Heck, Even Champaign
The News actually comes out against the couch ban in a Sunday editorial. Sometimes friends can be found in the most unexpected places.
Also, a man from Evanston is convinced (reg. req.) that “Madison, Ann Arbor, heck, even Champaign, Dekalb and Normal” are superior to his own community in “feel, ambience [and] all the unique little independent retailers.”
As is my policy, if the Ann Arbor News is for something, then I must be against it. Ban couches from porches! The News must never be right.
posted by Eric on August 10th, 2004 at 2:40 amActually I was more curious about the proposal to restrict flowers and vegatation. Not being from around here, could someone please tell me what a “vegetarian ordinance” is?
posted by Nick on August 10th, 2004 at 9:14 amI think normally the main purpose of a vegetation ordinance is to force people to mow their lawns. I have to say I’m in favor of that aspect of it–when I lived in the OFW, my roommates and I couldn’t use our meager little patch of front yard because the landlord refused to mow it more than once every other month. Since we had a dog, this was a problem for us. I am certainly NOT in favor of banning everything but dwarf snapdragons from being planted on the treelawn, however.
posted by c-loh on August 10th, 2004 at 9:31 amIt’s true: Evanston’s a hole.
posted by RDS on August 10th, 2004 at 10:11 amOK. For a moment there I thought the News was reporting a law regulating meat-eating.
posted by Nick on August 10th, 2004 at 10:22 amThat’s not impossible.
posted by c-loh on August 10th, 2004 at 11:14 amVegetation ordinances (a big oops on the News’ part) tend to be even more openly appearance-based than the couch ban. There are good reasons for them (like maintaining visibility for drivers at intersections, or keeping the sidewalks from being overgrown and thus unusable, or, as c-loh notes, giving tenants some leverage against their landlords), but they’re mainly implemented to force your neighbors to keep their lawns “nice” looking, and I’ve seen them used to force people to cut down their front yard vegetable gardens when the neighbors decided that the tomato plants looked “messy”.
posted by Murph on August 10th, 2004 at 11:16 amThey’d have to take me away in chains before I cut down my tomato plants!
Speaking of which, I harvested my first ripe tomato yesterday and ate it this morning. Divine.
posted by Alex(andra) on August 10th, 2004 at 11:41 amNever been to Evanston, so I’ll take this guy’s word for it. Does this mean that AA, Madison, Champaign, Dekalb, and Normal are the Athens, Vienna, Paris, Florence, and Rome of the Midwest?
posted by Nick on August 10th, 2004 at 1:45 pmYes, in that order.
Evanston isn’t that bad. I thought it was the coolest place ever when I was at Northwestern math summer camp. Like A2, it’s an expensive suburb, but it’s actually a suburb of something.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on August 10th, 2004 at 2:00 pmAlex, I just harvested my first tomato last week and ate it like an apple– it made me never want to buy another one from California in the winter again. No comparison.
posted by Brandon on August 10th, 2004 at 3:33 pmI’m still waiting for my tomatoes! Every day I ride my bike out to my Zion plot and they’re still on the vine, fat and green. But I must say the peppers and broccoli have been fantastic this year.
posted by Other Alex on August 11th, 2004 at 12:51 pmdamn, I still can’t get my broccoli to flower! But those turnips are rocking out for sure. And I can’t the yield I’ve gotten from a measly *1* buttercrunch and *1* spinach plant.
Plus I’m on my third batch of pesto.
posted by Alex(andra) on August 11th, 2004 at 2:03 pm“I thought it was the coolest place ever when I was at Northwestern math summer camp.”
There’s something to be said for considering the source here…
posted by George on August 11th, 2004 at 3:14 pmThe El stations in Evanston have big signs saying “34 Minutes to the Loop!” (Or some number close to that.)
My father got his Ph.D. (history) from Northwestern and, in the meantime, taught in Evanston Township High School (ETHS). He was the first Jew they ever hired to teach there. In about 1958, the school suddenly got nervous about their no-Jews policy, and decided to hire one (1) Jewish teacher. My father won out over hundreds of other applicants to be ETHS’s token Jew.
One other Evanston thing. Just north of the Chicago/Evanston city limits, right at the lake shore, is Calvary Cemetery. The cemetery land is flat, and has a straight road that goes directly from the front gate to the back gate. You can see all the way through it. There are almost no trees or bushes. It has a high fence on all sides. And everything within miles is dense urban/suburban development.
Yet Calvary Cemetery has several deer living in it, cavorting and hiding among the Catholic crosses and grave monuments. Nobody knows how they got there.
posted by Larry Kestenbaum on August 11th, 2004 at 5:28 pm