The Pittsburgh housing authority has approved a sale of land to Pitt for new athletic facilities.  The property is right next to the Oak Hill apartments.  The land left over will be sold to Beacon developers to more than double the number of housing units of Oak Hill.  This is great stuff for 2 reasons.  The obvious reason would be so many new houses in an otherwise undeveloped section of the Hill.  More houses mean more residents.  More residents mean demand for more restaurants, stores, etc.  More development also bridges the shady gaps of the Hill district and makes it a more aesthetically pleasing place to live.  All of that leading to higher property values.

The second good thing to come from this is having pitt's footprint spread beyond Oakland.  The further into the Hill District that Pitt goes, the more student foot traffic the Hill will see.  Eventually, they'll see Centre avenue as a great route to downtown.  Pitt creeping into the Hill district really fills in the blanks around the area and all just becomes a well blended section of the City.  So when you're driving down Centre Avenue, you don't have that obvious unsettling feeling of, "oh, we must be in the Hill District now."  It'll be seamless, just like going from shadyside to squirrel Hill.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08207/899398-53.stm?cmpid=news.xml

Surprise, Surprise, Don Barden doesn't have the money to finish the casino as planned, so he's sold off 75% ownership to some dude in Chicago.  That means that the Majestic Star will most likely be called something else.  There's all kind of hooting and hollering going on, some saying that it's a bait and switch, others saying that the casino license should go up to another vote, and I'm not in either of those mindsets.  Neil Bluhm and the investors from Chicago have promised to deliver what was originally promised, and by June 2009, so let's go for it.  I'm not a fan of beaurocratic red tape and legal delays and blah blah blah.  Let's just find someone that can get the job done right instead of letting costs increase and have steel structure blotter on the river front.

read more at the post gazette: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08197/897080-53.stm

There's a bunch of lists out there, and I'm sure you've heard how geeks are great lovers, but I think I have a few things to add to the list.  Geeks are great.

10.  Getting to know a geek is easy - just google their name...or sometimes, their alias...or aliases.  You can find pictures, blogs, forums, newspaper articles, anything they've done or been involved in.  Throw in some myspace and facebook stalking, and you've got a good sense of what they're all about and their friends.  You can make a pretty good judgement of how interested you should be based on these alone, and you didn't even have to meet them in an awkward place!

9.  It works both ways - rest assured, they're going to do the same google stalker on you too.  Geeks want to know what they're getting themselves into while satisfying their stalker tendencies.  Geeks are thirsty for knowledge, and this time it's about you!  You should be flattered at how much they want to learn about you and be able to have a conversation with you right off the bat instead of just having small talk.

8.  They leave an audit trail - If your geek shows up with a tan one day...you know something is up.  They're life is well documented, email use, text messages, new facebook friends and wall posts, twitter updates, blog posts, etc.  They great thing is, even if you can't get an idea of what's going on in their lives from all these things, if they stop activity...you know they're distracted by something...

7.  They're easy to please - All you have to do is smile at them and they're in love.  If that fails, just buy them a new gadget like an iphone or some GPS thing-a-majig.

6..  They're devoted - Geeks like reliability.  Once they spend all their time in building a new computer, they don't want to see that hard drive crash.  They're the same with their relationships.

5.  They're connected - So you want to take a trip to London, but don't have the money for a hotel?  Don't worry, your geek probably plays World of Warcraft with someone from London, and you can crash at their place.

4.  They're only 1 click away - Email, text, call, IM, facebook, and probably lots of other ways should make for an easy way to get in contact with your geek.  Alternatively, you can find out which one they check least often, and send a message there, then you can say, "oh, i facebooked messaged you that, didn't you get it?" and you're home safe.

3.  Full of potential (too) - Let's face it, you're geek spends a lot of time on his or her computer.  This doesn't (necessarily) mean they're an introvert or misanthrope though.  Chances are, they're just waiting for someone else to come along and see if they want to do something.  They'll probably be full of ideas of things to do that they read about on wikipedia or digg, and you can do them together!

2.  Mr Fix it - Yeah, they can fix your computer.  Yeah, they can figure out why your wireless router isn't working.  Yeah, they can hook up your new HDTV for  you.  They can also do some awesome research on webMD or How stuff works or any other resource out there to do what you need done.  Like I said, they're thirsty for knowledge because they believe human knowledge belongs to the world.

1.  Dropped connection - If you decide it's time to end the relationship, just tell them that you're going to South Africa to live in a hut and you won't have any internet.  They've read stories about those places, and they don't want to go there, or be with anyone who could live there.

saw this in my headline reader today.  You'd think people would learn to stay away from the reservoir!