Category: default || By jt3y

Headline on the front page of this week's Valley Mirror: "Pear Harbor Remembered."

You remember Pear Harbor. That happened on Dec. 8, 1941, when the Japanese launched a surprise attack on Fruit-of-the-Loom. Witnesses recall seeing squashed grapes and boxer shorts everywhere.

Watch for upcoming Valley Mirror coverage of remembrances of 6/11 --- when terrorists attacked a Bell Telephone repair truck --- and a nostalgic look back at Braddock Avenue's immortal rallying cry during the Spanish-American War, "Remember the Main Hotel!"

It's a good thing I never make mistakes. Tube City Almanac: Where typographical errors are unpossible!

Anyway, inspired by Dave Copeland's piece on Tuesday about this survey --- in which the American public ranked newspaper reporters with car salesmen in terms of "trustworthiness" --- I was going to write a big long screed. But then I remembered that nothing is more boring to non-journalists than journalists journalizing about journalism. So just go read Copeland instead. Or don't. Who am I to tell you what to do?

Speaking of telling people what to do --- and where to go ...

If you live in Dravosburg, Braddock or Turtle Creek, and you've been dreaming that some day, your little town might be divided by a giant wall of concrete and speeding cars, your prayers were answered yesterday. The federal government has approved the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission's plans to complete the Mon-Fayette Expressway from Route 51 to Picksberg. An official announcement is expected today.

This means the Road to Nowhere --- the high-speed toll road which currently connects the bustling metropolis of Large with the metropolitan California, Pa. area --- will actually go somewhere, but at a cost of about $2 billion.

And only 40 years too late to help the Mon-Yough area! Whoopee!

Now, if Turtle Creek residents are interested in seeing what their town is going to look like 10 or 15 years from now, they should load the kiddos into the old family truckster and head down Route 837 to New Eagle, and then hang a right onto Route 88 until they get to Mingo Creek County Park.

Pull over to the side and get out of the car. See those two giant bridges?

Now just imagine those over St. Colman's Church, 'cause that's what you're probably getting. It should make the fireman's fairs a lot of fun.

Oh, don't worry; the Turnpike Commission has promised to appoint "local advisory boards" that will "advise" the highway builders on how the roads will be routed. If you want to "advise" the Turnpike Commission, rumor has it that they're actually very gentle, though you might find yourself walking funny for a few days.

Complete coverage from Jim Ritchie in the Trib and Joe Grata in the Post-Gazette.

Other than that, it's kind of a slow day at the Almanac. Patti Dobranski reports in the Tribune-Review that the old Pennsylvania Avenue Elementary School in Irwin has been acquired for use as a personal care home. The school closed in 2003, and there had been some talk that the borough building might relocate there, but nothing came of it.

Also in the Trib, in neighboring North Huntingdon, Michelle Merlo writes that geese are doing what geese do, all over the sidewalks at Indian Lake Park. At one point, Merlo writes, workers had to hose down the walking track every morning.

Um, yuck?

With chemicals, fencing and other measures having little or no effect, the fed-up township commissioners have authorized the parks and recreation director to get his shootin' arn and bag him some geese.

I know roast goose is supposed to be good eatin', but having spent some time around geese, and having seen what comes out of them, I'm not sure I would want to eat the insides.