OTBR: Blue House near Wheaton College

Latitude N 41° 52.116
Longitude: W 088° 06.144

A child on a road trip with his family asks, "Where are we?" and the father answers, "Let's check the map. We're off the blue roads [the Interstate Highways marked in blue on the road atlas]. We're off the red roads [the US and state highways]. We're off the black roads [the county highways]. I think we're off the map altogether." It was always my dream to be off the map altogether.

After the jump, a few of the random places (and I mean random literally) that I visited vicariously last month that are "off the blue roads".

The Look of Silence (2014)

IMDB

Look of Silence (2014): Picking at 50 yr old scab of an Indonesian massacre of a million people. Tragic. Inhuman. Inexplicable. Personal. B-

Two Countries Separated by a Common Language

No, not England and America, as Winston Churchill famously said. Or, rather, not only England and America. Also, America and Australia. They speak English in Australia. That doesn't mean Americans don't sometimes feel like it's a foreign language down under. Here's a headline in the Herald Sun, a Melbourne, Australia, newspaper.

Essendon unveils guernsey for Dreamtime at the G designed by Gavin Wanganeen who says Jobe Watson should keep his Brownlow

Source: Herald Sun.

To add to the comprehension difficulty for Americans, imagine this being read by a television news anchor with an Australian accent (or more properly "Strine").

Here's my attempt to translate it for an American audience:

"The Essendon Australian Rules Football club unveils a special jersey honoring the aboriginal understanding of the creation of the world to be worn at an upcoming game at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and designed by retired team great and now indigenous artist Gavin Wanganeen who says team captain Jobe Watson should keep his Brownlow Medal despite accusations of use of illegal drugs surrounding the club."

But that's probably too long to fit in the space available.

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P.S. Long ago, I rooted for the Essendon Bombers (which indirectly is how I stumbled across this headline today), but I quickly learned not to "root" for them at all.

It Gets Worse

I'm talking CityLine of course. Every time I think it couldn't get worse, Richardson's city planners prove me wrong. Two months ago, it was "Residential Uses Not Allowed in Mixed-Use". That was the decision "to build 32 single-family, detached homes in back of a CVS." That a zoning change was even needed to build residential in a so-called mixed-use, transit-oriented urban community was just a small sign that something is very wrong with the planning of this whole area. Worse, the desire was to build a compound of single-family homes walled-off from a traditional suburban strip shopping center. The ad hoc Frankenstein's monster that CityLine is evolving into is something to behold.

POTD: Stepwell

From 2016 02 07 Ranthambore

Today's photo-of-the-day is of Chand Baori, a thousand year old stepwell in Rajasthan, India. "Stepwells are wells or ponds in which the water may be reached by descending a set of steps."

Bonus photo after the jump.

Review: Spare Parts

Amazon

From Spare Parts, by Joshua Davis:

She remembered West Phoenix as a place that she wouldn't drive through by herself. It was a poor area and the better schools were elsewhere. So she was surprised to see an underwater-robotics team coming out of that neighborhood. 'There aren't oceans in Phoenix,' she pointed out diplomatically. 'No, ma’am,' Lorenzo Santillan said. 'But we got pools.'"

"Spare Parts" is the 2016 selection for "Richardson Reads One Book." As such, it carries the burden of high expectations. Does it live up to recent prior selections?

• 2015: "We Are Called to Rise" C+
• 2014: "Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore" B-
• 2013: "The Book Thief" A-
• 2012: "One Amazing Thing" C+

After the jump, my review.

Repeat Tweets: The Budget Deficit Is Too Low

Repeat tweets from April, 2016:

• Apr 1 2016: "The budget deficit is too low." Not an April Fools story. vox.com
• Apr 2 2016: Texas is stingy with tax dollars for public schools and Medicaid. Not for private events like Final Four in Houston.
• Apr 4 2016: As Trump drops and Cruz rises on betting markets, odds of a Dem win in November have stayed the same. predictwise.com
• Apr 4 2016: 23 years from the Four Tops to NWA. How does that even happen?

After the jump, more repeat tweets.