Peoria Illinoisan

Billy here. Just doing some maintenance. All is well.

Photo by Peoria.com member StfRon. Reprinted with permission.

Hillary wins Florida.

No delegates are at stake and all of the Democrat Presidential hopefuls supposedly agreed not to campaign there. Technically, she didn’t, but she showed up at a few fund raisers the just before the election.

As I see it, this is a calculated move by the Clinton’s to garner some sorely needed momentum by using the press to pump up her campaign and give her a ‘win’ in an another uncontested and meaningless State.

While perusing the internet, I ran across this blog entry of a transgender’s recent visit to Peoria which should put to rest any notion that this is nothing but a sleepy midwestern town.

Time for a video, Elbo Room Karaoke style.

Thumbs Down: Bradley Basketball Coach Jim Les for blowing off the seriousness of underage drinking by athletes, letting Theron Wilson play most of the game against ISU even while he claims to hold his athletes to a higher standard: “It’s unfortunate, but we hold our guys to a high standard. They’re not normal college students. They’re held to a higher standard, and they’re very remorseful.” Later he added “It’s over, in terms of the direct punishment from me.”

Thumbs Up: Journal Star sports writer Kirk Wessler for keeping the pressure on Bradley to do more punishment wise, at the risk of losing future interviews and contact with the sports department.

Thumbs Down: Bradley Braves athletics director Ken Kavanagh for not stepping up and insisting more be done. On the night of the BU/ISU game, Kavanagh said “There is a team disciplinary procedure I let the coaches work through. If I don’t feel the coaches have met a minimum threshold then we step in as an athletic department.”

Thumbs Up: Bradley President Joanne Glasser for sending out an email to the entire Bradley Community and the Journal Star stating in no uncertain terms “more will be done,” and indeed it was, most certainly to the ire of Les & Kavanagh who, “upon further review” were forced into “altering our stance on this important issue.”

If you haven’t been following this, two Bradley Basketball players, 20 year old driver Theron Wilson and 20 year old passenger Tyrone Cole-Scott, were pulled over on Main Street early last Sunday Morning for speeding 10-20 over the speed limit (that means they flying down Main Street at 40 - 50 mph) and subsequently were arrested for underaged drinking under zero-tolerance laws. News of this event came to light on Wednesday, the day of BU’s big game against ISU, and the same day four young men went sent to prison for the underage alcohol related death of BU soccer player Danny Dahlquist.

As punishment, Jim Les found it appropriate to make the two do some extra drills and removed Theron Wilson from the starting lineup vs ISU… but inserted him into the game after a mere 2 1/2 minutes and let him continue to play 31 out of 40 minutes, culminating in him making the game winning shot.

Of course underage drinking occurs on campus. Always has, always will. But to claim to hold atheletes to a higher standard and then give no punishment in the interest of winning a game is not acceptable and only goes to show that atheletes are not held to a higher standard. They are held to a lower standard - one in which actions do not appear to have consequences - especially when the game is on the line.

As some of you are well aware, there was a Kellar Trail-only pep rally at Vonachen’s yesterday.

WEEK had a decent report with no mis-information as far as I could discern, even taking the time to interview Mike Carr of Pioneer Rail, although calling it the old Kellar Branch Rail Line three times seemed a bit over the top.

1470 ran this quote:

David Pittman, the Vice President of Recreation Trail Advocates, says the recent use of the rail line should not sway people against the trail. he said the railroad engine was ran due to a clause that said if nothing is run on the line the railroad operators lose some of their rights. He said no freight was ran on the line.

First of all, I do not believe there is any clause about rail operators losing their rights, and the comment about having no freight run on the line is to insinuate that there is no business. The fact of the matter is, Pioneer Rail ran the train up the Kellar Branch as a test and is parked next to Carver Lumber waiting to run back down and pick up it’s first load in a long long time. By no fault of it’s own, I might add.

Now comes the Journal Star article about the rally and how all three 18th district candidates want to change federal law so we can get rid of the old unused tracks. Besides a goofy quote of Schock “A company just cannot continue to claim rights to land it does not own if they have not been paying rent and refuse to pay market value rent in the future,” the entire article was nothing but a reprint of what they wrote down in a prepared statement. They weren’t in attendance!

Let’s quit with the pep rallys and false information. A group has been put together to study the feasibility of a side by side rail and trail. Let’s see if it can be done. If not, let’s start looking at other options such as running a trail along the length of the river and going up Grandview Drive, connecting to a side by side in the heights or near Junction City. I refuse to accept the notion that there is only one option and I don’t understand the mindset of people who continue to mislead and blatantly lie in an effort to get what they want under the guise of economic development while at the same time trying to run current and future business out of town.

Nothing better than leaving the house when it’s 7 below zero only to arrive at work and find out all the gas lines froze up at some point in the night causing all the furnaces quit working. It is currently 36 degrees in my office.

My only saving grace is I brought along a hat and gloves in case of emergency.

Sonny Boy, I know how you feel…

I received this notice in an email from who I thought was an intelligent and well informed friend of mine. I read it and of course forwarded it to my wife and several friends.

Subject: Cell Phone Numbers Going Public
Cell phone numbers going public

REMINDER….all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies tomorrow and you will start to receive sale calls.

…..YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS

To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone:

888-382-1222

It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time
It blocks your number for five (5) years. You must call from the cell phone number you want to have blocked. You cannot call from a different phone number.

As a public service I was going to put this up on my blog, but thought I should google it to learn more about it first. Well, I’ll be damned if it isn’t a hoax!

ftc.gov: You may have received an email telling you that your cell phone is about to be assaulted by telemarketing calls as a result of a new cell phone number database; however, that is not the case. FCC regulations prohibit telemarketers from using automated dialers to call cell phone numbers. Automated dialers are standard in the industry, so most telemarketers don’t call consumers on their cell phones without their consent.

I find it odd that the phone number given to call actually IS the Federal Government’s do not call number, so I don’t really understand the nature of this email other than to make you look like a dumbass for actually forwarding it.

That being said, it is a good idea to call the number from your home phone number … unless, of course, you are lonely and need someone to talk to.

Yes, Randy Oliver, but you already know better than to come here to read about that. I’m talking about one of the original Peoria bloggers: PollyPeoria.

I admit it. I’ve lost my taste for blogging. It was fun for a long time. I got a kick out of the comments, the mild publicity, the dim lime light. Eventually I came to the conclusion that there is no way to be anonymous and honest and write about the things I want to write about. Anyway, thanks for reading. I’m leaving Peoria Blogging to those who take it seriously and do it so much better than I ever could.

She was one of my inspirations to start blogging way back in the day, and even though it’s been forever since her last post, I kept holding out hope that she’d be back.

At least she said goodbye.

Recently my son told me of his New Years resolution, which I am proud to say he has been following religiously. He then asked me what my resolution was… well, I don’t have one. So he asked his mother to which she responded “Son, when you get old like us you don’t really make them anymore.”

I thought about that for a little bit. Does anyone else make resolutions or at a certain age do you realize that every New Years resolution that you’ve ever made was broken just a few days later?

I actually started (and abandoned) a post with some resolutions. It included the following: Update my blogroll, play more golf w/my son, snap more pics for NTPL, take more hikes and ride more bikes with my kids.

Looking at it now, it seems my abandoned resolutions were born out of selfishness, guilt and things not done. My blogroll is horribly out of date (not done), my son always wants to play more golf with me (guilt), I’m running out of photos (the selfish part), and even though I do take many bike rides with my kids, I could probably improve on the number of hikes (guilt again).

So how am I doing with resolutions made and forgotten? I did update my blogroll, but it’s too cold to play golf, although we did play a round on the Wii. I haven’t taken many photos, but I did take a nice bike ride during the last break in the weather. I have not taken any hikes but not for the lack of want- the few warm days we’ve had were so wet any trail would have been one long puddle of mud.

At this point I’d say it’s a draw.

…to be continued…

Now THIS is funny!

If someone mentioned this already I must’ve missed it, but I ran across this new blog a few days ago called City Of Peoria Economic Development (cityofpeoria.blogspot.com)

I thought this was somehow related to Peoria’s new and improved website, but I couldn’t find any links to it from there. In any event, it appears to be an easy and timely way to disperse information, documents and some commentary to the public… as a tiny taxpayer bonus, blogspot is free!

On the downside, comments are not currently being accepted.

Dumb:

On the verge of a deal that could cut his potential prison sentence in half, a Chillicothe man inexplicably balked and refused to plead to a lesser crime on Friday.

Maurice R. Martin, 33, faces charges of attempted first-degree murder, aggravated domestic battery and two counts of aggravated battery for allegedly stabbing his girlfriend in the chest on Sept. 11, 2007.

At the request of the girlfriend, Alicia Meyers, 23, also of Chillicothe, Peoria County prosecutors were willing to drop the attempted murder charge and its maximum sentence of 30 years in prison. Instead, he would have pleaded to the aggravated domestic battery and faced up to 13 years behind bars, one year shy of the maximum for that charge.

Dumber:

A Chillicothe woman says she wrote a false statement regarding her boyfriend because she didn’t want him to get in trouble for stabbing her in the chest last fall.

Alicia Meyers, 23, at first told police Maurice Martin stabbed her in the chest on Sept. 11 after the two had argued in her car. But then in December, she wrote a new statement saying she plunged a large, almost medieval-looking knife into her chest because she wanted to die. She said she didn’t want Martin to break up with her and leave for Chicago.

[…] Assistant State’s Attorney Deborah Shelby noted Meyers originally told police it was Martin who stabbed her just above her heart with the 8-inch blade. Meyers testified she kept the knife in the car for protection.

My previously square bread was purchased at Krogers. We rarely go Krogering because both my wife and I have a personal objection to having a Kroger Card on our key chains, and really object to the whole notion of a discount card. I don’t want to jump through hoops to save a few bucks. If you’re really cheaper, just discount the price! …but I digress.

There’s something about dropping a couple of large bills for groceries (only to get home to find your only loaf of bread has been jammed into a bag and permanently deformed) that kinda bugs me. Maybe the bagger was having a bad day, but this is a perfect example of why I like to do the bagging myself.

My wife’s been bitching about it for days, but honestly, it didn’t bother me until the cheese didn’t fit the bread.

Now if it turned out to look like the Virgin Mary and I could sell it to GoldenCasino for big bucks, that’d be different…