Here‘s a great article about Pittsburgh from an unexpected source: Cleveland.  It talks about How Pittsburgh is still growing in the recession, how companies like PNC Bank are still growing, the success of Giant Eagle, and all the riverfront initiatives that have been in motion.  Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is definitely making this place look younger.

And take a look at the Otto Milk Condos.  Their site rocks, you can see layouts and prices for every unit.  They also have a twitter account and pictures on flickr.  That’s what I call hip marketing.  The place looks pretty sweet once it’s done.  It’d be sweet to live in the cheap places knowing that someone with a 1.3 million dollar apartment lives above you too.

From news release:

"The Bank of New York Mellon has announced that it will contribute $3 million over a six-year period to Pittsburgh’s Hill District community through Pennsylvania’s Neighborhood Partnership Program (NPP). The program will focus on education, job training and community revitalization for residents of the Hill District, which is near the company’s downtown Pittsburgh campus.

Also supporting the One Hill Community Benefits Agreement are the Pittsburgh Penguins, the city’s champion ice hockey team. "We are deeply honored to invest in a neighborhood with a noble history and promising future," said Vince Sands, Chairman, BNY Mellon of Pennsylvania. "With more than 6,800 employees located within a mile of Centre Avenue and Crawford Street, and many of them volunteering in the Hill District and surrounding communities, we are both a corporate sponsor and an involved neighbor."

Hill House Association will serve as the NPP program administrator and will work with the One Hill Coalition, which represents more than 100 community groups assembled to identify and prioritize strategies for revitalizing Pittsburgh’s historic Hill District. The NPP funds will address community needs ranging from job training and education to community improvements and social services.

"BNY Mellon has a strong history of supporting Pittsburgh’s neighborhoods; but never more than today with this unprecedented commitment to the Hill District," said Carl Redwood, chairman of the One Hill Coalition. "The BNY Mellon commitment gives the One Hill community benefits agreement a strong early start in the efforts to revitalize the Hill."

"BNY Mellon’s initial commitment is for six years, but its impact will last for decades to come," said Evan Frazier, Hill House Association president and CEO. This is a great example of what’s possible when communities, companies and public officials come together for the collective good."

"Fundamentally, good business decisions are also good community decisions," said David Morehouse, Pittsburgh Penguins president. "The BNY Mellon commitment is a significant investment in the Hill District and a very positive local development."

"We are working together to make sure that the millions of dollars of new development under way translates into job opportunities and long-term neighborhood revitalization for the residents of the Hill," Mayor Luke Ravenstahl said. "Working with residents and committed businesses, a new, better city will be built on the Hill.""

turning 25 on the 16th…wow.  Deirdre just showed me a pic from my high school soccer days and said, "here’s you almost 10 years ago."  WTF  10 years ago??!  When the crap did that happen!?!?  shoot.  I havent done half of what i had hoped i’d do by the time i’m 25.  It’s really depressing, but most birthdays are for me.  That’s why I don’t work for that whole week.  Just so i don’t have the risk of having "a bad day" and getting even more depressed.  I don’t care if i sleep all day or if i am productive all day, the only thing that’s important is that I’m happy.  Egocentric and self-indulgant?  Mayhaps.  This year I’m going down to vegas.  WEEEEE.

As another indicator of how low ludicrous my degree is, I didn’t turn in the first assignment in one of my classes, half-arsed it through the whole class, it was supposed to be a professional writing class and I can’t think of one paper that I turned in.  But i got an A.  WTF.  When I first started back at school, i thought it was just me being an excellent slacker and social engineer, but now i realize it’s the lack of anything challenging, consequential, or pressured.  Mostly.  With one of the last 2 classes i have to finish, I have to write a 10 page paper.  That’s rather overwhelming to me.  I think i’ve written 1 twelve page paper before…at Pitt…during the whole semester.  This will give me 5 weeks to do it.  I think it might be our only grade, or the majority of our entire grade.   Joy in buckets i tell ya.

I think i found a good open mic to play at regularly on Monday nights.  I want to get a email list set up for people, and the most obvious/easiest for me would be to use the newsletter function built into this site.  So the trick is to get people to go through the registration process.  I might just try to do a batch user add with all my friend’s email addresses and set their passwords to something generic.  We’ll see what I can do…I do see that they hey ya acoustic cover in the downloads section has been downloaded 30 times though, and that’s pretty acceptable to me.  I think i’m going to jump into the studio, probably my uncle kenny’s, and record a demo CD to hand out to people.  That will give me some good quality recordings to replace the bad ones too.

Luke ravenstahl, the pittsburgh mayor, came by my house the other day.  he was walking through the hill district trying to get voters and i just so happen to notice him.  He came up to my door to meet me and shake my hand and ask me about what i did and how long i lived there and any issues I had.  I could have drilled him with questions like what is that "propel pittsburgh" committee doing, if anything, and why didnt i get on it, and why don’t you just take your own car to country concerts, and why don’t you chill out a bit when you’re obviously under the spotlight for being young and immature?  but that would have taken some preparation and relied on me being able to overcome the shock of seeing the mayor in my front yard, which did not happen.  Oh well.  Not like i vote anyway.  I am definitely seeing good stuff in the development of the hill district though, so i’d like to get behind him 100%, but dude just needs to be a little more considerate of how the city thinks of him and what he does.

Truck got hit.  I was in the right lane, doing about 35mph, someone in the left lane wanted to exit, but the problem was, they had to get through me to get to that exit.  The scraped and dented my whole left side.  And then took off.  MOTHER EFFER.  This was about 2:30 am saturday night, so i’m pretty sure they were drunk and didnt stop to avoid the cops.  I have a $1,000 deductable, so i’m going to have to pay for it pretty much.  ballz.

Luke Ravenstaul was out celebrating cinco de mayo saturday.  His wife was not present.  He tried to pick up 2 girls minding their own business at a table with "you two look lonely."  Wow.  He totally should have been like,  "I’m the mayor of pittsburgh, I’d like to give welcome you to my city with a ride inside my limo."  I mean, that’s how i’d do it anyway.  He was certainly getting his drink on.  Almost felt bad for him.

europe in 10 days!

Wee!  So, Trip is all set now.  Leaving pittsburgh may 16th headed for a quick stop in new york then over to rome.  Then, first class to london on wednesday may 23rd.  Back to rome on the 25th, then back to the states on saturday, the 26th.  Work is paying for my room & board while in london and i’ll get to meet everyone there in London.  Good times!  I ended up redeeming my credit card points to help with the flight to london, so that was pretty cool too.  Hopefully the whole trip will go on without problems.  So many of us going, all never having been there, depending on keren, trying to organize events and such.  I’ll admit, i’m a little worried.

Things with Rachel continue to go well.  Hung out with her family at her cousin’s wedding on saturday.  The reception was at the Carnegie museum inside the hall of architecture.  really classy!  lots of statues and columns and stuff around the room.  Acoustics left something to be desired, but still a cool event.  We do a lot of social activities, like with other people, but we don’t do too much just the two of us.  It has it’s a good thing and a bad thing, but i’ve told her that i want to have some date nights too.  Relationship builders for the win!

lots of city news going on.  Pittsburgh was rated most livable city.  In response to Pittsburgh having the 2nd highest population drop (1st was post-Katrina New Orleans)  Mayor Luke Ravenstaul (27 years old) announced the Propel Pittsburgh Commission, a group of 37 people, from ages 20-34, who will meet and talk about what they wantlikedislike in the city.  I threw in my application.  Hopefully I’ll hear something back soon!  I would really like to get more involved in the city, and the Hill District.  In unrelated city news, Pittsburgh eats more ho-hos than any other city.

Roommates are going well. Alex is cool.  I have someone coming in for may 5th-25th, and then from june 1st – august 6th.  Deirdre will probably move in shortly after that and then we’ll see where we can go.  I’ll admit, i’ve had good luck with finding people and such on craigslist.  hopefully i’ll be continued to be blessed there.

no more word on the merger yet.  2 summer classes, starting while i’ll be in london…oh well.  Dallas is coming back from Vegas, and flights were too expensive to go down to see him a second time.  bummer.  new songs recorded and posted.  estate is finally closed!  lots of stuff to do with figuring out how to pay for it now though.  We gotta start cutting the grass too, and the tractor is broken.  Bleh.  I’m a city boy, not a farmer!