The same day the City of Indianapolis announced a multi-million dollar plan to demolish abandoned homes, 6 News went out and did a story on “the city’s dirty secret.” Winona Memorial Hospital.

The iPhone is an addictive, evil device

For the holidays this year, @mmagnolia22 and I decided we would buy each other iPhone 3Gs.

Don’t worry, it’s only the 8GB model, nothing too crazy.

She picked the phones up yesterday afternoon, and we’ve spent 16 of the last 24 hours playing with our new tech-toys (the other 8 hours were spent sleeping).

I’ve found I love the phone even more than I thought I would, and I have trouble putting it down. In fact, I yearn to hold the phone when I’m in the shower. My dreams are filled with thoughts of the Apps Store. I have a problem. We have a problem.

So far, these are my favorite apps:

• Tweetie (for Twitter)
• RTM (for Remember the Milk Pro accounts)
• WordPress (for, well, Wordpress)
• Facebook (again, self-explanatory)
• Urbanspoon (finding and rating food)
• Pandora (music)
• Last.fm (music)
• ICanHazCheezBurger (all the LOLcatz, Kitchen Pundit and FailBlog one person can handle)

Transit center talks

Over the weekend, I stumbled on to this article about IndyGo searching for a new transit center location.

What really mattered in the story was the potential locations for the center. Now this “center” may sound like a fancy idea, but it’s really just a bus station. Even Muncie had a bus station downtown for MITS (Muncie Indiana Transit System). I still find it hard to believe that IndyGo just uses Indianapolis sidewalks downtown as bus stations. It crowds the streets and make driving downtown trickier during the mornings and evenings.

But I might be willing to continue putting up with downtown bus congestion after the potential locations were announced:

Both Union Station and the Market Square Arena property are owned by the city. Union Station could make sense because it already receives Amtrak and Greyhound traffic. The MSA site could be a tougher sell since a bus depot could discourage residential or retail development.

Another possibility for the hub is on parking lots on IUPUI’s campus.

MSA seems like a good choice, but I understand the desire to keep that a prime area for residential and retail developments. Union Station appears to be a good choice, until you look at the traffic situation on the near-southside. It’s already difficult to get around on South Street in the evening, adding all the bus traffic to that mess will just cause more problems.

The IUPUI idea is intriguing, but keep in mind the parking lots over there get pretty full during the day. What about all those students? Will they want to put up with the buses crowding traffic? If it’s going to be a “transit center,” isn’t it a little too far from the center?

Just a thought.

IndyGo seeks new location for transit center – IBJ.

It was quite an odd weather day in Indianapolis. Especially for the weekend after Christmas. Despite the overcast skies, the temperature climbed to a high of 66°F. In December. We opened windows all over the house, so we could enjoy the unseasonably warm weather. Did I mention it’s almost January?

I managed to get out on the rooftop deck to dismantle our patio table and umbrella. It became quite a chore, as the umbrella had become fused to the weight keeping it on the ground. It’s last few more than a few strong winds and freezing temperatures over the past few months, but I really didn’t want it slamming into our bedroom tonight.

Why would it want to slam into our bedroom window?

Well, there’s a lovely low pressure system working its way east during the evening and overnight hours. Winds are expected to have gusts between 45 and 50 MPH, with a steady breeze around 30MPH. Oh, and at one point there was a discussion that tornadoes could be an issue tonight.

How exciting!