The Most Dangerous Bridge In North Carolina

Ken AshfordLocal InterestLeave a Comment

With the collapse of the bridge in Minneapolis, lots of people are talking about the dangerous infrastructure in their backyard.

WFDD did a story on this yesterday.  Guess where the most dangerous bridge in North Carolina is located?

Right here in downtown Winston-Salem, on the heavily travelled Business 40.  It’s the portion of the highway that passes over Liberty Street. (Click image below for full scale)

Libertybridge_3

Happy commuting, y’all!

UPDATE:  Confirmed …by this article in yesterday’s W-S Journal:

If you want to find a structurally deficient bridge in North Carolina, just look in the Triad.

Hundreds of bridges in the Triad are considered structurally deficient, and five Triad counties are among the top 10 in the state for having such bridges.

A bridge is structurally deficient if it is in relatively poor condition or has insufficient load-carrying capacity, caused by either the original design or deterioration, according to the N.C. Department of Transportation.

Two years ago, the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis was listed in a report as structurally deficient.

Forsyth County has 70 such bridges, the fourth worst county in the state, according to records kept by the bridge-maintenance unit of the DOT.

***

Every year, the AAA Carolinas auto club publishes a list of the 20 worst highway bridges in North Carolina. When the rankings are compared with other states, North Carolina’s bridges are the 11th worst in the country, said Tom Crosby, a spokesman for AAA.

No. 1 on AAA’s list of bad bridges is the one on Business 40 over Liberty Street in Winston-Salem. The bridge, which has topped AAA’s list for six years, is 52 years old and carries 476,000 vehicles a week. It isn’t scheduled to be replaced until 2013.

Four bridges on U. S. 52 also made the list. Three of those bridges will be replaced by 2013.

DOT and AAA officials say that neither the Liberty Street Bridge nor any of the others on the worst-bridge list, last published in February, poses an immediate danger.

But the Minnesota bridge collapse is a clear signal to the state that it needs to pay more attention to bridges, Crosby said.

Stupid Quote Of The Day

Ken AshfordHealth CareLeave a Comment

Rep. J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.):

“Folks, that’s the bottom line: It’s government-paid health care,” . “It’s a bad bill for a bad time, and it’s coming under the false pretenses of trying to do something for children.”

Statements like that are why the Republicans lost control of Congress in 2006, and why Hastert is no longer House speaker.

He’s talking, of course, about the House passage of a bill "vastly expanding a federal health insurance program for the children of the working poor". 

Hastert’s statement is stupid because there are no "false pretenses" at all.  The law will "insure 5 million more children who otherwise would have no access to health care".  It has the approval of Republican and Democratic governors, the American Medical Association, AARP, the March of Dimes, the Catholic Health Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and even cyclist Lance Armstrong.  As one Senator put it (a Republican, mind you): "It’s difficult for me to understand how anyone wouldn’t want to do this."

And should the bill pass the Senate, as it is expected to do, Bush has vowed to veto it.  That’s right — he’s going to veto a bill that will help insure 5 million poor American children.

And why?  Because of the cost?  Nope.  That will come from a federal tax on cigarettes.

Bush will veto it for ideological reasons — the same silly ones as Hastert — i.e., it is "socialized medicine".

This goes to the heart of my objections with conservative policies.  I mean, I can understand that some people don’t believe government should be the answer for everything.  And to some extent, I agree.  But should people who don’t believe in government be voted in to actually run the government?  Republicans are always fond of saying how "government is bad" and then, when in power, they do everything to prove that is true. 

Government programs are necessary, vital, and successful.  Look at Medicare.  Look at FEMA (under Clinton; not so much under Bush).  Look at the moon landings, the federal highway system, the postal service, etc. — properly managed, government programs can be good things.  Those who want to leave everything to the "free market" are seeking to turn the clock back to the pre-20th century days where we had little government regulation and where it stood out of the way of business.  We tried that in the late 1800’s and we ended up with the Gilded Age, steel monopolies, children working in factories, Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, etc.

This bill makes absolute sense and is a moral good.  It’s a perfect example of what government should be, and what government (in the right hands) can do — establish laws for the greater common good.

Seriously — giving medical attention to this country’s poorest children who have NO health care protection at all?  How can you be a human being and be opposed to that?

RELATED: Ezra Klein looks at the healthcare "plan" offered up by Rudy Giuliani on Tuesday:

Just about all you need to know about Giuliani’s thoughtfulness on the issue can be summed up by the following: In the speech introducing and detailing his new health care proposal, Giuliani refers to the "Democrats" six times. "Single-payer" is said eight times. "Socialized medicine," or some variant thereof, makes nine appearances. "Uninsured" is never uttered — not once.

Ezra also provides a technical explanation of why Rudy’s plan is meaningless (tax deductions don’t help the poor, who don’t pay taxes in the first place, and the incentives are too small to make much difference to middle class taxpayers who do pay taxes).

Kevin Drum adds:

The remarkable thing about Giuliani’s plan isn’t in the details anyway. It’s that it doesn’t even make a serious pretense of being an actual solution to any of our current healthcare problems. Even taken on its own terms, it woudn’t expand coverage, it wouldn’t help the poor, it wouldn’t contain costs, and it wouldn’t improve care. It literally wouldn’t do anything except provide a tax break for the wealthy, the only people who would benefit from an increased tax deduction.

Funny how that works.

We Can’t Account For Weapons?

Ken AshfordIraqLeave a Comment

At least 190,000 weapons issued to Iraqi security forces in 2004 and 2005 cannot be accounted for, the Government Accountability Office concludes in a new report.

The Pentagon "cannot fully account for about 110,000 AK-47 assault rifles, 80,000 pistols, 135,000 items of body armor and 115,000 helmets reported as issued to Iraqi forces." The weapons vanished from the ledgers as the Pentagon was trying to rebuild the Iraqi army to counter Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias. President Bush disbanded the army after the 2003 invasion.

The GAO report also says that despite "greater emphasis on collecting the supporting documents," military commanders still aren’t keeping track of all weapons.

Vox Populi (and Minneapolis Bridge Collapse Updates)

Ken AshfordDisastersLeave a Comment

James Hafner of Coon Rapids, MN wrote a letter to the editor of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, complaining about the new Minnesota Twins stadium (the groundbreaking ceremony, now postponed, was to take place today).  In his letter, Hafner wrote:

It sure looks like Carl Pohlad and the Twins could have paid for the entire stadium project and had enough leftover to finance a few lakeside estates, an overpriced jewelry store and still made a handsome profit on their investment. In a period of crucial funding shortfalls for roads, bridges, libraries and crumbling public infrastructure, local government officials decided building a stadium for a billionaire was more important.

Less than 12 hours after that letter was published in the morning paper….

35wbridge

UPDATE:  Some good amateur photos of the event here and here.  To be honest, I don’t quite understand why people are videotaping their TV and uploading it to Youtube.  (I have a TV, people!)

MORE:  Law Professor Dale Carpenter:

I cross the 35W bridge that collapsed tonight at least twice a day to go to and from work, often during rush hour. Tonight I left my office at about 5:45 p.m. and took the 10th St bridge right next to the 35W bridge in order to avoid the congestion created by the recent construction on it. It went down about 15 minutes later. If I’d taken the 35W bridge, as I usually would, there’s a decent chance I would have been delayed in the congestion and stuck on it when it collapsed.

As I crossed the Mississippi River tonight, I looked over and saw the cars jam-packed on 35W and remember thinking, "Thank God I didn’t go that way."

MORE:  This article suggests that vibrations may have brought the bridge down.  Hmmm.  Let’s see.  A bridge known to have some cracking in the supports.  A work crew operating machinary on the bridge.  A train passing underneath (causing vibrations).  And bumper-to-bumper traffic weighing on the bridge.  I’m no civil engineer, but I think they add up to the disaster we saw.

MORE:  What Digby said (Echoing my sentiments yesterday) —

Governments all over the country have been robbing Peter to pay Paul, shifting money to immediate needs like health care and child welfare and hoping against hope that the roads and bridges and buildings built during the new deal era held up. "No New Taxes" has been the rallying cry for decades now, but nobody ever said how we were supposed to pay for the things we all take for granted. And, of course, when things like this happen, the wingers blame the government and everyone decries taxes even more.

Minneapolis Bridge Collapse

Ken AshfordDisastersLeave a Comment

MnbridgeCheryl doesn’t like driving over bridges.  I could never understand that.

But okay.  Now I can a little.

Think back a few weeks ago to the exploding steam pipe in the middle of Manhattan, and perhaps you’ll recognize that one of the big issues to face this country in the next decade or two is our aging infrastructure.  Things are, quite literally, falling apart.

And let’s not forget one of the biggest infrastructure warning signs, the failure of some dams in New Orleans.

The Greensboro News & Record had an editorial on this subject just a week ago, just following several incidents of sinkholes plaguing the streets of that city:

It’s like one of those Parade Magazine brain teasers. What do these have in common? Hurricane Katrina. Flight delays nationwide. A blast of steam in New York. A traffic-stopping sinkhole on Wendover Avenue.

The answer is actually a no-brainer. Aging infrastructure. And far from being a secret, the nation’s civil engineers have been warning about it for years to little response.

Let’s face it, the decay of roads, bridges, water and sewer lines, dams and levees, the air traffic control system and electrical grid isn’t sexy. But our lives can depend on sound infrastructure and our economic health certainly does. Still, we have deferred maintenance for so many years that a huge bill is about to come due. The Wendover sinkhole was caused by broken pipes laid in 1929 and 1930. Jolson was on Broadway when Manhattan’s 83-year-old exploding steam pipe was installed. The levees that gave way in New Orleans were accidents waiting to happen. And the air traffic control system is a relic.

Michigan04_5In 2005, the American Society of Civil Engineers reported that it would take $1.6 trillion to bring the nation’s vital structures up to snuff. Its report card for North Carolina gave the state a D for airports, dams and roads; a C for bridges, schools, drinking water, waste water and storm water; a lone B for rail. Overall, a C minus.

The looming bill for North Carolina is huge and may not fully take into account an anticipated population increase of 50 percent. It does figure on $28 billion for needed road and bridge work, $6 billion for waste water and $3 billion for drinking water.

The numbers are imposing, but the cost of neglect can be even higher. Fuel is wasted in epic quantities by inadequate roads that slow transit and commerce. Immense business losses are incurred when flights are late 30 percent of the time. And how can you put a number on a New Orleans swept away and half its population displaced?

Much of Europe had to be rebuilt after World War II, and it has continued to fund improvements. Newer economies have new infrastructure.

We are forced to play catch-up. A public infrastructure commission chaired by banker Felix Rohatyn and former Sen. Warren Rudman recommends a national investment corporation to streamline financing of improvements through government-backed bonds.

Whatever shape a fix takes, a fix is urgently needed. Every candidate for state, local or national office should be forced to say how and when he or she intends to fund the upgrades needed to keep us safe, to keep up with population growth and to keep us competitive.

You can see the ASCE report card on the nation’s infrastructure, broken down by state, here.   One thing the civil engineers recommend?

Congress must enact the National Infrastructure Improvement Act to establish the National Commission on Infrastructure of the United States.

The Commission would study the present condition of the nation’s various infrastructure systems and report to Congress by 2009 on the capacity of our infrastructure to support the national economy, the age of the systems and possible methods to finance improvements.

Sounds like a reasonable first step.  Now, it’s too early to tell if the tragic Minneapolis bridge collapse was due to the fact that it has been neglected (indeed, some sketchy reports indicate that there were improvements being made to the bridge at the time of the collapse — i.e., a jackhammer was working on it).    But regardless, I think we’re going to see more of this type of news — bridge collapses, pipe explosions, dam breaks, etc. — in the years to come, unless we do something about it.

Public Airwaves

Ken AshfordScience & TechnologyLeave a Comment

Bb700w_lrgI know that FCC regulations sounds like a boring topic for a post, but so I’ll make this short and sweet, and tell you why you should care.

Some background first.  Come February 2009, all television transmissions must be digital.  What this means is that BROADCAST television (you know, the kind where you need antennae and "rabbit ears") will cease to exist.

And THAT means that there suddenly will become available lots of FREQUENCIES — a 700 megahertz wide spectrum — on which to broadcast.  These are, literally, the "public airwaves", and they are regulated by the Federal Communications Commission.  (They have to regulate it because, obviously, if two radio or TV transmitters use the same frequency, then you get garbage on your radio or TV).

So who wants these frequencies?  Well, wireless phone companies mostly.  So, the FCC has decided to auction them off.  Or, at least, that’s the proposal.

Another aspect of the proposal is to reserve some of that bandwidth for emergency services.  A smart thing.  One of the problems that hampered the 9/11 rescue efforts was all the cross-chatter between various rescue personnel (fire, police, paramedics) as they all tried to broadcast on the same frequency.  So that problem should go away, as these newly-available frequencies become reserved for more emergency services.

But here’s why you should really care…

Another aspect of the FCC proposal is that, in exchange for all this new bandwidth, the wireless communication providers have to allow for "open access". 

See, the way it is today, your phone and your service are connected.  If you have, say, Verizon, you have to get a Verizon-compatible phone (usually from a Verizon vender).  And if you have a Verizon phone but want to switch to Suncom, then you have to get a Suncom phone.

And, as we all know, if you want to buy an iPhone, then you MUST use AT&T service.

"Open access" does away with all that.  Your phone will become transferrable to ANY wireless service, and vice versa.  Also, any software (like ringtones) that is developed for one phone must work on all phones designed with that feature.

Another benefit to having more bandwidth is that it will spur on competition for wireless phone rates, bringing down the cost you pay.  And of course, with more bandwidth that is available, we won’t have to play the "can you hear me now" game so much.

Better service, lower prices.  So, all said, this is a good thing for consumers.

Keep your eye on this story.  The "auction" won’t happen for a few months, and Google is going to be a major player in this.  Yup, your phone service might be Google in 2009 — who knows?

That’s Some Protective God You Got There, Judge Roy Moore

Ken AshfordGodstuffLeave a Comment

"Judge"* Roy Moore:

That same providential God has sustained America through two world wars, the Cold War and several other conflicts around the world. Through economic depressions, natural disasters, acts of terrorism and political strife, He has been our strength and stability. Only blocks away from where Washington gave that first Inaugural Address, terrorists brought down the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in 2001. On the same day, Congress assembled on the steps of the Capitol in Washington, D.C., to ask God that He grant favor to our nation.

Although we face new and seemingly insurmountable difficulties in the world today, we can look with assurance and hope to that power Who protected and defended us in our past…

…through two world wars, the Cold War, several other conflicts around the world, economic depression, natural disasters, acts of terrorism, and political strife.

*  He was removed from office as Chief Justice of the State of Alabama for refusing to a Ten Commandments monument he had placed in the Alabama courthouse, but he still apparently likes the title.

Obama v. Clinton

Ken AshfordElection 2008Leave a Comment

There’s an emerging meme going around about the salient difference between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.  Andrew Sullivan put his finger on it:

One difference between Obama and Clinton does not seem to me to have been stressed enough. They are of different Democratic generations. Clinton is from the traumatized generation; Obama isn’t. Clinton has internalized to her bones the 1990s sense that conservatism is ascendant, that what she really believes is unpopular, that the Republicans have structural, latent power of having a majority of Americans on their side. Hence the fact that she reeks of fear, of calculation, of focus groups, of triangulation. She might once have had ideals keenly felt; she might once have actually relished fighting for them and arguing in thier defense. But she has not been like that for a very long time…

Obama is different. He wasn’t mugged by the 1980s and 1990s as Clinton was. He doesn’t carry within him the liberal self-hatred and self-doubt that Clinton does. The traumatized Democrats fear the majority of Americans are bigoted, know-nothing, racist rubes from whom they need to conceal their true feelings and views. The non-traumatized Democrats are able to say what they think, make their case to potential supporters and act, well, like Republicans acted in the 1980s and 1990s. The choice between Clinton and Obama is the choice between a defensive crouch and a confident engagement. It is the choice between someone who lost their beliefs in a welter of fear; and someone who has faith that his worldview can persuade a majority.

I think there is some truth to that.

Hillary has the battle scars of the 1990’s.  She was taken to task for her feminism (the whole "stay at home and bake cookies" remark), her reaction to Bill’s philandering, and her health care plan from the 1990’s was ripped to shreds.  As a result, she’s much more polished — or perhaps — timid.  Or put another way, "politically saavy", which isn’t necessarily a good thing.  As Ezra says:

Hillary’s approach to politics often seems predicated on survival, with accomplishments to be jammed in-between the cracks.

Sullivan characterized this as "fear", although I’m not so sure.  It may just be smart.  In the end, it may be exactly the way to play it, if the 2008 White House is the objective.

Obama, on the other hand, seems to be, well, just who he is.  He’s going to take harder hits for it, to be sure.  But you get the sense that he is simply speaking his beliefs — not catering to the polls and not trying to play it safe.  He’s a progressive, and by God, he’s going to speak like one.

How this plays out in the long run is tough to say.  The difference between the two became very noticable in the latest Youtube/CNN debate, particualrly over one question regarding whether or not each would, as President, meet with enemy leaders of rogue nations.  Obama gave an unabashed "yes"; Clinton said "no" because she didn’t want to be "used" for "propaganda purposes".  Objective observers noted that Clinton "won" that round, but the two campaigns have been sparring about it all week:

The rival camps of Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama clashed today over the meaning of Obama’s claim in a Democratic presidential debate that he’d be willing to meet with leaders of rogue nations such as Cuba, North Korea and Iran.

Clinton supporters characterized it as a gaffe that underscored the freshman senator’s lack of foreign-policy savvy while Obama’s team claimed his response displayed judgment and a repudiation of President Bush’s diplomacy.

In a memo from Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton, the campaign contended that Obama’s comments played well with focus groups that watched the debate and "showed his willingness to lead and ask tough questions on matters of war."

Obama "offered a dramatic change from the Bush administration’s eight-year refusal to protect our security interests by using every tool of American power available — including diplomacy.

Clinton’s campaign, meanwhile, portrayed Obama’s response as naive — and scheduled a conference call for reporters with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to reinforce the contention.

I have been leaning Obama over Clinton for the past several months — well, years, really.  But I have been impressed with the Clinton campaign and she’s moved up a few notches in my estimation.  Still on the fence, and I haven’t counted out Edwards either.  But it’s nice to see these schisms because ultimately, my decision will probably come about as a result of them.

Crime Spree

Ken AshfordWeb RecommendationsLeave a Comment

Clever idea for a book.  I love it.

Two guys go on a crime spree across America, and write a book about it.  It’s entitled "You Can Get Arrested For That".

The laws they broke?  Stupid ones.

For example, it is illegal in Chicago to go fishing in your pajamas.  So….

Fishing 

In Pittsburgh, it is illegal to sleep on a refridgerator.  So….

Fridge_2

You get the idea….

Unintentional?

Ken AshfordRandom MusingsLeave a Comment

Heh:

Radio_towerTHE call letters KUNT have landed at a yet-unbuilt low-power digital television station in Wailuku, Maui.

Alarmingly similar to a word the dictionary says is obscene, the call letters were among a 15-page list of new call letters issued by the Federal Communications Commission and released this week.

The same station owner also received KWTF for a station in Arizona.

From Skokie, Ill., comes a sincere apology "to anyone that was offended," said Kevin Bae, vice president of KM Communications Inc., who requested and received KUNT and KWTF. It is "extremely embarrassing for me and my company and we will file to change those call letters immediately."

He thanked your columnist for bringing the matter to his attention and pledged to, "make sure I don’t fall asleep on the job when selecting call signs again."

Riiiiiight.  As if he didn’t know….

For What It’s Worth, My IQ Is 149…

Ken AshfordSex/Morality/Family ValuesLeave a Comment

…which may explain certain things from my teen years:

We think we may have found the answer in a study entitled “Smart Teens Don’t Have Sex (or Kiss Much Either).” It’s one of those studies that isn’t that surprising on the surface, but the devil’s always in the details, isn’t it? Here are some highlights:

• Students with IQs above 100 and below 70 were significantly less likely to have had intercourse than those in between.

• Each additional point of IQ increased the odds of virginity by 2.7% for males and 1.7% for females.

• It’s not just home runs they’re talking about, either: a higher IQ decreased the likelihood of romantic contact in any sense, from holding hands to kissing, across the board.

• For males with IQs between 70-90 only 50.2% were virgin, whereas those with IQs above 110 were 70.3% virgins.

Iqodds_2

Sadly, there’s this, suggesting that the phenomenon isn’t restricted to teenage years:

Some insightful digging by blogger Half Sigma into the General Social Survey, which also includes an abbreviated intelligence test, has turned up a number of associations that speak to these theories. The relationship between sexual activity and intelligence found across adolescence and young adulthood appears to continue on into adulthood proper.

Not only do intelligent people have a delayed onset of sexual behavior, Half Sigma found that they also have a lower number of premarital sex partners throughout adulthood (18-39). While this is consistent with the above theory that high IQ people are more religious and conservative, this is, of course, not true. Religiousness correlates with lower IQ, and as HS shows in the same post, intelligent people were also more likely to say that premarital sex was not immoral. (Leaving those who did think it was immoral to participate in the bulk of it!) Most of the other theories are still consistent with this finding though.

Perhaps more revealing, HS, also showed that intelligence correlates with less sex within marriage for the same age range. While still consistent with pregnancy fears and competing interests, lower sex drive seems like a better fit. In fact another revealing finding from the Counterpoint survey was that while 95% of US men and 70% of women masturbate, this number is only 68% of men and 20% of women at MIT!

Also the idea that more intelligent people are too busy for the opposite sex not just in 7th grade to college, but throughout adulthood and for their own spouse, seems unrealistic. In fact the GSS also shows (PDF) that smarter people spend more time socializing with their friends, indicating their hours aren’t spent as uniquely isolated and narrowly channeled as the theory would require.

But lower sex drive and anxiety about sex’s consequences can’t be the whole story either. Half Sigma also showed that the smartest men in the GSS (approx. IQ >120) were also more likely to visit a prostitute. (Hardly indicative of cautiousness) This may suggest intelligent men are less able to find willing sex partners. Are smart men less attractive to women? Perhaps in some ways. For instance HS found that smart men were less likely to be athletic, and this paper shows, unathletic men and women have fewer sex partners. Athletic men, with more willing sexual partners are also less likely to visit a prostitute. Athletic activity gives men more masculine bodies, which are more attractive to women. A more masculine physique correlates with (PDF) an increased number of sex partners.

So intelligent people have lower libidos and less masculine physiques. What hormone is responsible for both sex drive and masculine builds? That’s right: testosterone.

And two new papers suggest that testosterone may depress IQ. One team found that salivary testosterone levels were lower for preadolescent boys with IQs above 130 and below 70. (the same two groups most likely to be virgins in adolescence)

Another paper suggests that a gene responsible for androgen sensitivity and higher sperm counts may also create a tradeoff for intelligence.

If any of this is true, I’m going to get a T-shirt that says "Outlier"

UPDATE:  This T-shirt is pretty close.

UPDATE:  Reactions from around the internets:

    A Link Between Intercourse and Intelligence?

    It’s Only The Average-Intelligence Kids We Have To Worry About

    The Sex Lives Of Smart Folk

    Hmm, Not Sure About Those Numbers…

    Nerds! Embrace Your Virgin Status!

    The Smarter You are, the Less Sex You Have

    This Also Means Dumb People Are Having More Sex – Good Luck, Humanity

Duh, Ya Think?

Ken AshfordIraqLeave a Comment

Too little, too late:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney acknowledged on Tuesday he was wrong in 2005 when he insisted the insurgency in Iraq was in its "last throes."

It was Cheney’s most direct public admission of how badly the administration had underestimated the strength of America’s enemies in the increasingly unpopular war in Iraq.

The Full Monty: Epilogue

Ken AshfordPersonalLeave a Comment

MontydatesShow closings are always bittersweet for everyone involved, but I think for everyone associated with the LTWS/CTG production of The Full Monty, it was particularly hard.  Myself included.

It seems like years since we sat around on first rehearsal, with everyone stating their name and who they are playing.  But it was only a couple of months ago.  For me, it was some old and beloved friends and some new people I would grow to love and admire.

Since then, we’ve experienced our fair share of frustrations, laughs, wardrobe malfunctions, running jokes, feet going through walls, parades, promotional adds, etc.  It’s all been good.

The last week of the show was by far the best from a performance standpoint.  We had large and receptive audiences — even the closing show (a Sunday matinee!). 

We had a lot of two-timers and three-timers in the audience this week, people coming back to see it again.  That’s pretty cool.

I always marvel at how these things come together.  There’s a wonderful backstage dance that happens in productions like this, where things happen like clockwork.  A pen shows up in my hand just as I need it, right before I go onstage.  A cast member is there to help another cast member do a quick costume change.  Things like that.  They’re there; there reliable; you can count on these things.  Not much else about life that goes that way.

The nice thing about a four-week run is that the show gets really polished.  You’ve added things; you’ve changed things.  A subtle look here.  A pregnant pause here.  An added phrase.  You discover what works, and fix what hasn’t worked.  The last week of this show was, in my mind, twice as good as the first week, purely from a performance standpoint.

On Sunday’s matinee, the pre-show entertainment (a Triad Idol winner) sang the opening strains of "Tomorrow", and the cast — including seasoned vets — started to digest the impact of the upcoming 3 hours.  "Last time we’ll do this; last time I’ll say that".  It kind of got to us, but the curtain rose and we gave them a good show.  I was already primed for a letdown, having been reminded by Heather that we probably weren’t going to appear onstage together again (she’s moving to NYC).

But the show was a thrill, and fun, as always.

Then came strike, the ultimate anti-climax to a two-plus-month thrill ride.  It went suprisingly well and mercifully quick (as strikes go).  Then, exhausted, we mumbled goodbyes, made future plans to get together.

I got in my car and drove to Winston.  Seals & Crofts "Summer Breeze" blared from the iPod.  Sure I’ll see these people again (I hope), but not in that setting, not in that show.  Nothing like it ever again.  Tough to let go.

But what a journey, huh?

Previous Full Monty posts: