January 20, 2006

Vibe.




The Niagara Mohawk Building.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

To kick off the weekend in style, Earl and I journeyed to downtown Syracuse for some real, good ol’ honky-tonk food at Dinosaur Bar-B-Que. A local landmark, the Dinosaur Bar-B-Que is famous for their great food, blues music and eclectic crowd. It’s always a good time and Earl and I try to take out of town family and friends there whenever we the opportunity presents itself. Hint, hint to Tim and Steve.

Dinosaur Bar-B-Que is located on the edge of the downtown area, so after supper Earl and I decided to embrace the low 50s and clear weather Mother Nature has given us again this January and go for a walk. We walked over to Clinton Square and watched the skaters do their thing a la Rockefeller Center and then walked around a few blocks of the general area.

The City of Syracuse is making an effort to bring more residential space to downtown by converting old warehouses and office buildings into lofts and other living space and this is something appeals very much to both Earl and myself. Somewhat a native of Syracuse (half my family lives there), the Salt City is the the place that I feel most comfortable in and I could live there the rest of my life without thinking about it twice. Living in a bigger city also appeals to Earl so we took great interest in a building we walked by that was being converted to apartments and townhouses and jotted down the phone number.

Even though I grew up in the country and have lived in varying places including suburban Boston and rural Upstate New York, I’ve always wanted to try living in a downtown area where I would do a lot of walking and have our own little speck of existence in a busy city area.

Another magnificent building we walked by was the Niagara Mohawk building, a wonderful art deco structure built in the first half of the 20th century. I find art deco structures so cool; it’s as if the designers and builders went out of their way to make their work as unique as possible, a welcomed relief to the cookie cutter buildings being built today.

The vibe of the city was a great way to kick off the weekend and wash away the hectic pace of the work week. It’s all good.