Davy Crockett called...

He'd like his hat back.
Saw a guy wearing this hat today, most interestingly, inside, the coffee shop. Complete with foot long "tail". Bizarre. I think this is the same Nugent 2012 guy. This must be his winter apparel.

Also, people don't like carrots. At the coffee place when you order a sandwich, you can get chips or carrots. Why do people order carrots if they're not really going to eat them? Does it make them feel more virtuous somehow? Like Oh, I've made the right choice. But then they don't eat them. I made this observation as I passed the used dish bin on my way out and noticed several sandwich plates, sandwiches eaten but lots of uneaten baby carrots. Maybe the idea of eating those poor baby carrots was too horrifying. Well, may as well just get chips then, instead of ordering carrots and not eating them. Who knows though. Maybe this was some sort of organized demonstration.
Two other odd things... as I walked by the Jimmy Johns, couldn't help but overhear someone giving a real dressing down to another person. The woman doing the scolding kept saying something about her f'ing employees and that wasn't how she treated her f'ing employees. Don't know what that was all about, but apparently working or dining at JJ's is a high-stress event.
Also I noticed that the coffee place was very busy today and there were a bunch of middle aged ladies hanging out there, I later observed many of them boarding one of those charter type buses, which makes me wonder...where do they live that coming to Main Street, Ames, is a worthy excursion?!?
Odd...

Smells like teen spirit...

Okay, not really. It's sort of a mix of stale beer and ??? I can't quite place what the rest of that lovely cocktail is but it's the smell that permeates the recycling/redemption "center" at the Hy-vee. I can see how this alone could be a deterrent to returning those bottles and cans. Cuz let's face it... unless you're already going shopping and you've got a respectable pile of bottles and cans to return, is the prospect of a few nickels (or nickels off your grocery bill) really worth facing that tantalizing aroma? Something about the smell of stagnant beer puddles...Yum.
Plus, I know I've mentioned it before, but the machines suck. They work for about 3 cans/bottles and then nope, they just stop working. This has happened every time I've tried using them. It doesn't matter if you follow the directions and use the right machine for the right type of bottle. They just don't like it and make you take your bottle/can, which has now gone into the machine and been rejected and spit back out at you, back. It's gross. I can easily see how people are discouraged OR wind up at Ames Redemption on Saturday mornings with garbage-bagfulls of cans.

But the alternative is landfill, which makes me sad. I talked to someone today who works with school recycling and asked about the city recycling and was told the city garbage will burn some of the recyclables for energy? but the temperature isn't high enough for glass to burn.

kids today

This isn't really about Ames, I think it's more about college life.
Yesterday in class I sat next to a girl who was both playing solitaire on her laptop ( I wonder if someday people won't realize this game actually used to be played with a deck of cards?)
AND texting in the middle of class. She may have also been taking notes for the class but somehow this seems doubtful.
Ah multi-taskers...

" Hey,it's a beautiful day...

... a good day not to get run over" *

Said the guy on a bike, at the corner of Kellogg and Lincoln Way, going into the Mister Money;
http://www.mistermoney.com/

He was wearing a camo backpack and hiking boots, which makes me wonder how practical those are for bike riding. Wouldn't think those would be the most well-suited for biking.

People like this ALWAYS talk to me.

*This is the conversation, verbatim.

wine, biking, recycling, dmv & susie one tooth

bike bus for bike ride

These are all related, I swear. A few weeks ago we went on a bike ride which started at the Snus Hill Winery. I could find a link for them somewhere if you really wanted but I guess it isn't too relevant if you're not living nearby. It was a 34 mile bike ride, round-trip, which started in Madrid, IA and went to Ankeney, IA. Kind of a funny group- the ride proposed to start at 10:00 a.m. We got there around 9:30 or so, and found a group of hard-core bikers, getting ready (by drinking Coronas apparently) and putting gear and bikes on the above-photographed bus. Apparently we were mixing it up with a group who had done RAGBRAI together, earlier this summer.
This is the big Iowa-Des Moines register sponsored ride across Iowa which happens in the summer.
So there was this group plus some random others. It was basically a ride for a cancer-support charity which the winery was hosting/sponsoring. The winery was going to have wine tastings at the end, although after a few hours of biking, wine is really not the drink you really want.
Anyhow...while we were hanging around, waiting for the biking to begin, saw a guy wearing a Steelers jersey. I thought, damn, we can't escape! I thought about talking with him anyway, based on the Pgh connection, but it was an oddly cliquish group of bikers.

Friday we stopped at a wine tasting at a wine store for Prairie Moon winery... most of the wines were actually pretty bad, ranging from mediocre to just plain awful. Sorry Prairie Moon. I hope no one from PM is reading this. The rep at the store was pretty nice, and since we were the only ones there, he & the wine store owner talked a bit. Somehow we started to talk about Snus Hill and the bike trip, and we mentioned we had moved here just recently. I don't know, this always seems like a good default topic for conversation. Then they told us that the guy with the Steelers jersey was a guy from WVA area and the owner of Snus Hill.

Anyway... the rest of this weekend involved going to the recycling place again. This was both good and weird. After sorting all the plastic/glass/papers/cardboard, thought we would try to cash in our maybe 10 soda cans and a few wine bottles and beer bottles. To get your deposit back, you have to go to a separate bldg. (okay more of a shed really). And the place is only open til 12 pm. on Saturdays. As we walked over there, were informed by a sort of unkempt, ill-tempered lady with a giant trash bag full of cans, that the line STARTED after her. Apparently the holding pen inside was full and the rest must wait outside, til space becomes available. At this point another woman came by (also with huge bag of cans)-- seriously, how much freakin' BEER and SODA do people drink? I'll assume this is several weeks or month's worth and not that people actually go thru cases of soda or beer in one week. Okay, c'mon, I really want to think this.
Finally, we get to go inside and wow. First, it's that smell of the recycling area at Hy-vee, only intensified. Second, it's so sad. A guy & his son walk out with a $20 bill. People wait with giant garbage bagfuls of cans. We briefly contemplate whether we really need to wait right then to get back like $1 or so. Um, nope.
We let the second woman take our place inside.

Oh I think I was going to talk about the Dept of transportation too, but this entry is already kind of long and depressing.