Busy holiday weekend: Drake House Party, Rec Division Craft Fair, SID's Santa Trolley Ride, Crescent Concerts Yuletide by Candlelight, Swain's Miniatures Show

A busy weekend, full of holiday opportunities.

 

Plainfielders have many opportunities to enjoy the holiday season. Here is a roundup of local holiday activities this weekend --

Drake House Tree Lighting & Santa's Visit
Friday, December 11, 6:30 PM

The Historical Society of Plainfield hosts its annual Christmas party for the community at 6:30 PM Friday evening.

In addition to the tree lighting ceremony, there will be holiday carols, prizes and refreshments. Santa will make a special visit and distribute small toyr to the youngsters. There will be a total of four decorated trees, including in the museum's period rooms.

The Drake House Museum at 602 West Front Street (at the foot of Plainfield Avenue) is open to the public Sunday afternoons and at other times by appointment.

Division of Recreation Holiday Craft Fair
Saturday, December 12, 10 AM - 6 PM

The Division of Recreation is sponsoring a Holiday Craft Fair at duCret School of Art this Saturday, 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM..

Handcrafted items, with or without a holiday theme, as well as items suitable for holiday gifts will be available, including jewelry, ceramics and pottery, quilts, knit goods of all sorts, hats, scarves and hair accessories, homemade jams and jellies and holiday baked goods.

The Holiday Craft Fair will run from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM. The event will be in the auditorium at the rear of the school, entrance off the rear parking lot. duCret School of Art is at 1030 Central Avenue, Plainfield.

Plainfield SID Santa Trolley Ride
Saturday, December 12, times as noted

Continuing its holiday tradition, the Plainfield SID will this year host trolley rides with Santa in two locations this Saturday afternoon.

From Noon to 1:30 PM, Santa's trolley will give visitors a ride through downtown, leaving from the pocket park near McDonald's.

From 2:00 to 3:30 PM, the trolley will give rides on South Avenue, beginning at Plainwood Square Park on South Avenue.

Trolly trips are 15-minutes roundtrip from each staging area. The trolle is enclosed and heated and can accommodate 30 riders at a time. Families are encouraged to bring their own cameras to get snapshots of the youngsters with Santa.

Santa will give out candy canes to the kiddies on each trolley ride. Entries will be available at both staging areas for a drawing for a giant toy-filled stocking. The drawing will take place at 3:50 PM at Plainwood Square Park and the winner must be present to collect the stocking.

Crescent Concerts: Yuletide by Candlelight
Sunday, December 13, 5 PM

Crescent Concerts annual holiday gift to the community is this year titled 'There Is No Rose of Such Virtue'. The concert is free and begins at 5:00 PM this Sunday.

The concert features music of the season from Renaissance to modern times, plus carols and hymns joined in by the audience. This is always a joyful and uplifting occasion.

At Crescent Avenue Presbyterian Church, East 7th Street at Watchung Avenue. Parking available in the church lot on First Place and in Swain Galleries lot on Watchung.

Christmas Miniatures at Swain's
Show runs through December 31, see hours below

Small paintings as holiday gifts in an exhibit and sale, offered by Swain Galleries, which is celebrating its 147th year of service to Plainfielders. The annual miniatures show and sale is in its 25th year. See more about this year's show at the Courier article here.

Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday, 10 - 5; Saturday, 9:30 - 4; and Sundays in December, Noon - 4.

Swain Galleries is at East 7th and Watchung Avenue. Parking in the lot on Watchung Avenue.

Besides these holiday events, many organizations and houses of worship are gathering contributions of toys, clothing, food donations and other items for our fellow Plainfielders. Please be generous with your gifts.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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(Corrected) Two meetings Thursday: Youth Summit listening session, Planning Board

A chance for input on the upcoming Youth Summit
on Jobs and Education.

 

CORRECTION: Though the Cedar Brook Park matter is listed on the Planning Board agenda for this evening, it will be heard next Thursday, December 17, and NOT tonight. 

Two events of interest to Plainfielders are set for Thursday evening --

Youth Summit Listening Session. A second 'listening session' for the upcoming Youth Summit is slated for 6:00 PM (note the time!) in the Anne Louise Davis Meeting Room of the Plainfield Public Library.

This follows up on a session led last Saturday morning by Mayor Adrian Mapp. Plainfield young people and those who care about their futures are invited to contribute ideas and suggestions for topics for the Youth Summit.

The meeting will be facilitated by the GrassROOTS Community Foundation, who will also be leading the Youth Summit when it takes place.

The Plainfield Public Library is at Park Avenue and West 8th Street and is an accessible facility. Parking is available in the 8th and 9th Street lots.

Planning Board: Review of Cedar Brook Park plans. The Planning Board meets at 7:30 PM in City Hall Library.

On the agenda are a capital plan review of the proposals by Union County for improvements at Cedar Brook Park, including artificial turf fields as well as drainage, lighting and spectator improvements.

This is another opportunity to see and hear what the County has in mind for this popular and heavily used park.

Parking and entry in the rear of City Hall, Watchung Avenue and East 6th Street.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Dust Bunnies: NJ Transit, Cathcart and basketball, City fined

Gavett Place was reopened to traffic on Monday . . .

. . . as crews secured a restored historic end cap
on the Park Avenue overpass.

 

A few bits of Plainfield news, too small for a full post, but interesting none the less.

NJ Transit overpasses. Work continues apace on the replacement of the Park and Watchung Avenue overpasses. Gavett Place was reopened Monday to the relief of NJ Transit bus drivers and the taxis which use it (though it can use a good sweeping, which I hope has been included in the deal between the city and NJT for its use).

At the same time, I noticed the end cap on the south side of the Park Avenue overpass has been put in place. The originals are being restored and will ultimately frame both overpasses. While the newly constructed inner bays will actually carry the trains, the outer bays, which will be faced with the restored end caps, appear to be non-weight bearing.

This has been a huge project -- and a large investment in Plainfield by NJT -- and it will benefit the city for years to come.

Upcoming work will include Roosevelt and Leland Avenues and Berckman Street overpasses. Plainfield has more overpasses than any other community on the Raritan Valley Line.

Cathcart and basketball. The on-again, off-again status of longtime basketball maven Lenny Cathcart took another twist on Monday.

After announcing last year that he would not return to the Recreation Division's basketball program this year, Cathcart then changed his mind and stirred a fuss to get back on board, embarrassing a sitting Council member in the process.

After Mayor Mapp graciously accommodated him, Cathcart abruptly resigned yesterday in a one-sentence email, without giving any reason.

Hopefully the drama is over.

City fined. Turns out Plainfield homeowners aren't the only ones who can face penalties when their taxes or sewer charges aren't paid on time.

While the city does not pay taxes, it is responsible for collecting the county's tax assessment from Plainfield taxpayers and forwarding same to the county on a regular basis, as are all other municipalities in Union County.

Hillside got some attention from the Ledger recently (see here) when it was fined more than $12,000 for being late on its payment.

Buried in the article was a mention that Roselle and Plainfield had also been penalized with light fines for being a day late in last August's payments.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Dottie Gutenkauf back at Hartwyck at Cedarbrook

Dottie Gutenkauf (seated), listens as Councilor Rebecca Williams
and Mother Carolyn Eklund speak at 2013 commemoration of
Muhlenberg Hospital's closing.

 

Dottie Gutenkauf is back at JFK's Hartwyck at Cedarbrook Rehab Center in Plainfield.

I spent a pleasant hour visiting with Dottie Sunday afternoon and delivering a birthday gift (some cigarettes, what else!) that had been delayed by her recent stay at RWJ Somerset Hospital.

Feisty as ever, the first thing she wanted to know was what has been happening on the political front in Plainfield while she has been out of commission.

I told her about last week's Town Hall meeting, and the city's newly refurbished website (see here).

"That's it?" she asked.

"Well, says I, the Board of Ed has moved the school board elections back to April."

"What!" she said, "Was there public discussion of the move?"

On hearing there was none, she wanted to know what the justification was.

The board has given no explanation, says I.

Hrumph! says she.

Dottie, as most folks know, has been struggling for several years with a rare cancer (ocular melanoma).

Among its effects has been the development of glaucoma in the affected eye and reduced acuity in the other -- to the extent that she some time ago gave up her driver's license.

Her balance has also been affected, and Hartwyck rules require her to use a wheelchair when she goes outside for a puff.

I called her during her previous stay there on the afternoon of the election to say I would stop by after dropping in to Democratic headquarters for a few minutes.

"Hurry," she said, "I need a babysitter."

She explained that house rules would not let her go out to the smoking booth unaccompanied, so she needed someone to push her wheelchair. I went right over. Her smoke break stretched for four or five ciagrettes before we went inside because of the chill.

It's one of the few pleasures remaining.

At the end of yesterday's visit, Dottie asked that I send her love to all -- which this post is conveying.

She welcomes phone calls and brief visits (always call first!), and can get emails once her laptop is set up today (her email is: dottiegutenkauf@gmail.com). Hartwyck at Cedarbook is on Park Avenue at the entrance to Cedar Brook Park. Visitor parking is in the Park Avenue lot.

Send well wishes to one of Plainfield's treasures!

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Town Hall on development brings PILOT, jobs, other questions

Mayor Mapp and members of his economic development team
gave an overview and answered questions at the Town Hall.

Mayor Mapp's Town Hall on economic development in Plainfield brought many questions from attendees, focused mainly on the use of PILOTs, the question of jobs and the likelihood of gentrification.

The meeting last Thursday at the Plainfield Senior Center was well-attended by senior staff and cabinet members. (Folks joshed good-naturedly with DPW Superintendent John Louise, who was in full business suit and tie; he also got the most applause when staff was introduced.)

Council members Diane Toliver, Cory Storch and Bridget Rivers were in attendance. (Councilor Williams teaches on Thursday evenings at Essex County College.)

Mayor Mapp spent the first portion of the meeting introducing the city's new smartphone application, the Mapp App (available for download for iPhone here, and Android here). It is also available through links on the city's freshly redesigned website here.

The  Mapp App gives residents, visitors and prospective businesses and developers complete access to the city's website and digital services through their smartphones. While the app may appeal at first to the young and the geeky, this the way information will be delivered more readily as time goes by and desktop computers fade in importance as a platform.

The bulk of the evening was given over to presentations by the administration's economic development team, with Deputy City Administrator for Economic Development Carlos Sanchez taking the lead.

The overview of development, redevelopment and rehab activities showed the city to be busy indeed. Sanchez noted that last year there were 35 projects on the books and as of October this yearm, 66 projects were in the works (either in the planning approval stages, permitting, or construction).

These will lead to more than 1,000 new one- and two-bedroom apartments and 270,000 square feet of commercial space when completed. Sanchez estimates the total investment to be in the neighborhood of $140 million. All this is welcome news for those who have been waiting for years for things to start happening.

However, the good news did not come without some serious questions from the audience.

While planners and officials insist that the apartments coming on line -- one and two bedroom units -- will not be attractive for families, many residents are skeptical of these claims. As one put it, "they move in and then, before you know it, [the woman] gets pregnant." Staff insisted that as children come into the picture, couples will move on to other arrangements -- like buying a home.

Some of this appears to be wishful thinking from my point of view. Consider the paradox of the "walking wallets" (to use one developer's metaphor) that everyone is salivating over. If the desirability of having high-spending Millienials move into these new units, paying higher rents (that will produce upward pressure on other rent rates in the city), and spending their cash in new stores, restaurants and other businesses, how will they save the money necessary to buy a house?

Also, no marketing studies have been introduced to show the level of demand for new apartments. So, are we in a "if we build it, they will come" state of mind that can lead to over-speculation?

There were also questions about job development.

While planners and officials have taken great care to point out the range of construction jobs that will be generated, and setting up conditions to maximize opportunities for local labor, these jobs eventually go away once the project is completed.

So, it seems fair and reasonable to ask how many permanent jobs for locals will be the result of the development efforts. Numbers there are more modest, almost to the vanishing point.

Traditionally, economic development has been thought of as helping the residential portion of the tax base by bringing in new commercial operations (and thereby more jobs) and/or new manufacturing opportunities (and also thereby new jobs). Residential-only development does not do this (as is the case with the South Avenue Gateway project).

I think there is an opportunity in the manufacturing sector that Plainfield should pay attention to, and Papp Iron Works on South Second Street is a prime example of what could be done. In this case, an existing manufacturing company was enticed to Plainfield because of an appropriately sized location, with good access to transportation networks.

PILOTs, the perennial development tool, also got their share of attention from attendees.

It seems quite clear to me that planners and officials have more ground to cover here. In nearly twenty years of listening to these discussions, one has to ask why residents come with the same questions (are they fair? what about the schools? why do we have to use them?), and are given the same answers (yes, the schools are not cheated, and 'because').

Is there an opportunity here to use the newly spiffed up website to provide handy -- and permanent -- answers to the issues around PILOTs? I think so.

There were other suggestions and concerns (can the Mapp App be used to promoted Plainfield's cultural richness? what about 'those people' gathering on Front Street? are police paying attention to truck and traffic issues around the old Mack plant?).

Attendance was lighter than usual, with perhaps only two thirds of the room filled as opposed to standing room only at the last Town Hall held there. Could it be because the topics were of less general concern? Or because we are in the holiday shopping season? Or both?

In any event, these Town Halls are a proven method for reaching out to the community. Let's have more!

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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St. Mark's Tricky Tray Saturday

St. Mark's Church holds its Holiday Tricky Tray Saturday, December 5, from 4 to 8 PM at the Wardlaw-Hartridge School. $25 admission gets 25 tickets. More info  and tickets at (908) 447-3789.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Tree Lighting tonight; Listening session on Youth Summit Saturday

DPW crew strings lights on annual holiday tree Thursday.
Photo courtesy Plainfield Recreation Division.

Two important events for Plainfield today and tomorrow --

ANNUAL TREE LIGHTING

Kids of all ages eagerly await this annual event, set for this evening at 6:00 PM on the steps of City Hall.

As usual, there will be caroling, hot chocolate and giveaways for the youngsters. Santa's visit is set for 6:45 PM, when by custom he will arrive on a fire truck with lights and sirens.

This year, there will also be a special treat -- an opportunity for a family photo inside a giant snow globe. Families are invited to come to City Hall Library beginning at 4:00 PM to pose inside a giant snowglobe for a complimentary holiday photo. (One photo per family, while supplies last.)

The festivities are being organized by the Recreation Division.

MAYOR'S LISTENING SESSION ON THE YOUTH SUMMIT

Saturday morning, Mayor Mapp will host an important "Community Listening Session" concerning the upcoming citywide Youth Summit.

Residents -- especially young people -- are encouraged to come out and share their thoughts on important topics for this upcoming event.

Originally scheduled as a daylong event at Plainfield High School in cooperation with the Plainfield public schools, the district unilaterally notified Mayor Mapp just days before that it would not make the high school building or students available for the long-planned event.

The mayor may also expect to hear from residents about their reaction to the news that the Board of Ed is moving its election back to April -- the only school district in the state to do so.

The meeting gets under way at 10:00 AM in the Anne Louise Davis Meeting Room of the Plainfield Public Library. Light refreshments will be served.

The Plainfield Public Library is at Park Avenue and West 8th Street and is an accessible facility. Parking is available in the 8th and 9th Street lots and on College Place.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Mayor Mapp's Town Hall tonight at Senior Center

City Hall from the roof of the YMCA.

 

Mayor Adrian O. Mapp will host a Town Hall this evening at the Plainfield Senior Citizens Center at 7:00 PM.

Topics slated for discussion are --

• Unveiling of the city's new smartphone Mapp App
  
  
• Economic Development update by Carlos Sanchez
  
  
• Planning Division update by Bill Nierstedt

As always, there will be opportunities for questions and comments from the public, and other topics may be addressed.

The Plainfield Senior Center is at 400 East Front Street. Limited parking is available in the lot off East 2nd Street. Mind that you do not park in residents' spaces! Additional parking on the street.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Plainfield's elected officials weigh in with blogs, too

Elected officials' blogs are part of the quest for
'Just and Capable Government,' too.

 

Several of Plainfield's elected officials also weigh in with blogs.

Councilor Rebecca Williams

Wards 2/3 at-large Councilor Rebecca Williams posts her thoughts on issues facing Plainfield and the larger world from a progressive perspective at And My Point Is: A Radical Vision for Plainfield. (Today, for instance, she has a post on the estimated cost of moving the Board of Ed election from November to April.)

Rebecca often discusses questions with which the Council wrestles, as well as noting important activities in the community and initiatives of the Mapp administration.

She also keeps a more personal blog, Confessions of a Bathrobe Blogger, where she mulls larger non-political issues, celebrates Plainfield activities and posts her haiku,  demanding Japanese literary form.

Rebecca's day job, as a tenured professor at Essex County College, keeps her busy, but she still manages to be very active on Facebook.

Councilor Cory Storch

Ward 2 Councilor Cory Storch, just re-elected to a fourth term, is the 'dean' of Plainfield city councilors. Cory also served on the Board of Ed before coming to the council and has many years of service in elected office.

Cory blogs at Cory Storch for Good Government in Plainfield, where, true to his blog's title, he often takes up matters from a deeper, longer-range policy perspective.

Cory's day job as executive director of Bridgeway, New Jersey's largest mental health services nonprofit, keeps him busy day and night, but he still finds time to serve as the Council's designee on the Planning Board in addition to his Council duties.

Mayor Adrian Mapp

Though as mayor, Adrian Mapp now has a suite of communications options for staying in touch with Plainfield residents -- the most important of which is the excellent weekly email newsletter that goes out every Friday -- he still keeps the blog he began as a City Council member, Mapping It Out.

He uses that blog periodically to announce special events or to discuss community issues from a more private perspective.

Assemblyman Jerry Green

Assemblyman Jerry Green also keeps a blog to which someone in his office makes periodic updates, at Jerry Green's Page.

The blog primarily concerns itself with Assembly press releases concerning legislation of which Green is sponsor or co-sponsor and, during election seson, letters of endorsement for his re-election.

Jerry Green is now the longest-serving Assemblyman in the NJ Legislature and was re-elected Chair Pro-Tempore after the recent November general election.

These elected officials take the time to give thoughtful, considered opinions and information on issues facing Plainfield. Take the time to check them out.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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Plainfield's blogs: An appreciation

Workers on City Hall's cupola.
Hoping to deflect lightning -- or attract it?

Since Plainfield is mostly ignored by the media unless there is a shooting or a fire, I thought it important to follow up yesterday's post about the CLIPS blogroll with an appreciation of the Queen City's bloggers and the themes about which they write.

Bernice at Plaintalker II:

The 'dean' of Plainfield bloggers, Bernice Paglia has been posting almost daily (often more than one post at a time) since June 2005. She regularly follows City Council, the land use boards (Planning and Zoning) and the PMUA, with a sprinkling of other interests from time to time, including her garden and its preying mantises as well as her shopping exploits.

Bernice brings to her writing the focus and skills of an experienced journalist -- she was a longtime beat reporter for the Courier News and before that worked at Jan and Henry Johnson's weekly Plainfield Today newspaper (no connection to this blog), once published on North Avenue.

Scrupulous, thorough and even-handed, Bernice upholds the very best in journalistic traditions. You will not be well-informed about Plainfield issues and prospects if you are not reading her blog every day. (And it's typo-free.)

Olddoc at Doc's Potpourri:

Lifelong Plainfield resident, raised in the West End, Harold C. Yood, MD (affectionately known by his handle 'Olddoc'), is a retired physician who had a private practice in Plainfield and a long career at Muhlenberg Hospital.

For decades, he has been a regular presence at City Council meetings, where he often -- and still today -- raises issues that make elected officials squirm.

A raconteur, I nudged him years ago to write down some of his WWII stories, which he eventually did by starting a blog. But, true to his 'good government' inclinations, it wasn't long before his 'potpourri' blog began to take on his themes of good government, health care policy and his trove of interesting knowledge and lore (who else knows as much about asphalt paving as Olddoc? or has such an interesting collection of JAMA covers? or can relish decades of Texas Weiners?).

He is also the true geek among Plainfield's bloggers. He has converted many 35mm slides to stunning digital photographs (if you think that's easy, you should give it a try), upgraded all sorts of electronic equipment as the latest improvements become available and even uses a speech-to-text program on occasion.

Though mobility issues have crimped his style somewhat, you will not want to miss his point of view on life and happenings in Oz (as he calls Plainfield) and the world beyond.

Oh, and did I mention UVA basketball?

Jackie at The (TV) Show Must Go On...:

Jackie Schnoop is an award-winning amateur photographer living in Plainfield who regularly rides the Raritan Valley Line to and from work.

Her blog is followed by hundreds who share her enthusiasm for watching certain perennial TV favorites (especially Survivor and The Amazing Race)

While she is at it she regularly comments on Plainfield sights and situations. Her Sunday 'week in review' post keeps us up to date on her photographic excursions, sometimes startling animal poses and the goings-on of her companion Vincent.

Back when David Connolly was Plainfield's rental property kingpin (before taking a well-deserved trip to the slammer), Jackie shared some of the suffering of being one of his tenants. Jackie has also a sometime blog of her photos (see here).

David at Plainfieldview:

With more energy than his elder blogging colleagues, David Rutherford manages to have a career in New York as an architect, serve the community as an elected Board of Ed member, travel to interesting locales and stay in touch with the pulse of Plainfield's young people -- you know, the generation that will be running the Queen City in a decade or so.

Alone among the bloggers, David makes consistent and compelling use of his smartphone to make videos of City Council and other happenings of interest around town.

David also finds the time -- and energy -- to participate in the mass movements of our day, from anti-violence rallies in Newark and New York City to the Million Person March in Washington, DC.

Make it a habit to check in on him regularly.

Dottie Gutenkauf at Dottie G Sez:

Dottie is an old-time rabble-rouser and union activist (American Federation of Teachers) whom I met shortly after moving to Plainfield in the 1980s. She is also perhaps Plainfield's only current bona fide, certified Democratic Socialist.

Once Plainfield began to elect its Board of Ed members in the late 1980s, I worked with Dottie and others to bring nonpartisan slates of forward-looking and younger candidates to the Board of Ed. (Our victors included Cory Storch, Roni Taylor, Lynne Richard, Rick Smiley, Randy Bullock, and Wolde Woubneh -- Plainfield's once and only Ethiopian-American BOE  member.)

When the struggle over Muhlenberg Hospital's fate moved to center stage, Dottie (along with Nancy Piwowar and others), helped rally the community to protest and prevent -- unsuccessfully-- the hospital's closing by its then-parent Solaris Health System.

Beginning her blog in 2008, Dottie has used it as a sounding board for community issues -- including Muhlenberg and Plainfield Democratic politics -- as well as her own poetry (which you should read).

A regular presence at Council meetings with her late husband Joe, Dottie celebrated her 82nd birthday this past week. Health issues have curtailed her presence at meetings and her blogging, but she is still the same old Dottie when you catch her on the phone.

Though she has switched to American Spirit cigarettes, which have no additives or chemicals, and which come in the brightest yellow package.

Noel at Plainfield Area Local Sports:

I met Noel through his brother Michael. Both have an intense interest in Plainfield's sports scene, including youth sports and scholastic teams (Go Cardinals!).

Noel had been writing some sports coverage for Augustine Dashiell's Plainfield Sports News and struck out on his own with PALS in 2014 when Augustine had to give up the blog because of the press of work.

Besides covering high school teams in the Plainfield area, Noel does in-depth interviews -- as with Plainfield High's new head basketball coach Milt Gaylord, who he spoke with last week.

If you are passionate about our young people's sports scene, you should be a regular reader.

Plainfield Latino:

The most recently begun blog is Plainfield Latino. Though "independent" candidate Norman Ortega seems to have begun the blog on his own, he was quickly joined by a coterie of a few other writers.

The blog focuses on issues its writers think are of interest to Plainfield's Latino community. During the election season, it became a sort of unofficial campaign blog for Ortega's failed run for the Wards 1/4 at-large Council seat.

Stridently anti-Mapp in tone, often with scant attention to the facts, I included the blog on the CLIPS blogroll after Mr. Ortega agreed that all posts would be signed with an author's name (honored somewhat in the breach).

Even though I believe there are more Latino opinions on Plainfield matters than are expressed here, its writers have a right to hold and present their views.

I will take up the remaining blogs -- by elected officials -- in a separate post.

These folks all labor (believe me, writing IS work!) to keep us posted on Plainfield's pulse. It is an invaluable service, for which they get little thanks. Visit their blogs -- and thank them, if you've a mind to.

Oh yes, Plainfield Today? Impertinent and snarky in nearly 7,500 posts since 2005.

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  -- Dan Damon [follow]

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