All Up Hill

Okay, so I had found the courthouse and established it was somewhere under three miles from where I had parked. I could do that walk in forty-five minutes. It is supposed to be in the nineties next Wednesday when I must, and I can do that because today is supposed to get to the mid-nineties. Of course then I won't be doing a round trip immediately.

Which means I am now about to walk back that near three miles and I can tell the heat is picking up.

I walk up to the historic district. There is a familiar sign, one I have been seeing everywhere about downtown today, sidewalk closed.

They have had sidewalks and streets torn up constantly since I last worked downtown nine years ago and before that.

I cross over and walk up the other side of Market. This used to be called, "The Mall" and was closed to automobile traffic. A decade ago they opened it to traffic, both ways, again and now it is a bit dodgy crossing the street. Even after several years a lot of people forget it isn't shut off and wander aimlessly into the street without really looking. I really don't know why they didn't keep it car free.

I think you can notice in this picture that the street is going up an incline. That upward incline will be constant from this point.

When I worked in the city this was one of my favorite places to buy lunch, although I didn't get it there a lot. Leo & Jimmy's Deli is another area institution and Jimmy has been a real giving citizen for decades. I believe Leo is dead now.

This was the only place I could get Lebanon sandwiches, piled with Lebanon, sharp cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, salt, pepper and yellow mustard on a large hoagie roll with a side of kosher pickles.

My grandmother used to make a sandwich with those ingratiates for my lunches when I was a little boy, we called it "The Dagwood" and it has always been my favorite.

On the right the lighter building with the flag is the Grand Opera House and The Little Grand. The Little Woman and I were subscribers for a few years, taking in five or six shows a year until the economy went sour for me this past year.

My first time in the place was for the announcement of a new logo for the big bank I once worked for. They paid someone a hundred thousand dollars to design a new logo, what a waste of good money. Then they wasted more by renting this place, hiring a composer to write some original elevator music to go with the announcement and making us all come here to hear it.

The door to the box office.

The little sidewalk posts announcing coming shows.

Across the street from the Opera House is a newer restaurant in town called the Chelsea Tavern. The Little Woman and I ate there once recently and we will go back, it is very good.

Actually there was another restaurant here called 821, but it failed after a few years. It was more upscale in its decor and had a confusing menu. We ate at it once as well, but didn't care for it. The menu was really, really difficult to figure out. It was one of those little-dish-big-dish combo you choose from this column and that column places.

I call this photo the dance because of the positions and stances of the man and woman.

There is this corridor between Market and the street behind. Subscribers of The Grand get free parking at a garage and the garage is located on the back street. You can then walk through here to the theater.

Along the left wall are posters for The Grand shows and on the right are windows for the Chelsea Tavern.

Peeking through a window into the restaurant.

Now we are on that back street and that Monchanin Building where I had both my first and last job downtown is dominating the center. I am going in that direction.

The parking garage I mentioned is on the left.

Further along we see another building where I worked peeking around the corner of the round building. This is where I had my last position with that big bank I was employed by for 21 years before they tossed me for getting old,.

We also see a hint of that other nuisance downtown.

Road construction.

Yes sir, we have a nice blockage on a main inbound artery. When I took this picture one of those distant guys in yellow was yelling at a motorist. See that white vehicle on the right turning into a side street.

He's turning the wrong way into a one-way street.

Oops!

"Hot dang! Summer in the city..."

Dig we must.

The doorway I walked out of for the last time on September 7, 2001.

Hard to believe tomorrow, September 5, will be the ninth anniversary of the day I heard those kind and affection words, "Retire or be terminated".

I had my first interview with an outsourcing firm on the top floor of the tallest building of the city scheduled for 9/11. It was cancelled for some reason.

Here is another popular eatery in town, The Washington Street Ale House.  We have eaten there and liked it, but parking can be a problem so we haven't been there often or lately.

Oddly it looks similar to the restaurant I started yesterday's post off with.

Going to start my exit from downtown now.

I like to walk about this city, but I really am not looking forward to jury duty.  If I were actually retired it would be okay.

But it is going to be costly for me. I only get paid when I work and the compensation the court gives a juror is not even half of what I make, and I don't  make very much to begin with.

Plus my vacation starts the week after I must report and I don't want to spend my vacation sitting in a courtroom.

(I don't get paid anything while on vacation either.)

I pity the defendant if I am selected because I won't be in a forgiving mood.


This picture is called, "letters"

Last time I was called for jury duty that famous local one-time-big-shot-influential-well-to-do-person was about to be tried. I thought I might get on that jury. I worked for that big bank then and they would have paid me while on jury duty. A long trial would have been fine. Not now.

Last photo I took. Usual scene, roadwork on I-95.

I thought I had my lens clear of the fence, but obviously not, so the shot was ruined.

I took no more photos because I had walked a long way and the day had grown hot and humid and it has been all up hill and the hill is about to get steeper and I didn't have the energy left to raise my camera.

I'm not as young as I used to be, you know.