• Cyburbia is a friendly big tent, where we share our experiences and thoughts about urban planning practice, the built environment, planning adjacent topics, and anything else that comes to mind. No ads, no spam, and it's free. It's easy to join!

RTDNTOTO 🐻 Random Thoughts Deserving No Thread Of Their Own 21 (2026)

Working on the April 1 agenda.

Would it be funny to slip some ridiculous proposals into the public notice, like "Code Amendment to allow Data Centers By Right in All Zones"?

Won't do it, of course.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I asked him about skiing back in the fall and he says he hates the ski meets precisely because they are sooo long and that actual competition but the school sends them to ski camp in northern Michigan in the fall and another in Colorado or Utah in the spring and then his parents agreed to send him to a 2-week ski camp in Oregon each summer if he skied for the school and he really likes going to all those camps so he suffers through the actual HS ski season knowing he's got the camps to look forward to. I think most of their ski meets are on the weekends but they also have a few that are during school days so they get to miss some school for those, which he probably likes too.

I've never skied and never really had a desire to do so but yeah, getting to go to a bunch of camps each year might make me more interested in the sport!

He grew up in Waterville, ME and the family just moved to Michigan a few years ago so I imagine they probably got to ski a lot on some more interesting terrain out there too.
Click to expand...
I love that high schools have random sports now. I don't know if we have skiing, but there are a few ranked wakeboarders that are friends of the family and live on the large lake about 30 minutes away. One of the local schools has started to talk about adding rowing to add to their current water "sports" teams. They have bass fishing currently. My high school has added both skeet shooting and target shooting which would seem difficult to get around zero tolerance gun rules.
 
JNA said:
I could be in either Kentucky or Illinois but still in Indiana.

Could you be in another state in 30 miles ?
Click to expand...

It's about 65 miles to Ohio for me, so close, but no cigar.

I could however be well into Canada within 30 miles. Could you be in another country in 30 miles?
 
bureaucrat#3 said:
I love that high schools have random sports now. I don't know if we have skiing, but there are a few ranked wakeboarders that are friends of the family and live on the large lake about 30 minutes away. One of the local schools has started to talk about adding rowing to add to their current water "sports" teams. They have bass fishing currently. My high school has added both skeet shooting and target shooting which would seem difficult to get around zero tolerance gun rules.
Click to expand...

Our high school has a sailing team. We had no idea that existed until we saw it in the yearbook. Our daughter's boyfriend and his friend were intrigued when they learned there was a sailing team (they learned about it the same way we did) so they went to the first couple meetings for it this school year because they thought it could be fun.... and because they thought it would be funny.

They found out it was a bit more work than they expected and they practiced on one of the larger inland lakes here all through the fall when it's already sort of cold so they gave up their sailing dreams. :rofl:

I think sailing is probably the craziest sport our district offers but some of the other ones you don't see everywhere that we've got would be skiing (as discussed), equestrian, and figure skating. We've got a bowling team (and apparently they're pretty good) but I think a lot of districts up here have that. We also have an e-sports team which sounds sort of cool to me. I imagine that's becoming more popular around the country. Our oldest has a friend who had one of those massive mobile gaming trucks come to his bar mitzvah back when they were in middle school and they had a big organized Super Smash Bros tournament (our daughter, who was one of the 3 girls there) loves video games and was ecstatic to get 3rd in the tournament... Anyway, that kid is on the e-sports team and wears his letter jacket all over the place which I think is cool.

Our daughter has another friend who is really into curling and has founded a curling club at the school and has dreams of there being organized curling through the Michigan High School Sports Association but I don't see that happening anytime soon.

A bunch of the districts in the area have rowing and most of the private schools here have it as well. That's one sport that I'm surprised our district doesn't offer. I was running at a park one Saturday morning a few years ago and they have a big lake and there was a high school rowing tournament going on. It was pretty cool seeing gear and tents set up with kids from all over the place. There must be limited rowing opportunities, or maybe it's one of those sports that just works better with a lot of teams competing all at once, because there were schools here from Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin, Kentucky, and Ontario.
 
JNA said:
I L L I N O I S H I G H S C H O O L A S S O C I A T I O N

View attachment 66493
Kentucky High School Athletic Association

View attachment 66494
Click to expand...

^ Forgot about girls flag football. That's a new one around here. We have two high schools in our district and one has girls flag football. Some of our sports are "unified" with kids from both high schools as that's the only way they can have enough participants. The other high school has had a girls flag football team for a couple seasons now but our high school does not, and it's also not a unified team so they must have had enough kids there to get it up and running.
 
I've been given clearance to bring a Betta into work as I have in previous jobs. I may go buy one this weekend. They actually have a lot of personality for a fish.

(No birds though. Rio would do well with me at work; he'd just sit on my shoulder all day.)
 
bureaucrat#3 said:
I love that high schools have random sports now. I don't know if we have skiing, but there are a few ranked wakeboarders that are friends of the family and live on the large lake about 30 minutes away. One of the local schools has started to talk about adding rowing to add to their current water "sports" teams. They have bass fishing currently. My high school has added both skeet shooting and target shooting which would seem difficult to get around zero tolerance gun rules.
Click to expand...

I lettered in Outrigger Canoeing and Bowling.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
There is was an old school burger diner on a corner in our downtown at what's arguably the most high profile site (in terms of traffic and incomes) in the entire metro area. The burger place had been on that site for about 75 years and owned their building and fixtures but not the land. They had been fighting with the landowner for about the past 20 years. The landowner wanted them out so he could build a 5-story mixed use building on the lot and a neighboring lot that they own. The burger place was a neighborhood icon but honestly, the mixed use place would probably be a more efficient use of the site and generate a lot more foot activity at that corner of town. The burger place had a long-term lease and the courts kept siding with them over the years.

Fast forward to this fall and the burger place got help buying a larger parcel at an equally high profile site about a half mile south and reluctantly moved down there. Most of the details of the deal were sealed but we're pretty sure their landlord offered to buy them the other site and give it to them if they'd vacate their existing site. So they moved south on November 1 and have been operating out of a closed KFC and a tent while they wait for the spring to redevelop the site and build essentially a 1:1 copy of the iconic building the moved out of, complete with their old grills and kitchen fixtures.

Everybody wins, right?

This past Monday the building they moved out of suddenly and unexpectedly re-opened as another burger joint with basically the same menu. It looks the exact same from the outside, and from the few pictures I've seen online, it looks like they may not have even cleaned the grease off of the counters. I cannot find details of ownership in CoStar yet but I'm pretty sure the new place is owned by a company that is also owned by the guy who owns the property and he's probably leasing to himself for free. I imagine this new burger place is only going to be open for a few months until they begin site work, but it sounds like basically a big FU to the old burger place that refused to break the lease over the years.

The TLDR version of this is that we now have our own local version of Larry David's "Mocha Joe's", just in burger form.
Click to expand...

The burger drama continues: It didn't take long but our local Mocha Joe's has been sued:

HUNTER HOUSE HAMBURGERS FILES LAWSUIT AGAINST BETTER BURGERS

Unrelated to the lawsuit, our oldest has asked for dinner from Hunter House every. single. day. this week. We keep saying no. The place has been absolutely packed every time we've driven past ever since the imposter opened up shop a couple weeks ago and I definitely don't want to wait 45 minutes for a sack of grease and salt.
 
What if our working world was like sports in that you could get traded, reassigned, relegated?

- You assign a poorly performing planner to a small town for a "rehab stint"
"You staff reports have been lacking and Im not sure you're ready for this town... we are sending you back to North Haverbrook for now."
- You can make trades...
"The City of Ogdenville has traded a Building Inspector II to the City of Brockway for a Budiling Permit Technician, a reem of plotter paper and $25,000 cash"
- You can get called up
"Well, youve done good work. Here is your bus ticket... Capital City needs you. Good luck."
 
zman said:
What if our working world was like sports in that you could get traded, reassigned, relegated?

- You assign a poorly performing planner to a small town for a "rehab stint"
"You staff reports have been lacking and Im not sure you're ready for this town... we are sending you back to North Haverbrook for now."
- You can make trades...
"The City of Ogdenville has traded a Building Inspector II to the City of Brockway for a Budiling Permit Technician, a reem of plotter paper and $25,000 cash"
- You can get called up
"Well, youve done good work. Here is your bus ticket... Capital City needs you. Good luck."
Click to expand...
Don't forget the announcer that says what you are doing and provides his/her commentary on it throughout your day.
 
1772225926603.png
 
jumbach said:
Don't forget the announcer that says what you are doing and provides his/her commentary on it throughout your day.
Click to expand...
And "locker room" interviews during Council intermission and after Council

"On Item 4a, Councilor Smith surprised everyone with his take on property rights, but then voted in concurrence with the majority, what's you take?"
 
zman said:
What if our working world was like sports in that you could get traded, reassigned, relegated?

- You assign a poorly performing planner to a small town for a "rehab stint"
"You staff reports have been lacking and Im not sure you're ready for this town... we are sending you back to North Haverbrook for now."
- You can make trades...
"The City of Ogdenville has traded a Building Inspector II to the City of Brockway for a Budiling Permit Technician, a reem of plotter paper and $25,000 cash"
- You can get called up
"Well, youve done good work. Here is your bus ticket... Capital City needs you. Good luck."
Click to expand...

This reminds me, though not really related, to my first three jobs out of college - worked at a private firm as a draftsperson, came in one day and the principals said, we are retiring, so on Monday you will start working at this other firm, you're all set (it was a firm they had fathered), spent 3 years there and then the recession was hitting and they said, we need to do layoffs, but we like you and don't want to lay you off, so on Monday, you will go work at this firm (it was a firm whose principals were personal friends of the principal at the firm I was at) and I worked there for 3 years, then that firm folded in a delayed recession hit, and then I got moved around in filling in people's maternity leaves at development firms for a year (I knew them because they had been clients), and then, I had my first baby and then went into the public sector thinking it would be more stable (lol, right?) - as a further aside, it was really hard to do that interview because I was post partum foggy brain and I hadn't interviewed for a job for 7 years lol - but anyway, the trading comment made me think of my early career years of being moved around so that's all I got for randomness
 
I have done press conferences before... but imagine a post Planning Commission press conference where the staff sits at a table answering questions.

City Council could have intros like in Sunday Night Football... where you face pops up and you state: "Zman... University of Colorado"
 
WSU MUP Student said:
^ Forgot about girls flag football. That's a new one around here. We have two high schools in our district and one has girls flag football. Some of our sports are "unified" with kids from both high schools as that's the only way they can have enough participants. The other high school has had a girls flag football team for a couple seasons now but our high school does not, and it's also not a unified team so they must have had enough kids there to get it up and running.
Click to expand...
Flag football has grown significantly around here. There are few community colleges that are picking it up. Nashville also started growing high school hockey, but most teams are two or three schools together as unified teams.


Ultimate disc is starting to pick up and there was some talk about moving from club teams to a small regulated league. In TN there were also loosely related club competitions for rodeo events like roping and barrel racing. It wasn't under the state high school association, but you could get a letter.



I have a friend who's daughter who just won state in bowling which I think is great.
 
zman said:
I have done press conferences before... but imagine a post Planning Commission press conference where the staff sits at a table answering questions.

City Council could have intros like in Sunday Night Football... where you face pops up and you state: "Zman... University of Colorado"
Click to expand...
Don't forget about the T-shirt cannon after Item 6.
 
zman said:
I have done press conferences before... but imagine a post Planning Commission press conference where the staff sits at a table answering questions.

City Council could have intros like in Sunday Night Football... where you face pops up and you state: "Zman... University of Colorado"
Click to expand...
How long until Electronic Arts comes out with "Madden Planning Commission 2027?" Who would be on the cover?
 
JNA said:
I could be in either Kentucky or Illinois but still in Indiana.

Could you be in another state in 30 miles ?
Click to expand...
It's like 146 miles to California and maybe a few more miles to Mexico, not the new one.

I can stand in a part of the state and be in four states at once. Does that count for anything?

zman said:
What if our working world was like sports in that you could get traded, reassigned, relegated?

- You assign a poorly performing planner to a small town for a "rehab stint"
"You staff reports have been lacking and Im not sure you're ready for this town... we are sending you back to North Haverbrook for now."
- You can make trades...
"The City of Ogdenville has traded a Building Inspector II to the City of Brockway for a Budiling Permit Technician, a reem of plotter paper and $25,000 cash"
- You can get called up
"Well, youve done good work. Here is your bus ticket... Capital City needs you. Good luck."
Click to expand...
Don't forget the 47th item stretch! Take me out to City Hall...
 
Back
Top