Community

Dialogistics

“Your contest is so clever,” wrote Amy Saalberg. “It effectively gets us to look closely at every single ad each month! This [Fake Ad] grabbed our attention by its extreme vagueness!”True, the ad was...

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Ann Arborite Katherine Willson

When Katherine Willson recently told her husband she’d taken a job working for the military, he joked, “I better call the Department of Defense and tell them they’ve been infiltrated!”Willson,...

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That Fifth Ave. Detour

Commuters, downtown residents, and bus riders have been seeing more of downtown since August, when construction of the library lot parking structure shut down Fifth Avenue, the city’s main southbound artery. Drivers...

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Showdown at City Place

Local developer Alex de Parry has been seeking permission to build a big new apartment complex on Fifth Avenue south of the library for five years. First he proposed tearing down the seven houses there now, all more than a...

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The Simpson Memorial Institute

“That’s the I Spy, that’s the I Spy!” exclaimed Matthew DeBona, pointing out the car window at the Simpson Memorial Institute on Observatory at East Ann. Matthew is “our resident Mr. I Spy,”...

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Brain Gain

Students at Bates Elementary School in Dexter aren’t sitting still in their classrooms–and that’s just fine with their teachers and principal. The K-2 school is using Brain Gym–a program funded through a...

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Poetry in Motion

It was the kind of discussion business owners dread. “The economy took a huge toll on us in 2008,” says Joe Meza, the founder, owner, and driving force behind ArborMotion, the import car care conglomerate on State...

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The Math of Dating

Tell a friend, a sibling, or a neighbor that you are using an online dating site, and it seems as though every one of them has a story.Some things about online dating are the same regardless of one’s age, sex, or...

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Bus Stop 2010

A cold rain has started, dark rags of clouds spitting out hard, tiny droplets, the wind kicking up. My bus from the VA Hospital was five minutes late to the Green Road Park & Ride lot, missing my connecting bus home. I know...

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Pimp My Cop Car

Ann Arborites may have seen the Washtenaw County sheriff’s new customized ride–a 2009 Chevrolet HHR–parked at Wheeler Park or directing traffic at U-M football games. Featuring a black-and-white paint job, red...

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Telephone Man

“The cell died!” Pete Blanshard exclaims. “I’m no good with them.”Blanshard is explaining why a phone interview just ended abruptly—and making it clear that the vintage phones he restores...

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Homeless Smokers

Cigar bars aside, about the last place in Ann Arbor where you can still smoke indoors is the DeLonis Center–the homeless shelter has three ventilated rooms for nicotine-addicted residents. Administrator Mike Austin says...

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Chatty Plumbers

We received 146 entries correctly identifying last month’s Fake Ad for a plumbers’ discussion group on page 74 of the November issue. Evalyn Yanna’s entry was chosen as our winner. She’s taking her gift...

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Orion at UMMA

“That’s the sculpture in front of the U-M Art Museum!” exclaims Judy Steeh, adding that her husband urged her “to put ‘sculpture’ in quotes.” Judy Sorensen apologizes to the artist for...

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A Better Mousetrap

Chester, our loyal rat terrier, was the first member of our family to see the mouse. He suddenly bolted upright and stood in a state of total readiness, a look of utter perplexity fixed on his face. In his four years with us,...

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Kat Snips

“We’re five cat-loving women,” says Jeanne Spencer of Manchester. She and the four other board members of a new nonprofit called Kat Snips own upwards of sixty cats among them. That almost matches the total...

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Fiery Dragons

Last month’s Fake Ad prompted 184 correct entries, many of which had high praise for the ad, which appeared on page 92 of the October Observer. Well, pretty high praise.”The Fake Ad is for ‘The Girl Who Played...

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Frieze Building Frieze

“It is like bits of frozen Frieze,” puns Will Hathaway. Hathaway correctly identifies October’s feature (below) as “an architectural detail of the new North Quad Academic Building … on the site of...

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Taming the Big House

When Richard Frey was a U-M student in the 1960s, he had a friend who brought five bottles of Boone’s Farm wine into Michigan Stadium for every football game. “He’d drink one per quarter, and one at...

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Pioneer’s Track Stars

“Every year is my last year,” Don Sleeman jokes.Sleeman began coaching Pioneer High’s cross-country team in 1968 and added the track program in 1974. In more than four decades, his teams have won six state...

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