You’ve all heard that Buffalo is on Forbes’ “Ten Fastest Dying Cities”…w/e. I don’t know why Pittsburgh wasn’t on it but other than it its a fairly obvious list.

Buffalo has issues, a lot of them, a lot of old ones too. Things that can be dealt with and some that will probably never be solved.

There are two types of cliche Buffalonians. Those that obsess over this and add to their endless gloom and doom, and the others who say the exact opposite and wax on about how Buffalo is the best. ever. WIVB has a pretty good video of that:

You can’t get more Buffalo than this:

Caroline Babb, “I think Buffalo’s a beautiful city. It’s one of the best cities there is. We have the Bills, we have the Sabres, we have a lot of fine restaurants. A lot of five star restaurants. It’s beautiful here.”

There’s a list of things that need to be done to make things better…to merely assist the region fight the inevitable realities of the 21st century economy. But it all starts with the mentality. If large sums of people demand responsible government and a business-friendly culture instead of whining or convincing themselves everything is fine-then the chances of survival are greatly increased.

One of the better things about Buffalo is the Buffalo News crime reports. My personal favorite was the man who was shot while sitting on the toilet at the Buffalo Tourist Lodge on Main and didn’t even realize it until the next day.

This one is close to the top though…

A Buffalo man was robbed of five cents Tuesday night by two teenage boys outside his home in the 2700 block of Main Street, near East Amherst Street, police said.

Northwest District police said the victim was confronted at about 10 p. m. by two boys, described as 14 to 16 years old. The boys demanded money and displayed a gun covered by a cloth. They took the man’s cash and ran.

When I saw that 200 Delaware would now be referred to as “Avant” I thought, oh thats slightly pretentious but whatever…” And then I saw that the building will say “Avant” in big letters facing the thruway…Buffalonians, not necessarially known for pronouncing French words correctly ( I mean, we turned ‘Beau Fleuve’ into ‘Buffalo’) would be doomed to embarrass themselves for years to come upon trying to pronounce it.

But apparently the issue has been addressed…

When Avant took the lead in the name game, there was some concern that Buffalonians would have a tough time pronouncing it.

“There was some worry that the Buffalo “flat A” would overtake the softer “Ah-vahnt,” said Uniland spokeswoman Judi Griggs.

To dispel concerns Crowley Webb hit Main Street and asked passers-by to pronounce Avant, along with two other possible building names. When results yielded a 90 percent success rate for Avant’s soft A’s, the choice became final.

Always enjoy the WGRZ comment forums. No snobs who love culture or gentrification here. Just good old uneducated angry cliche Buffalonians.

Here are some highlights:

So Bourdain might come to Buffalo to film a show…

Buffalo is not an attrative city at all, i would be ashamed to show anyone our city. there is nothing good to look at in buffalo except the black idots going around killing other innocent people. I sure will not vote for buffalo to be on any show.

And ridership has gone up 8% for the NFTA…

I will poop on anyone that rides metro!

Sheer awesomeness. Remember to check up daily on WGRZ.com to remind yourself that these people exist in fairly large numbers up here.

One morning upon arriving at work at the Gap, I see we had hired an older gentleman which in itself was a bit of a double take but it turns out he’s a local celebrity of sorts…

DJ Harv Moore of Oldies 104 in Buffalo. Before coming to Buffalo he was a DJ in my other hometown back in the DC area with WPGC (rap station all my life) Wtf?!

Smooth radio voice and a quick wit for sure. But I can’t help but laugh at the absolute “only in Buffalo” randomness of this situation. Oh and there is a picture of him on display at the Smithsonian Museum on the National Mall introducing the Beatles at their first ever USA concert in DC when he was a DJ down there.

Apparently the Buffalo station became an adult top 40-type station a couple years ago so he left and in case anyone wondered what he’s up to these days…well…he’s opening large boxes of Gap clothing with me in the morning.

Yes. Its becoming a weekly installment whether you like it or not. Today’s story isn’t as good as a woman grabbing my nose for fun or a man urinating in the seat next to me, but its’ still good.

Today I sat next to a rather large man. On each finger a different and quite unique ring. He had a walker. His walker had a basket. And in his basket was….

Sausages. Lots of Sausages. Literally bursting out the seams of his basket. Cooked, cooling off, and slowly-wrinkling sausages. All for himself.

Sausages.

On my bus ride to campus, the driver piped the Sandy Beach show through the speakers and I got to hear him for the 1st time.

Wow.

Just wow.

I completely respect people who choose the suburbs over Buffalo, in a lot of cases I don’t even blame them…but I never heard someone just spew such pure…PURE…intense hatred for the city and the people that live in it. Incredible.

Some woman to support city kids and their surroundings. He went OFF on her and used her name after the ensuing calls bashing the city.

This one woman was complaining that city kids were making fun of her being really fat. And now she’ll never come back downtown. Beach was like “YEAH! SEE! Those are YOUR kids, City of Buffalo. YOUR SHOOTERS, DRUG USERS…” etc. “And thats why we’ll never go into town.”

Fascinating stuff.

I have no problem with people living in the suburbs, but if you do it because you want to be exempt from dealing with Buffalo’s problems…just look at the inner ring of Amherst and Cheektowaga and realize slowly but surely, the same problems are coming your way.

I don’t have a car. But I’ve become slightly bored with my personal Buffalo of Downtown, University Heights, and North Campus. So this school year I’m trying to explore and get a better feeling for the rest of the Buffalo area…I think it will help me understand the Buffalo region better.

For example:
Yesterday I was taking the 32 bus back to town through Cheektowaga/Cleveland Hill area and Cheektowaga has these neighborhoods that look like they’re frozen in time back to 1955 or 1960. Small single family homes built with cheap materials but decorated with passion by the owners, old ladies on their porch, old men taking care of their gardens, kids riding their bike back from football practice. I saw bars in humble looking one-story structures that are packed before dinner time with hearty local folk. I suppose the elderly folks out front were once the young post-WW2 parents who made Cheektowaga a wonderful Levittown and the hearty men in the bars were at those same bars after a long day of bringing home the bacon when Buffalo was a manufacturing hub.

These neighborhoods looked like they still strive to be like the ‘Leave It To Beaver’ ideal American ‘hood. I really didn’t think these places still existed. On the way out I asked myself if Levittowns like Cheektowaga will become architectural fascinations like old neighborhoods in the city have become-except perhaps in a more twisted way. I don’t know. But I will say that paying 3.50 for a trip through time was quite the bargain.

After picking up empty heroine bags along Niagara Street, Saturday morning, it was picture time with some local celebrities…

The mayor…

JP Losman…

Peerless Price…

Coy Wire…

Josh Stamer…

Alex Van Pelt drove around in a golf cart handing out “Round Up” for all the weeds growing out of the sidewalks, and Brian Moorman could be seen spotted brushing up stuff around the new courthouse site.

Later on in the day when the event was long over my friends and I saw JP with a couple people still doing landscaping…I don’t think I can ever have a negative opinion of Losman anymore after I’ve witnessed how much he genuinely cares about Buffalo.

Coming back to Buffalo after some time in DC, I forgot how much more…interesting…the train is here.

On today’s train, a middle aged woman who I would classify as a “crack head” talked to herself loudly for most of the ride, talking to her imaginary friend about the history of the NFTA.

No big deal, happens all the time, right?

But as she got off the train she came up to me and reached for my nose, saying “GOT YOUR NOSE!” and then did it to the guy next to me as well.

$3.50 for an all day pass takes you everywhere you want to go in the region, plus some extra entertainment on the side…guaranteed.