31 March 2013

[PDX_liff] The Last Safeway On 82nd Avenue

2910.It's been a long time in coming, I suppose. Its sister down at SE 82nd and Foster closed about three years back, leaving the locals with the choice between Fred Meyer and Fred Meyer, the Albertsons at Eastport Plaza closing sometime before.

The closing of a Safeway seems to have bound into it the idea of a surrender, a giving-up. If Safeway can't make it in your neighborhood, there's not much money to be had from the locals. If business is good, fortune passes everywhere, so they say.


They say E. 82nd Avenue is 'distressed'. This in and of itself is worrisome; distressed can mean many things to many people, but when they start using it on a public policy level, that always seems to be code for here comes the developers and the gentrification. And if they aren't just down the road, well, hold on tight. They'll get there eventually.

The sign boasts that Safeway's been serving Portland since 1921. Whether it's this particular Safeway, at 101 SE 82nd Avenue, or Safeways in general, is unclear. And now we may never know.

Architecture matters. It lends character and form to a neighborhood, and in cases where it's unrelentingly commercial, soothes the eye if it's done right. The design of Safeway stores, the standard look … which is this:

 Is a welcome cool drink of water, visually speaking. Truth be told, SE 82nd Avenue gets fairly bleak south of here; there's a Lutheran Episcopal church (Sts. Peter and Paul) and then it's a succession of shabby used car lots and stores-that-had-seen-better-days until … well, on SE 82nd, it never really does end. Clackamas Town Center is about six miles away to your left as you look at the above picture and it's unrelenting commerce all the way. But I do not condemn it here, understand; I merely state it for the record. I make no judgements. It does not bother me as such; people live here. It is what it is.

The grace of the the wave-form roof has always been a beauty to me. Not so much a roofline as wings that are just waiting to take off from the top of the building. Gave the standard Safeway design a nice symmetry, even if the building is ultimately asymmetrical the curving roof is a dominant element that the entire design revolves around.

And, like other well-done designs of the 20th Century, in its way, timeless.

During the administration of Sam Adams, there was a big deal made about food deserts. Regardless of the press TriMet is peddling these days, it ain't what it once was; it's more expensive, less frequent, and goes fewer places.  Along 82nd, now, there used to be four or five supermarkets: There was once an Albertson's at 82nd and Holgate, two Safeways (82nd and Foster and 82nd and Burnside),  and a Food 4 Less (82nd and Powell). And, over the last decade, they have slowly, one-by-one, died. The Albertsons was the first to go, followed by the Foster Safeway; the Food 4 Less closed suddenly, with no advance warning, just last month.

The 82nd and Burnside Safeway was the sole survivor, and as though it heard its last comrade died, gave up the ghost almost in sympathy. Now, the Adams administration seemed to be saying if you didn't have a grocery store in walking distance, or within, say, half-a-mile, that made your nabe less livable, and going to the grocery store is like a trek to the nearest oasis. A food desert. And with the closing of the 82nd and Burnside Safeway, the nearest supermarket is the Fred Meyer on 82nd and Foster (about 2 and a half miles south). The next one is yet another Fred Meyer, 82nd and Johnson Creek Blvd, about 2 more miles beyond that. The next reasonably price food store is still over a mile south of that, the WinCo at 82nd and Causey. And Fred Meyer is not really a great choice when it comes to prices.

There are no food stores except a Plaid Pantry and a 7-Eleven on NE 82nd.  

Food desert? Sure, why not? This is a regular food al-Rub-al-Khali. Checking the nearest Safeways they recommend (helpfully tacked to the door):


Those are reasonably reached in a tolerable time only if you have a car. TriMet rides to these stores, with the fewer routes and reduced service, have become an ordeal for some.

If shopping for a family, using the city bus for transportation, seems a reasonable concept then, sirra, I would respectfully submit you have never actually done it.

Not one to waste an opportunity, I looked into the market with fascination. I've never seen a supermarket, much less a Safeway, look so danged empty before.


Pallets of bottled water stood in front of shelves as bare as the videos I remember of Russians desperately looking for food during food shortages back when there was a USSR back in the 70s and 80s. In a land of plenty, plenty of space. And it looked as though things were getting packaged up for shipment to … where? Who knows?


The meat and dairy section, pictured above, seemed most folorn. So brightly lit, and so empty. The left over beverages, the ones that didn't get bought in the clearance sale, futures uncertain, sit waiting. The shelves in cooler cases always struck me as funny … no matter how clean the store kept them, when empty, they always looked overworn and abused.

Thronging with customers, serving a neighborhood … well, that was then. This is now. God only knows what that store will become … either it will get pulled down and developed, or some appalling retailer will take up that space, one can only guess.

But the party's over, folks. East Portland, you face the future thus, wandering in the food desert, wondering why the rest of the city disrespects you so.

'S'okay. Don't fret it. I'm sure it was nothing personal.

It was only business.

(NB: Thank you, Laura C. Minnick, for pointing out that Saints Peter and Paul is an Episcopal Church, not a Lutheran one. The Times regrets the error.)

[design] Design We Like: SE Portland's Township and Range Restaurant

2909.The various buildings and businesses along the ever-fashionable SE Hawthorne Blvd are in a state of flux. A building at 2422 SE Hawthorne was, for many years, a photo lab. It has become a restaurant.

It's called Township and Range, and being a geography hobbyist, I know of which they refer to, and found it intriguing that they should name a neighborhood bistro after such a technical term.
t caught our eye mainly because of the bold design of the signage, which is engaging to the eye, bold and attractive, and spiffily well-done. 

The design accomplishes the task of tying a philosophy of 'local is best' to the establishment's message by the rather clever trick of the geographer's term. The about page shows that they understand the thinking behind the Public Lands Survey System quite well, even to the point of just what the point of the Willamette Stone is, and they knew enough about to create an impressive logo that has the look of the Willamette Stone benchmark pretty much nailed.

When it comes to geographic attitude, it's got aplomb, Bob.  Which is an impressive bit of local passion, all the more so for a restaurant.

What really  caught our eyes, though, was the bold design of the signage facing the street, which we enjoy mightily:


Nice, eh? Bold, hard to ignore, and fun to look at. The type, reminiscent of automobile and appliance nameplates, is approachable, and the bright red neon provides the contrast you want against the coole colors of the building. The word and is lit from behind: when the night falls is when you see it outlined in silhouette.

It's clever and we wish we'd of thought of this. 

[teh_funnay] Chocolate Rabbit Nui

2908.Eastern morning on Easter Island, before the ears are eaten.


Found here: http://joannecasey.blogspot.com/2012/04/easter-island.html

[tech] Welcome Aboard Google Treasure Maps; This Is Your Pirate Speaking

2907.Just stumbled on this just now. This is something people will have fun with.

Gamboling about the globe on Google Maps and Street view, I saw a bit of a peculiarity; quite surprising actually. I've seen the buttons in Google Maps in a variety of ways, but never like this before …

Treasure?

Yes, treasure.

And what does a map of Portland look like as a Google Treasure Map? Well, like this:

 
A little rough, but nice. I mean, what does a pirate need to know except …


 Where the treasure is. How adorable. They put a bird on it.

The detail, as I said, is not great. if there were tools to draw dotted lines and such I wasn't able to find them; requesting directions just puts the regular route line and the A and B (or however many) flags on it. The real fun comes when using street view. The little guy turns into a telescope; drag the shadow of the telescope and you'll see things in glorious age-inflected sepia.

The tale is told of the Dread Pirate Greenbeard, sailing the multimodal asphalt, coming from Gresham to unleash torment and plunder upon the prime trade routes crossing the Willamette River. Enroute, he passed through the treacherous pavement in the Russellville Main:


Sailing between the Scylla of the Chevron station at SE 102nd and Stark and the Charybdis of the Starbucks and food cart pod across the street was no easy task; he hadn't had his coffee that morning, had to run out of the house so skipped breakfast, and was running low of fuel. But this privateer knew that great reward attends great risk.

After taking broadsides all the way down the Banfield freeway into town, avoiding the siren song of the Laurelhurst Theater (though not on the freeway, its song could be heard by mariners for leagues in every direction, luring them to idle hours drinking IPAs and eating pizza slices), and, going through the Straits of No Return (the Lloyd District), he finally found his goal:


Success was his. Provided he paid the licensing fee to feature the famous Portland sign in the gazette of his travels …

But then he remembered. He was a pirate.

And not even landlubbers paid that fee!

Success just got that much sweeter!

UPDATE: Google Maps Mania has some additional information, and easter eggs. Which is appropriate. 

27 March 2013

[ad_design] When Words Fail, Just Tie A Woman Up And Throw Her In The Trunk

2906.In advertising, a joke can get too nuanced or dry betimes.

Today, in Our Conflicted Attitudes About Women, a Eurasian ad agency's (JWT) employees, showing off creative concepts for a notional campaign for the Ford Figo (a subcompact sold in the Indian market), created a worldwide furore. Why? Here's part of it:


That smiling figure in the front seat, flashing the satisfied peace-sign now that all his troubles are behind him (and appropriately silent), is ex-Italian PM Silvio Burlusconi, he of the 'bunga-bunga' parties and the sex scandals.

The idea is, of course, at the wheel of the Ford Figo, you can 'leave your worries behind', although I can't hear the tagline over abducting bound and gagged women and throwing them in your trunk. Sophisticated humor is like that, I suppose. But, hey, equal opportunity! There's also one of Paris Hilton with the three Kardashian sisters bound and gagged in the Figo's trunk. I showed a piece of one of them above, to see both in their full risible glory, check out the story at Businessweek Insider.

The ad concepts were apparently not circulated with the approval of JWT, but were uploaded by employees seeking a publication's award:
The ads hadn't been intended for publication, but were circulated widely after they were uploaded on an industry website by JWT employees over the weekend. The website, Ads of the World, gives monthly awards to ads submitted by users.
This had been done without JWT or Ford's authorization.
The depiction of assault on women is not only disturbing but inopportune, happening as it does during a time when the nation of India is fighting a battle with itself over the violence done to women that have made national and world headlines latterly.

We're hoping this becomes a teachable moment.

And, according to the Wall Street Journal, heads have rolled over it. So, there's that.

[brand] Branded With a Life Sentence

2905.Being a national brand's spokes-face carries dangers of its own.

One can read any number of tales of an actors' stereotyping due to a strong character identification … Adam West and Batman come to mind. But what of those who become so strongly identified with a brand name consumer product?

Like Enzyte's "Smilin' Bob" … Joe Isuzu … The Dell Dude?

They've handled the fame and stereotyping in different ways. Joe Isuzu (David Leasure) kept trying until he got a sitcom role. Andrew Olcott (Smilin' Bob) went into production. Ben Curtis (The Dell Dude) is trying to be a filmmaker and trying to get roles as an actor … and, in the most folorn way, hoping that the Dell dude can make a comeback somehow.

Businessweek Insider has the most interesting story here. Call it a most unexpected dark side of the branding equation.

I'm betting Stephanie Courtney can probably find life after Flo the Progressive Girl, whenever that happens … but it'll probably touch and go, for a while.

26 March 2013

[logo] GLAAD's Contracting Name Means An Expanding Mission

2904.On a day when the Supreme Court considers pivotal matters such as whether humane treatment and regular civil rights obtain to those of who had the poor taste to be born other than heterosexual, I thought it would be germane, given my continuing interest in branding and logos, and marriage equality, to spotlight a particular change of branding - or perhaps, better said, an evolution.

The organization GLAAD - formed as the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation - operates on the principle that words matter. By telling the human stories of those gay and lesbian people - your friends, and neighbors, humans, and functioning as a monitor on the media perceptions of gays and lesbians, they make that mission real.

Over time, the mission has expanded. Not only gays and lesbians but also bi and transgendered people face weal because of the way they lead their private lives in ways that heterosexuals not only do not fear but also can not, in some cases, comprehend.

Who gets physically attacked for being heterosexual? Nobody we've ever known. I am honored to count several LGBT people amongst my friends, and it's a daily fact of life for them.

In a timely coincidence, GLAAD announced a subtle but important change and shift in its branding. In a move designed to show solidarity in its mission amongst the entire LGBT spectrum, it has simply reduced its name to 'GLAAD' to reflect that inclusiveness. That move was announced on the MSNBC program Melissa Harris-Perry just this last week:
"It is a natural progression that reflects the work GLAAD's staff is already leading," said Cruz. "We respect and honor the full name that the organization was founded with, but GLAAD's work has expanded beyond fighting defamation to changing the culture. Our commitment to marriage equality, employment nondiscrimination, and other LGBT issues is stronger than ever, and now our name reflects our work on transgender issues as well as our work with allies."
The logo itself is elegant in its simplicity:



The mission of amplifying a message is aptly rendered into a graphic message here, and needs no further commentary on that point except that the glaad word mark is just as aptly positioned as the agent of that amplification. The shaping of the expanding soundwaves is a clever visual bonus that unifies the graphic element and leads the eye well through the rest of the design.

The tagline is a succinct statement of its mission as well.



The reduction of an initialism- or acronym-based name to merely its unified form is hardly new. The game Dungeons and Dragons was created by a company named TSR; in its original form, Tactical Studies Rules, the company originally flourished and grew, but as its core products contracted to just the D&D brand and moved away from more generic miniatures-based military gaming, the company's name shrank too; during its heydey and on into its absorption into Wizards Of The Coast, TSR's name was just that; the three-lettered initialism.

GLAAD's name evolution is kind of an opposite thing, though, in that shedding the words actually signifies an expansion of the mission. And we're 'glaad' to see it.

(NB: This blog and its author support marriage equality. Did we have to say?)

24 March 2013

[pdx] Sometimes I'm A Little Thorny On The Uptake.

2903.When at first I heard that the Thorns' Feelin' Thorny? t-shirts had created such a furore I have to admit, I didn't understand why for a few minutes.

Then The Wife™ told me to elide the T.

Ah, hah. I geddit.

Let this be a watchword for y'all: collaboration. Solves so many problems you didn't even know you had!

[logo] The Thorns Would Look Good On Your Arm

2902.I finally got a chance to take a good, close look at the new Portland Thorns FC logo, and I have an abashed confession to make.

At first, I wasn't all that wowed by it. It's a good and appropriate solution, and doesn't work against the team at all, but it didn't exactly excite me.

Then I took a nice close look at it.
My bad, people. This is one of those designs that rewards those who look and look again.

The logo (see right) has much cleverness to speak for it. In a conversation with the designer, Brent Diskin, in this Q&A at the team's site, we find out that this logo is full of clever: its circular design was informed by the history of similar football club logos down the history of the Timbers (both clubs have the same owner), that he was shooting for a design that resists datedness, and something that represented Portland on more than one level (the hypocycloid forms - the four pointed stars - that hold the letters F and C are inspired by the four-pointed star at the focus of the Portland city flag's design.

With so much Portland-centered passion here, we shouldn't be surprised that the designer is also a proud member of the legendary Timbers Army.

But what really got my attention was the roseate design at the center, called by the designer a vortex rose. A vortex it certainly resembles. At first, though, it reminded me of the strange looking roses we find in heraldic - coats of arms - designs.
An heraldic rose -
The arms of the German city
and region of Lippe

But as I said, it rewards the patient viewer. The 'vortex' rose has a lot of shapes at play with each other that mesh and work together as one in a very satisfying way. Not only to the forms merge in the center to form a five-petaled design resembling a soccer ball, but the red shapes spiralling out from that center look very much like salmon jumping the waterfalls on the journey upstream.

The 2 entwined thorn vines make loose five-pointed designs as well, which reminds me of the pattern on a soccer ball.

In the main, we wish we'd of thought of this. It's very well done. About the only thing that could be adjusted is the color scheme … the green of the vines and the red of the road are a little dark in all the versions I've seen, and tend to be dominated by the black of the logo's background. When you used a shaded color against black, contrast tends to suffer as a result, and the design elements get a little lost in the design.

The last thought we had after we had our fun playing in the vortex was that this was probably going to go on a lot of biceps.  It'd work very well as a tattoo, and as much ink as flows in Portland each year into eager epidermi, and as soccer-nuts as this burg is, I'd be quite surprised if that didn't happen already.

23 March 2013

[out122ndway] A New Beginning For Trafton's VW

2901.The end, and a new beginning, for a great Portland east side institution.

If you're a VW aficionado, you'll be feeling a pang of … well, your reactions will be as different as the individual. I know how I felt when I realized the change.

But, still, it's all good. You'll see.

At 15570 SE Stark Street, in far-outer-east Portlandia, is an auto shop. It has been known in the past as Trafton and Maier Foreign Service, and Trafton's Foreign Auto. It specializes in Volksies. Just VW's nothing but VW's and only VW's.

And, from time to time, my VW. Which is a 1972, orangey-red, Type I. Or Beetle if you prefer. Or Bug … if you must.

The proprietor of said shop has been one Bill Trafton, a man with VW running in his veins. I'm convinced that the moment he was born, he ran out of the delivery room, found the first wrench he could lay his hands on, and started tightening a bolt on the first VW he could find. Yes, Bill Trafton was that good.

As a matter of fact, he was probably born a little premature because he just couldn't wait to get started.

I was privileged to hand over my hard earned money to Bill and his crew to keep this sweetpea on the road:





And she still sails the open streets of Portland to this day. Classy ride, right?

As you go into the east 150s, and you hove within sight of Mordor Gresham,  you come upon this unlikely looking construction:




Tell you something, if you can't figure it out after seeing that front-end over the door, you won't ever. This is the capital of VW, the Taj Mahal of the boxer engine, the center of cool. This is Trafton's Foreign Auto Service.

The inside was even more fascinating than the outside. Hence.


That's a very large scale model of Herbie hanging off the window there. There is a suggestion of clutter of historic proportions on that bookcase on the left. Brother and/or sister, you ain't seen nothin' yet. Hark.


You get the idea, don't you? If it was a knickknack, and it was Veedub, it had a place somewhere in Trafton's shop. Sadly, I didn't capture every corner, but I did get some. The entire place had VW paraphernalia, VW standup cutouts, old ads, a glorious and gorgeous gallimaufry of stuff.


That's my Beetle in the distance, on the lift getting something done. If you ever doubt, you can tell my Beetle by the German flag in front of the front door there. So proud to get that sticker.

Then, I applied it … upside down.

Wunderbar!

The interior was a-clutter, but at the center of it was the coolest hands ever to lay ministrations on an air-cooled boxer engine. And it was all informed by the wit, wisdom, and knowledge of Bill Trafton, who you couldn't help but love.


He was an interesting sort, Bill was. He was folksy, always had a story or two, was willing to talk your ear off at the time and, I say this in the best way, he was very, very Christian. Refer again to the facade picture up toward the top of this post. You notice how several panels in each window seem to form a cross? This was not just decor for decor's sake. One thing you noticed when you went in there was that there was a lot of Christian literature scattered about. There was even a cardboard box full of Bibles at the end of the counter. Bill would let you have one for the asking.

But for all that, he didn't try to sell you on accepting Jesus. He sold you on his auto expertise. In this world where every zealously religious person seems desperate to convince you to accept Jesus (as though they're the first one who ever told you about him) Bill let the example of his business practice do the talking for him. He did honest work, he charged a fair price, if it was something that required a couple of minutes of his time he sent you down the road with a smile and a wave (sometimes he didn't even charge you for it). If you wanted to talk religion, he was perfectly happy to do that. But if you didn't, he didn't.

He even once took us out to lunch while we were waiting for the crew to finish the work on the Beetle and we had to hang about because we had nowhere else to go. That is the only time that any mechanic had ever done anything like that at all for me.

Giuseppe's Pizza, by the way, near 181st and Stark in Gresham. Highly recommended. That was some righteous pizza.

The only door you can't walk through
without stopping to look at every single thing

The last thing that Bill's shop did for us was to replace the left rear wheel bearing. He brought that in for under $300. Latterly, the windshield wipers had apparently given up the ghost. Time to see Bill again, and so last Monday we hied ourself out to 155th and Stark to do so.

Almost immediately we found some things had changed. The old sign, with the Pennzoil logo on, had been replaced with a simplified sign simply reading TRAFTON'S VW in these cute retro plastic letters. The half-chassis Type II (or VW Bus, if you like, or Transporter, if you have to, or Microbus, if you must) with a painted Here Comes the Son legend on was still there. But one important thing had gone away. On the west side of the building, there was this large iron cross (remember I told y'all about his faith?), not massive, made of square iron tube about 3 inches through and standing about 6 feet tall.

It was completely gone.

I'd taken this opportunity to look into the back lot of the property which is easily viewable from where you pull in to park your rig. It's the boneyard that every good mechanic has … half wrecks that they scavenge parts from old 'dubs and such. It had been … well. simplified. Fewer wrecks, and a big shipping container that wasn't there before.

I approached the front door behind The Wife™ and entered with trepidation. What I found inside left me absolutely gobsmacked. Every bit of the gorgeous clutter, the (I think) three decades of VW cruft, was absolutely gone. The old fridge, vanished; Herbie had left for parts unknown (or as parts unknown?) and there wasn't a scrap of Christian evangelism to be found. A pleasantly neat and tidy, rather freshly-painted, workspace was there.

Now, I don't want to leave the impression that I was unpleased at what I was seeing. By the same logic, I don't think that a pin-neat mechanic's shop is necessarily (operative word there) better – or worse – than a cluttered one. As much banal work comes from a clean desk as brilliance comes from a cluttered one, and vice versa. But when something is a certain way, and that thing changes fundamentally, your pins kind of get knocked out of you. And something that was sure, certain and safe has all assumptions revoked. Everything is back in play again.

In some situations, that's excitement and fun. When it comes to your trusted mechanic, it results in anxiety. It has gone from being a very known quantity to an extremely undefined one. But we had to venture forward you see; the 'dub's wipers were broke down, and rain was on the way, so once more unto the breach, and all that.

The first part of negotiating the new territory was the person managing the place, a very pleasant fellow named Daniel. He took us in hand and listened to The Wife™ outline the problem, and filled in the service order. She has always been a better judge of people than I, and the conversation was going rather well (and The Wife™ loves to talk). The conversation went rather well, and Daniel did something that always impresses me in places where guy stuff tends to transact; he talked to her.

I've been in similar situations when she tried to transact the business but the concessionaire insisted to address me until I pointedly reminded them that my spouse was in fact the one who was talking. We have not returned to such places.

So here we were starting off on a good foot. And whoever's playing that sad violin can stop it now. Thenkyew.

The repair cycle gave us much to be reassured of. It went, largely, as it would if Bill were still in the shop, which tells me one important thing: the new owners of Trafton's VW clearly understand the good will and reputation attached to the name they've inherited (and, tellingly, continue to use even though they presumably could have changed the place's name). They also care about retaining regular customers. I suppose also part of it is that at least one member of the old Team Trafton remained, a VW genius by the name of Marcos. It also helped that Daniel is as VW crazy as the rest of us; his terms of endearment involved letting on that he, too drove a '72 Beetle … and that he envied me the crisp responsiveness of my stick shift, which is one of the best things about driving that car.

The real test of it was the potential replacing of the wiper motor. Acquiring the new part could have pushed the repair bill into the low $200s, however, once Marcos got his magic hands on the thing and found that it needed just a little adjusting, it went down to the low $140s. And now, I have a working windshield wiper with 2 actual speeds!

That, and a new old auto shop to take the Beetle to.

The surprise was, as Daniel told us, Bill had actually been retired for the last two years but was taking his time to find the right people to sell the business to. Apparently, he's chosen well.

We can confidently recommend Trafton's VW to anyone at this point, even since the change of ownership. Sadly, if you go there, you won't see the VW Museum anymore, it having gone, presumably, with Bill, and you've missed meeting Bill himself, who is one of the truly memorable characters I have known.

He did leave me with something, though. Our lodger walked out with one of Bill's numerous Bibles which he was happy to give. As I became one of the sometimes-regulars around Bill's shop (he could clearly see I enjoyed hanging about while the 'dub was worked on) he decided I needed a copy of the Idiot's Guide. Now, I don't mean one of those modern Idiot's Guides to this, that, and the uddah thing. I mean the initially self-published wonder by the VW God, John Muir, How To Keep Your Volkswagen Alive: A Manual of Step-by-Step Procedures for the Compleat Idiot. The edition I was bestowed with was published sometime back in the 80s but my 'dub is a '72 so we're good there.

Even if you don't ever intend on working on the 'dub yourself, you need this book and need to read through it so at least you're a literate classic 'dub owner, because that's the only sort of 'dub owner there should be, and Muir's late-60s sensibility and the late, great Peter Aschwanden's astoundingly sweet illustrations will cause you to linger for a very long time anyhow, and you just might get smart enough to work on your own 'dub, which would get you out of some scrapes and make you self-sufficient, which is excellent per se. 

All of which is a long way of saying Our friend left with a Bible from Bill Trafton and, in a way, so did I. 

And we shall miss Bill. Take him as a man, all in all, for we shall not see his like again. I just wish I'd of had the chance to say g'bye.





Ecclesiastes 3:1 is a very famous verse, you've all heard it: To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven. 

I bet Bill Trafton would have given us an amen on that.