Archive for October, 2009
UPDATED Spill closes beach, halts fishing
Updated 3:02 p.m. Saturday, October 31
Crews are continuing their cleanup of the estimated 400 to 800 gallons of fuel oil that spilled out of a tanker during a refueling run in San Francisco Bay early Friday morning.
No fuel was visible to a reporter who walked the Island’s shores Saturday morning, but an official with the [...]
Oil spill could reach Alameda’s shores
The United States Coast Guard is reporting that a fuel spill that occurred early Friday morning in San Francisco Bay could reach Alameda’s shores.
According to the Coast Guard, their oil trajectory models showed that Alameda’s northern shoreline and Bay Farm Island could be affected by the spill, which was reported at 6:48 a.m. Friday [...]
Boat Movement Restricted Due to Bay Oil Spill; News of Sunken Sailboat during Baja Ha-Ha
This week has been as colorful for the Bay as the sunset picture taken at Crown Memorial Beach in Alameda today at 6:48 p.m.
The birds were feeding nicely, and no oil had appeared, fortunately.
Exactly 12 hours earlier, the U.S. Coast Guard got news that the tanker Dubai Star had suffered a rupture in a fuel lines [...]
This Just In! Reader’s Property Values Under Attack
Roger,
As the month of October has gone on, I have noticed gradually that the homes in my neighborhood are growing more and more dilapidated, and my neighbors are becoming less respectful of our fair city. As I drive around my street and the nearby streets I see the same thing everywhere. It’s as if nobody cares about how their house looks anymore, and everything is going to pot. And what irks me is that this means that it’s sending my property values down, down, down!
Let me tell you some examples of what I have seen around town:
- People are leaving uneaten food, like whole squashes and pumpkins, around on their porches. Please people, if you have harvested something from your garden, I’m proud of you, but can’t you store it in your basement where you are supposed to? Leaving them out front is just asking for vandalism — I see that a lot of neighborhood kids have cleverly drawn, or even cut, faces out of them.
- The spiders (or is that the squirrels?) have been spinning outrageously ugly webs on the bushes in front of many people’s houses. I can’t blame the owners for that, but at least they would have the common decency to clean up once in a while! A broom works wonders to whisk away cobwebs.
- This is unbelievably morbid, but I am pretty sure that the dead are being buried in people’s front yards, of all places! Look, I know the economy is tight, so maybe you cannot afford a fancy funeral and cemetary, but if you grandmother passes away, at least bury her in the back yard so that her final resting place is not visible from the street!
- I’ve seen a few scarecrows put up here and there. Scarecrows? In the city? Unless somebody has come up with an ingenious way to scare the squirrels away, I really don’t see any need for scarecrows, and it just creeps people out. Honestly!
- The windows in many houses are looking just terrible. Sometimes I see that the residents have put up a picture of some frightful creature, or maybe some words like “BEWARE” or “HAUNTED.” Why in the world would anybody want to simulate a house that is haunted? There is nothing more that drives property values down than a neighborhood that has an allegedly haunted house.
Are my neighbors just trying to perpetuate some sort of scam, perhaps so they can drive down the property values to a point where I and other right-minded Alamedans, are forced to move out?
Please Roger, I hope you can help us get to the bottom of this nefarious plot to ruin Alameda.
Pleadingly,
James V. Wherdonfield
School budget troubles loom large for Alameda public schools
Lest you think that everything in public school finance is peachy-keen, think again. Right now the Alameda Unified School District is living – as is almost every other California public school district – on borrowed time. Statewide we’re talking about more than six million public school children, their opportunities for success and their hopes for [...]
On Point: Bullet points
Lots of little bits of developments on the Point this week. Let’s get started, eh?
VA transfer: I promised a few weeks ago that I’d track down that Environmental Summary Document for the 549-acre chunk of the Point the Department of Veterans Affairs wants for outpatient clinics and an above-ground cemetery, and finally, I’m delivering. (Or [...]
Island sports: Middle school volleyball update
AEF’s Middle School Volleyball program culminated in an exciting playoff and championship series on October 27. The competitiveness between Chipman, Lincoln and Wood schools and the improvement in level of play during the season was evidenced by the fact all three schools were represented in the finals, and that in each division the #1 [...]
Transference
The newest member to the In Alameda blogging team, Susan Davis, has a wonderful debut post with an appropriately Halloween themed flair. It’s all about Halloween in Alameda, Alameda Unified School District Master Plan meetings, and out of district student transfers.
Excerpt:
In the ensuing decade, of course, I’ve learned that such xenophobia is not so [...]
Alameda Snapshot: High Winds Strike Jackson Park
This week’s high winds brought more down than cables on the Bay Bridge. On my nightly walk through Jackson Park I saw one of the large trees had fallen from the wind. Have a great weekend.
Green Living by Janet Marchant: Greening Your Halloween IV: This Time, It’s Environmental
If you’re like me, you’re ready and waiting for an exciting night of green trick-or-treating, with recycled costumes for your kids, all-natural decorations, and organic spirulina candies to hand out at your door. But wait! Before you fire up your Halloween jack-o’-lanterns, have you made sure that they are as kind to the planet as they can be? Until recently, when I plugged in my Halloween jack-o’-lanterns, they flickered to life with the white glow of compact fluorescent lights. Of course, when I realized that those light bulbs are made with some kind of dangerous chemical or heavy metal in them (I forget which), I immediately switched to all-natural incandescent bulbs.
Now my rows of festive pumpkins are guaranteed not to leak anything that is dangerous to children. And as an added bonus, they have the warm, orange glow that you can only get by using those incandescent bulbs.
