The second I get into Buffalo I turn on the news and the main stories were…

1. Casino
2. Bass Pro
3. Factory workers being layed off
4. Man drives down subway tunnel and crashes with train

Yuppppp nothing has changed

A poll on Buffalo Business Journal

Which of these events do you think will happen first?

Bass Pro opens a superstore on the Aud site
2%

Buffalo Bills move to a new downtown stadium
1%

Metro Rail trains start running to the airport
3%

New Peace Bridge begins carrying traffic
5%

Waterfront development projects are completed
25%

You-know-what freezes over
60%

Glad to see Buffalonians aren’t changing their thought process whatsoever.

My dad used to work at an iron foundry near the Bethlehem Steel plant. He had the normal everyday tasks that everyone else did but he also had an awesome bonus job given to him by his bosses…

Bypass the new $1 million filtration system and instead dump the probably toxic waste into the Buffalo River while the guys in the biohazard suits stood 100 feet away for safety

The foundry has since closed and we found out that it is now part of the Tift Nature preserve. Funny.

Got the news that Grandma Byrnes died last night from her University District home. She was 90 and lived a very fulfilling life.
She came with her sister from a small Canadian town to Buffalo in the 1940’s to pursue a better life and did. Grandma lived on Ellicott Street downtown (a current surface lot next to St. Micheal’s) until she met her husband and lived in the same Minnesota Ave house for 55 years.
A devout catholic whose 50 something years of tithing at St. Josephs must have single handedly kept the church going
Graduated from Bryant and Stratton, a secretary at the old Marine Trust Building downtown, and a waitress at the Buffalo Club on Delaware but most importantly a mother of 7, grandmother of 14, and great-grandmother of 2. A strong woman who stayed strong ’till the bitter end.

I don’t really watch TV…but my mom does. So she tells me to watch “Trading Spouses” this week because its about a family from the East Side of Buffalo and a family from South Beach in Miami.

Obviously, throwing a Miami Beach socialite into a East Side neighborhood makes for some interesting times but the best part is when the wives find out how they split up the $50,000 for their families.

When the Buffalo woman comes back and reads how their money has been split up she sees something slightly uncommon…

$3,500 contribution to the Mayor of Buffalo

She…EXPLODES. A five minute tirade, a good chunk devoted to how she would never give money to the mayor…EVER. It was great.

Allow me to be a Debbie-Downer today by telling you about all the awesome crimes that have occured in the last week in the part of Buffalo I walk around constantly
1. Minnesota Ave (my old street). Last week. Three girls who live on North Campus met two lovely gentlemen who demanded their purses. They said no. So the gentlemen proceeded to beat them up for $10 and a cell phone. TOTALLY EXTREME!
2. Two mornings ago on Winspear, two streets behind Minnesota, a man was shot early in the morning. Super.
3. Main and Fillmore, 2600 block of Main (Intersection I go by to get to work). Woman from Cheektowaga on her way to visit her mom at 1:30 PM…1:30 PM…gets kicked and beaten by two dudes.

And as a side note, keep your eyes out for these two guys on the east side who wear army coats and rob people with AK-47’s.

So yeah. This is why I like to focus on downtown.

David Torke from FixBuffalo is hangin’ it up after some discouraging news. In some ways, it shouldn’t be a surprise.

Anyone who pretty much devotes their life to the East Side of Buffalo and does everything in his power to make it better, only to have his heart broken would stop trying for at least a little.

Personally, I grew up off Bailey and when I came back last year I had all sorts of plans to buy my Grandma’s house, spruce it up, and watch the “other” end of the University District come back to life. I lived there this summer and realized how hopeless it was. It started to ruin my outlook and opinions of Buffalo…I had to flee and went back to DC for a couple of weeks before being able to put everything in perspective, roll up my sleeves, and head back to work.

And that’s the University District.

David was dealing with a whole other animal (and not a very nice or healthy one either).

I try not to think about a lot of Buffalo’s problems because there are so many. I focus on downtown because I ended up there by myself as a 15 year old without knowing anyone and very little about the place. I found myself as a person and decided that Buffalo was always home and will always be home.

Thankfully I got into the whole dowtown Buffalo thing right before all the growth came. I understand the awful past and I see the awesome future ahead for it. If downtown wasn’t growing, I don’t think I’d be doing this whole Buffalo thing like I am.

I think I speak for a lot of people when I say that I really hope David goes back to doing his thing for the online world and the East Side of Buffalo. Buffalo needs more people like him and we can’t afford to lose him, the East Side really can’t afford to lose him.

So David, I suggest a nice vacation in a thriving part of the country, the continent, or anywhere in the world. Hopefully it’ll liven up your psyche, and maybe you’ll be able to head back to the grind that seemingly only you can handle.

On a whim I decided to go downtown (you will all reap the benefits of this visit later) and as the metro went by the HSBC Tower I saw a familiar man with his dog taking a walk out on the plaza. Realizing who it was I got out at the Harbor Station and walked back as fast as I could…BuffaloRising’s own Newell Nussbaumer was there.

Newell and I talked about a bunch of things, including the whole wnymedia-bro debate that we’ve been witnessing over the past week. I’ve been making a consious effort this week to not get involved in it in my blog but Newell had some interesting perspectives on the whole thing and it was pretty cool to talk about it with him. Him and his dog (I couldn’t tell you how many people would tell him how beautiful the dog was…and it really is) followed me up Washington Street to the Ellicott Commons, shared some stories, discussed some architecture and then went over to Fountain Plaza to watch some kids skate.

Newell is pretty much an older, blonder, more excitable version of me. He gets so excited at the littlest thing when he’s downtown…like, pure, unadulterated joy when he sees a certain building or kids skating or people walking downtown…anything. We’re lucky to have him around since so few of the creative class remains here.

So I know that BRO and wnymedia.net are going at it right now but basically we’re just two different online options in the world of the Buffalo internets. When you want to know about new or unknown stores and restaurants, or little things about the city that make Buffalo cool, then you go to BRO. When you want to know about how much of a douche bag all the politicians are around here, or how screwed up the economy is, or how stupid people are doing stupid things to hurt this region of ours, you come to wnymedia.net

But anyways, it was an amazing day to just walk around downtown and soak in everything. I suggest you do so sometime as well and see all the awesome developements and architecture that exists. And who knows, maybe you’ll run into me or Newell.
That was my take, here’s how Newell saw it…

Thanks to Buffalo Pundit for this one…

Not so sure about that. My Maryland friends have a field day with the way I stretch my A’s out like your typical emotionally charged up Cheektowagan. But I will say that living in Maryland took the Buffalo accent away from my dad except when he would say Haaaaaasssek (Hasek) and Saaataaaaaan (Satan) and since I moved back here I’ve started saying Caaaaffey (Coffee) and Haaackeyy (Hockey). Linguistics is just oh so facinating eh?

Remember that brand new bank on Connecticut Street that was supposed to make the community all excited and turn the neighborhood around?!!?

Yeeeeah well it’s already been christened. Robbed yesterday.

Welcome to Buffalo-where you’ll never step into a bank that hasn’t been robbed. No seriously, you won’t.