half of the meeting of the Board of Directors of the Great Northwest Community Improvement Association. The audience was , dare I say, packed, with residents compared to normal meetings we attend. I don't have an exact head count, but it was easily triple or quadruple the normal crowd we see. Thank you residents; we need more people to show interest, and mark my words; you will enjoy the show, especially if you are a closet Springer Fan.

But I digress.

Following the fully participated in moment of silence and pledging to the flag, the meeting was called to order and such, then we heard from residents to complain:

Up first, Former Board Chair, Mrs. Kathleen Callahan and a few comments about the the content of letters from Board Chair Besing and Vice Chair Doherty in last months paper. Read it here. I'll save you some time and tell you that she was upset that two sitting Directors made comments in the official paper regarding intentions to run for the board. Multiple theories as to how this was a disadvantage to other potential candidates, and potentially, caused some candidates not to run knowing that they have to run against incumbents.

I don't know how I feel about the first part - is it an advantage? Who knows? Will it keep other people from running? In my estimation, if some potential board candidate made the decision to run based on whether or not an incumbent was running, I'll tell you right now, that person would not get my vote. Either do it because you intend to win and do a good job for the community, or don't run. If announcing their (Doherty and Besing) candidacy via Passages weeded out any crappy candidates, then I'm all for it.

Former (even before Mrs. Callahan) Chairman of the Board of Directors, Joe Martinez gave his concerns about a new GNW Group called The Happenings, not getting fair use of the GNW Lodge. I didn't quite get the full story, so I'd appreciate if someone from the Happenings group could fill me in, but the gist of it was that the Lodge people made the group meet at a smaller venue (Emerald Valley Lodge), which is not fair. That facility is not conducive to meetings, and I can testify. My understanding was that the reasoning was that it costs more money to open the GNW Lodge, so it needs to be for a group large enough to show that it is serving the interests of the community as a whole. I'm gonna have to side with Mr. Martinez on this one (at least the parts I understand). If a group is an officially sanctioned group of the association, let 'em have the good room. I recall my wife and I being the only attendees of a Board of Directors meeting, and our last GNW watch meeting only had about 5 or 6 folks in the audience.

Okay. You may recall the folks in Emerald Valley who had some drunk guy plow his car into their house. The residents spoke before the board to address their concerns and seek assistance from the board and security to help with the problem. This family has already made contact with the city and other agencies to try to address the problem, but you could see the look on the collective faces of the directors and most audience members; this is not an issue that the association can address in any substantive way. The resident made many informative and helpful points, explaining the problems with the street, the fact that vehicles speed and such. But, unfortunately, her suggestions of having the GNW Security basically sit on her street after hours and write down plate numbers of speeders is obviously a no go.

I was extremely proud of how Director Sigrid Long handled the matter in addressing the residents concerns. She made several suggestions on how to proceed and of course, mentioned the fact that the GNWatch group might be a place to start. (I later gave the family my e-mail address and number, and hope they will join the watch soon).

Have you had enough yet? There is more.

We had a surprise guest speaker, Judge Marcia S. Weiner who is the Justice of the Peace for Precinct Two, Place One. If you get in trouble, you will find her over in Leon Valley. It just so happens that my son is doing his Criminal Justice internship in her office, so, needless to say, I have nothing but glowing comments about Judge Weiner and her thirty or more minutes of informative material.

Seriously though, Judge Weiner has an informative pitch involving the the problems associated with truancy and the escalating troubles youth get into. She gave us ideas of the ways she deals with the little criminals to get them back on the right track. Turns out, she often gives the screw-ups community service and that if they live among us, they could perform said service here in the GNW! Sign them up! We need some fences painted.

Anyway, I believe the Passages will soon be running an article written by Judge Weiner, and if you'd like, she left some informative handouts with the office staff.

Okay. On to Committee reports.

Chairman of the Scholarship Committee, Mrs. Callahan gave a stirring report on the status of the committee and the resulting happy kids. Then the questions from Directors Garcia and Pucci started. There seem to be two concerns from the board members: Are there any conflicts of interest, and how is the money accounted for?

You should know that I have been sighted by two of the three factions of the GNW community for not giving a crap about all the details of every little thing in our community. But in the GNW, there are actually three factions.

One faction is made up of people who align themselves with former board chairman Martinez. A second faction is made up of people who align themselves with former board chair Callahan. The other 95 percent of the people in the GNW fall into my faction. We are the people who just want to pay our assessments, live in the community and not be inundated with this petty, petty, petty crap.

In this case, if some residents want to donate money to a scholarship fund and they want to take the proceeds of the vending machines at the pool to add to that fund, go for it. Keep it all legal and open, but go for it.

I have a better idea.

Do it, but do it as a private thing and don't even involve the association with it. They got a whopping $35 from the vending machines last year. My son is in college. $35 doesn't cover half the cost of his parking permit for one semester. The association (as far as I understand) doesn't provide any of the funds to the scholarship, right? So just do it on your own, and be done with it.

But, in the mean time, the deadline for this years scholarship is early April, so contact your high school and do whatever it takes to get the scholarship money.

I don't want to sound like I'm in a hurry, but it should not take 20 minutes of my life to hear about some stupid (Stupid is such a harsh and opinionated word - please don't let it taint the meaning of this report) scholarships at an HOA board meeting. What impact does that private group of well meaning neighbors (and I do applaud them) have to do with the running of the association? I'd like equal time for the Line Dancing committee and the Bunco team, please.

I was unexpectedly asked to give a few words about the GNWatch meeting coming up next Wednesday. I didn't expect to be peppered with questions from the board, but I was.

I have mentioned it before. I have a great deal of respect for Director Pucci. He asks everyone who speaks before the board questions that are intended to provide information he needs to make a decision. I'd like to think I had my shit together, but who knows? Bottom line, come out to the meeting next Wednesday, the 27th of February. I'll write more about it next week.

Our community Manager, Mr. Darrin Laraquente broke down a series of complaints he has received from residents and addressed each. I'm going to tell you right up front; Mr. Laraquente has hit the ground running and is doing a fantastic job for this association. He is still getting to know the community and trying to put people's complaints and concerns into perspective. Kudos to him and to how he is motivating the staff to get things done.

What he is facing is a series of things that are happening in neighborhoods all around San Antonio. First, people are tagging and vandalizing The Five Oh (78250 - get it?) daily. If that isn't bad enough, we have otherwise upstanding residents who are doing ridiculous things.

On a recent tour of the greenbelts in our area (also known as drainage ditches and dry creek beds), he got to see first hand how some residents simply dump garbage over their fences into the open area. Imagine this. You cut your tree limbs and you toss them right over the fence. Someone looks at them and can see exactly where the tree in your back yard has been cut, and exactly where the branch that matches the cut limb is laying on the other side of the fence. Hello? This isn't CSI people. You don't need a sperm sample to figure out who the donor is.

Okay. If you are still reading this, this is where it ends. My wife and I had another, more important meeting to attend, so we left promptly at 9PM.

On the way out, one resident stopped me to suggest that I stay for the next round of action. I'm sorry, but I'll wait for the official minutes.

Oh, I did hear from several people who stayed that there was an attempt to censure a few directors, but in keeping with my new policy of not reporting anything that I don't witness first hand, I'll have to read about it in the official minutes, and so will you.

Help me out people. We need more eyes and ears at these meetings. Why don't you come on down on the first and third Thursday of the month and sit in with us. You can pick any faction you want to sit with - there are no assigned seats.

As always, I tend to get things wrong. Don't file a lawsuit, just send me an e-mail or make a comment and tell me how bad I screwed things up. If you were at the meeting, I'll be happy to print your take on events, unedited, with or without attribution. My goal is to get the information out to my neighbors.

My GNW HOA Minutes: Okay, Hours Really...

As I wrote earlier, I attended my very first meeting of the GNW HOA on Thursday. I have been planning to attend for years, but never found the time. I’m glad I made it.

The meeting has a format which affords residents wishing to address the board of directors a chance to do so before the formal meeting agenda kicks off. There is also a sign-up which allows residents to speak while agenda items are discussed. I found this to be a great format though the execution was not as formal as it was probably intended.

A few residents to speak had clear, seemingly non-confrontational issues for the board regarding the pools. One lady asked about the diving boards being removed and another asked about hooligans hanging around at the pool. Okay, hooligans was my word, not necessarily hers.

Then it got interesting. A lady chose to ask a specific board director, Mr. Guy Pucci, if he had planned on giving the money he received in a lawsuit settlement from the association, back. She called him unethical for sitting on the board after costing residents $75K for his lawsuit against the very board he was now a member of. Before he could respond, Mr. Joe Martinez (publisher of the Sentinel Newsletter) admonished the board that this woman (whose name I did not catch) was out of order. “Out of order!” he repeated multiple times, to which the lady replied, “Sir, we aren’t in session; how can I be out of order?”

At this point there was a lot of talk between board members and onlookers in the audience, and I could see factions of people dividing like a wedding with the Hatfield’s and McCoy’s. I realized that the descriptions of board meetings given to me by neighbors who have participated before were pretty accurate. Another lady whose name I did not catch provided a formal letter to the board and then stood there and read it. She had three different complaints, all of which seemed petty to me, but the one that came up again in the formal portion of the meeting revolved around a particular volunteer having been let go by the board some 6 years ago. Whatever. I think audience members and the board all agreed that as long as the volunteer wasn’t doing anything bad now, let’s move on. Agreed.

Two gentlemen fully decked out in motorcycle gear spoke of their desire to form an area motorcycle club that HOA residents could join in and have twice monthly rides, perform community service events and perhaps hold meetings at the lodge. They were seeking permission not to form the club, but to be recognized as residents, and not as Hells Angels if neighbors saw a group of them meeting in the parking lot of the lodge etc. If ever there was a no-brainer, this was it. My gut feeling was that a member of the board would immediately move to have a proclamation of some sort, naming this new motorcycle club as a Friend of the Association or some such ceremonial convention. Instead, board member Ms. Sigrid Long brought up the fact that this group could somehow be a liability to the HOA, and that lawyers would have to be consulted.

Beyond being shocked, I was distressed that during the course of the meeting (which still was not actually in session yet) the “need to consult lawyers” had been proclaimed numerous times by Ms. Long and others.

Mr. Lee Besing, the chairman of the board was quick to dismiss Ms. Long’s concerns, citing that unless the motorcycle club was going to use the name, “Great Northwest Community Improvement Association, Inc. Motorcycle Gang” and perhaps use the GNW logo, there really wasn't any issue. Mr. Austin Sheldon, one of the club founders, confirmed that they would not be wearing leather jackets emblazoned with the seal of the GNW.

Interestingly enough, later in the meeting Mr. Besing noted that a group offered to let GNW board members ride in Corvettes during the 4^th of July parade. I couldn’t help but wonder if Ms. Long would want to consult lawyers for liability issues prior to jumping in for a ride down Timberwilde.

Another topic that came up in the early “residents to speak” session and then in the formal meeting was the use of e-mail addresses. Ms. Kathy Callahan pointed out that one board member; Mr. Pucci in particular did not wish to correspond with her via e-mail. Given an opportunity to explain his reasons, the fact that she was sending mail to his work address, the matter was resolved somewhat. Later, Ms. Long made the suggestion that board members should only be using official e-mail addresses for correspondence with residents and further, that any e-mail sent to one board member should go to all board members. Somehow, this good idea of making board members accessible via official e-mail addresses turned into a free-for-all with board members recounting the various e-mails they had received from their adoring public, and how they responded to them. This was fine, but it seemed as though the meeting never gained any momentum toward getting through the stated agenda because every sentence uttered required some legal review or interjection from an audience member.

During a break, my neighbor Eric introduced me to board member, Janet Doherty and former board member Kathy Callahan, both of whom seemed to be very nice folks just concerned about making the HOA work.

This brings me to the point. For all of the infighting and ruffled feathers over seemingly insignificant matters, these people all seem very concerned about doing the right thing for the community, yet I think there is some one-upmanship and pettiness spoiling what would otherwise be a tough job in the first place. Listening to the temporary accountant and one of the department heads discuss the very real and important issues facing the people who do the day-to-day running of this HOA and all the facilities, it comes across as unsettling to observe otherwise well intentioned people act like 6^th graders.

The Great Northwest is bigger than many towns in the state of Texas, and with a budget that far exceeds what I dismissively thought of as a pool and a few security guards. There are many hardworking people (the ones that have not quit, anyway) who have an important job to do to keep our community facilities running. To help guide the direction of the community are a group of volunteers who have been elected by a very small percentage of the total HOA membership (which by the way doesn’t diminish the fact that they are elected). It seems such a shame that the meeting could go on for so long (two hours before I gave up and left) to contain really only 20 minutes or so of real content; the rest of the time taken up by petty sniping and quibbling.

I’m no stranger to immaturity though, so I plan to be back at the next meeting and perhaps I’ll bring a cowbell or one of those air horns to give off an alarm each time someone starts being stupid. I feel like I’m going to like these people; they are my neighbors after all.

* If I mentioned your name, please don’t sue me, but please don’t hesitate to e-mail me if you’d like.

*No, I'm not really going to bring an air horn or a cowbell next time.

On the Scene

I'd like to think that I would make a good reporter if I worked for KENS-TV. I have this ability to sniff out gory situations and get to the scene of the incident right away. And if I have learned anything from watching Chris Marrou and Co for the last almost twenty years, it's that "if it bleeds, it leads".

Okay, who am I kidding? I was on my way to work this morning and happened upon a fender-bender at the intersection of Callahan and Old Highway 90. I don't think anyone was hurt, at least I hope not, but it was good for a quick voyeuristic gawking.*

* I only gawked since I hit the intersection at the red light. I would not have otherwise looked or had time for happy-snaps if the light had been green. No other traffic was held up nor did any other accidents occur as a result of my reporting.

Weekend Trip to San Antonio!

This may come as a shock, but finding a hotel room in downtown San Antonio for the last weekend in April is not really easy. And we figured this out years ago the first time my wife had the bright idea of taking a mini-vacation without leaving town.

Years ago, we found a hotel that met all of our requirements: an indoor pool, an in-room Jacuzzi, a manager’s reception (read: free drinks) and free breakfast. At the time, the hotel was called the Executive Guest Haus, and I think it was about $89.00 for the night.

Later, the hotel changed owners and I believe the Clarion folks called it the Atrium. Now, after being closed for two years, our little getaway hotel is called the Hilton Garden Inn and it is just south of Bitters on 281 North.

A few things have changed since our first visit – for one, we no longer require the use of the indoor pool allowing some body-modesty issues to rule out what would surely be a refreshing swim in the pool, visible to anyone seeking to admire the beautiful open atrium of the hotel. I suspect if you stayed there, you’d thank me for that.

Another thing is, they smartly installed an actual bar into the hotel rather than some guy serving keg beer and boxed wine from a little pushcart. Though it seems small at first glance, patrons can sit anywhere in the lobby to enjoy their drinks in private on the comfortable variety of sofas and chairs or at tables with a good view of the nice flat screen High-Def TVs. We opted to sit at the bar for a quick drink or two. I’ll get back to the bar n a moment.

The rooms have been upgraded to include quite possibly the most comfortable bed I have ever slept on. We were so impressed with the comfort that we pulled the linens off to look for a tag and found that it was one of those sleep systems that allows you to change the settings for softer or firmer etc. I’m guessing it was set to “Perfect” because, without sounding like some paid spokesman, it was really that good. Oh, I did Google it once we got home and I suspect that for the mattress, the platform, the mattress cover and the pillows, we were sleeping on a $2,500 .00 bed. And that was just the sleep system itself, not the really nicely done headboard. My wife is saving for ours now.

There was one disappointing change to the room though. Originally, the Jacuzzi tub had openings on both the bathroom side and the bedroom side. This allowed for sitting in the tub and soaking while watching TV. I’m going to guess that the Hilton folks just assumed nobody would be interested in watching TV from a Jacuzzi. They don’t know me!

So our original plan called for finding a nice place to have dinner close by, back to the hotel for drinks and then breakfast in the morning at The Magnolia Pancake Haus. However, when the manager gave us some coupons good toward the purchase of dinner, drinks or breakfast, we opted to try the restaurant in the hotel. I’ll take cheap over romantic any day of the week – and this made our dinner just about free.

As I mentioned earlier, we opted to sit at the bar to have a drink. My wife is fond of a thing called a Bahama Mama, which roughly equates to three types of rum, some grenadine and some juice. Our bartender, Vito, a fairly new barkeep had never heard of such nonsense, but was quick to look it up and take a stab at one. In minutes, my wife was sipping away on the festive novelty, though it lacked the customary little umbrella.

When we walked into the bar, there were already two people who had just finished work at Luby’s, and quite possibly just finished a “Doobie”. They were sharing a beer and a burger, and aside from the female having the word “CRAZY” conveniently tattooed on her arm as a warning, we would have figured it out even if she had not removed her Luby’s smock in favor of the more casual wife-beater T-shirt she was wearing. Hey, I dig a chick in a wife-beater; I just prefer to see it on “COPS”, not sitting next to my bride at a quiet hotel bar.

Anyway, and please, don’t let this little tangent take away from the overall good atmosphere of the Hilton Garden Inn; it was slightly amusing but more disheartening to observe this young girl make an ass of herself in public. I’m no prude and have imbibed to excess more than once, but this girl was proof positive that smoking dope then drinking beer should not be done in public. Put it this way, the bar only opened at 5PM and our trusty bartender refused to serve her another beer before it was 6. I could prattle on about this, but I’ll save the calls for mass sobriety to our friends at DARE.

The burger the folks next to us had looked really good and even though the menu had a wide selection of normal foods to choose from – steak, chicken alfredo, etc., we both opted to go for the custom burger with steak fries. I ordered mine with grilled onions, mushrooms, three different cheeses topped with bacon. My wife had the same, minus the ‘shrooms. Service was reasonably quick and, though I am only guessing that these were the instant HEB-like microwave patties, the burgers were thick, the buns were fresh and toasted, and they received my “Tasty Treat” seal of approval.

I’ll skip further details of our evening having adequately reported on the quality of the bed earlier, but I do have to slip in this one detail, which I found entertaining.

I have seen my fair share of hotels around the country as a result of traveling with my job. I have also seen those news-entertainment shows like 20/20 and Dateline NBC where they take the hotel linens to a lab only to find evidence of fecal matter and semen everywhere from the coffee pot to the remote control. I generally have to put this out of my mind in order to sleep. I simply pretend that either I am the first person to sleep in the room or if not, the well-paid housekeeping staff has washed everything in bleach, wiped everything that won’t fit in the washing machine with bleach, then used one of those CSI-like black lights to ensure that no remnants of personal bodily function or fluid has remained beyond the last tenants visit.

So, solidly living in fantasyland of perfectly pristine comfort, and having consumed several large beers from the aforementioned hotel bar, I was amused rather than disgusted to see a shade of faded brown on one of the towels in our room. Now surely this stain was as innocent as someone spilling a cup of hot black coffee as they came out of the shower and reaching for towel wrapped around their body so as to avoid any McDonald’s like lawsuit for burns in an uncomfortable and embarrassing area. I was willing to believe that, but I was not willing to take a chance by using the towel. Naturally, I gave that one to my wife.

But, she insisted I seek a different arrangement and so when I went back down to see Vito the barkeep for a spoon (my wife had a parfait she wanted to eat), I asked for some fresh towels as well. Vito was all too accommodating and I generously tipped him for his service.

So, Monday I had taken off from work and we decided to start our day with the long anticipated trip to the Magnolia Pancake Haus. First, by the appearance of the place, you can tell that the owners are really interested in an enjoyable atmosphere. Though the restaurant is actually located on an end slot of a strip center, they went out of their way to build a façade including columns, outdoor seating to accommodate people who my have to wait for a table, and a really crisp paint scheme to give it the feel of an older place in the country rather than a shop located in busy Embassy Oaks.

Right away, friendly staff seated us and I couldn’t help but notice the various plates of breakfast being brought out to the other patrons. Everything looked excellent, and the smell of the place was wonderful. I knew for sure that I wanted to have buttermilk pancakes and my wife was certain that she would be ordering the pecan pancakes. But believe me, the full menu will make you question your initial selection because everything sounds so appetizing.

Just as we were about to order, the gentleman seated in the booth behind us got his order. Against my better judgment, I decided on the spot to have whatever he was having, which turned out to be corned beef hash. I won’t lie here. It was not something I would order again, mostly because my idea of hash involves a can of Hormel with diced potatoes rather than shreds. But having said that, it was not bad and I was glad I tried them. The good news is, my the corned beef hash comes with a side of buttermilk pancakes and they were awesome. And as promised, my wife found her pecan pancakes to be the heaven that her friends had described. All in all, great stuff and I know we will visit again, if not for breakfast, but to give their lunch a try.

I know it is an Internet Rant cliché to go on about people and their cell phones in restaurants and such, but this little incident was worth passing along (at least I think so). First, as we were waiting for our breakfast, a frumpy looking gentleman with gray unkempt hair walked in and was seated about four booths away from us. Almost immediately, his obnoxiously loud cell phone rang and thankfully, he was able to answer it on about the fifth ring. If this wasn’t distracting enough, he began a lively conversation using an accent that sounded half-British and half-Australian. I should know, I lived in England for some time, and I’ve seen the Crocodile Hunter show (may he rest in peace). Anyway, the fact that it sounded awkward makes me think the guy was just faking it to impress other diners. “Oh, look at me, I’m British, or maybe I’m Aussie, I just don’t know which.”

So just after our food arrived and we were digging into it, the gentleman behind us (the guy who prompted me to order the hash) decided that he needed a new ring tone for his cell phone. And then he promptly played every ring tone on his phone until he found something he liked. The funny thing was, he was completely undeterred by my wife proclaiming, “You have got to be shitting me” at full volume and with no embarrassment whatsoever.

That was actually a perfect ending to our little getaway trip to celebrate our 22^nd anniversary. Like many others, we did encounter the most incredible torrential downpour on our trip back to 78250. In fact, I honestly thought that I was going to float away in the left hand lane (the fast lane) of Loop 410 at Callahan. What idiot designed a highway that can amass 2 feet of water in the fast lane?

How was your weekend? E-mail me and tell me about your adventure in San Antonio.