It's only a three-quarter moon but it wakes me up at midnight and it feels full. Just before I went to sleep I read that keyboardist and composer Ray Manzarek had died earlier today, in Germany. A resident of Napa Valley California...not far from my sister. How come I'd never gone on a pilgrimage to meet him and tell him what effect he had had on my youth, in conjunction with, of course, Jim Morrison. It was now officially too late to do so. And I had missed him when he'd appeared locally a few years back, with guitarist Robby Krieger, in Albany, at The Egg. What a mistake...his last time around.

When Morrison died, I was only sixteen. That seemed epic and tragic in 1971, and as such, corrupted my otherwise positive outlook at that age, when everything was on the upgrade in my life, and I felt I had the world by the tail. I had not seen The Doors in concert and felt crushed that now I never would. For years afterward I would listen to their music in a trance state, and I have to tell you, it meant more to me, and seemed to have more depth, than anything I'd ever heard from The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, or whomever else being touted as being the best of rock music.

Today I know there was a sloppy aspect to Morrison's performances and behavior and I do not idolize the man as I did as a teenager,.. but Manzarek always commanded my respect in being the thinker, the musical intellectual, and the primary arranger of the group. White Krieger's guitar was a stinging, lusty swagger that spoke like a blues siren, and John Densmore's drums seemed the crispest and slickest of all rock stickmen.
But in later years, Krieger became spacey as a hippie spoof and Densmore was bitter about the the crashing aftermath, and never forgave Morrison for his early demise. Only the keyboard guy-- Ray Manzarek-- evolved into a transcendent state.

In 1968, when "Light My Fire" hit the nation's airwaves, it seemed to be everywhere, Even though most of us had tinny transistor radios in our bedrooms, not exactly Bose speakers, you could tell that the roller-coaster jabbing of the organ was unlike any other rock group of the day, with the possible exception of Deep Purple. Jim Morrison's seductive baritone stole the show, of course, but Manzarek led the ride like a ringmaster.

Someday soon, maybe I'll take an hour on WEXT's "My Exit" and dredge up some of the longer, more obscure Doors songs that stuck with me long after the group's dissolution,
Over 40 years later, L.A. WOMAN, their last album recorded together, live in the studio, supposedly with no overdubs, remains on my Top 10 list of all time, despite falling well down the list on my favorite radio station's Top 500 Countdown recently. I'd like to express to the listeners and those at the station themselves why the staying power of The Doors is so potent and prevalent even now...

It's late on the east coast, Ray, and I feel your spirit here in the moonlight of mid-late May. Sorry to see you go, man, and sorry we never met. But there are keyboard hooks you injected into my soul long ago that will not be unfastened in my lifetime, and I thank you for those. Peace and safe travels beyond. Wayne

Saratoga's delayed Spring season...finally underway

Anyone born to the Northeast, or any long-term resident, has come to know that upstate NY can be cruel in fooling you this time of year.  I got use to saying that there were normally "7 False Springs" in this area, before the season had truly changed. Transitional season means that there can be thunderstorms with 70 degree temps that bring frogs and toads on the roads and the sound of peepers from the swamps for the first time one day (like, say, April 16^th) , and the next you have 20 degree wind-chills and hail squalls, and feel sorry for those amphibianss who popped out of the mud a bit too soon.

There are days when we all say, It's here, It's here!  And we run up to it like Charlie Brown about to kick the football Lucy is holding, only to get it yanked away.   That is what most of April was like.   But now, in the first week of May, 2013, though it was snowing in Colorado yesterday, we are in the middle of a balmy 70 degree stretch in upstate NY.  Still, we may get fooled again but I believe the delay is over, and the "false springs" are behind us.

I rejoiced internally last Saturday, in between appointment rounds, when I saw almost every long-dormant outdoor playground filled with activity.  I saw girls playing soccer and softball,  Little Leaguers eagerly practicing, lacrosse racquets in action, joggers jogging, and elders swinging tennis racquets.  Geyser Road complex, Gavin Park in Wilton, Eastside Rec playgrounds, Skidmore's campus perimeter, Daniels Road soccer complex, Westside Rec, even  southside fields adjacent to Saratoga's Racino I'd not seen used before, were at full capacity on my journeys that day.  Even though my kids are older now and not engaged in such outdoor fests on a glorious spring Saturday, I felt vicarious delight that parents and kids had returned to light-hearted games, as an antidote to the horrific happenings in Boston, mid-April. 

I keep having flashbacks, however, to an indoor sport played this time of year--AAU Basketball--which had dominated almost a decade of our lives from 2000-2009, when Miles was competing year-round, at gyms all over the area, and on weekends up-and-down the east coast at non-stop Tournaments.  Those days are gone for us, and we feel both nostalgia and relief that it is over with!  So much more time on our hands, less constant travel, fewer fastfood stops and hotels-on-the-road, less expense, and more time to work!!  I don't know how we did it, because when he was at his most serious, it was an 11-month-a-year program.

I know there are a lot of parents of athletes out there who commit just as strongly to their kid's passion for what seems like a long parade of practices and contests... whether rowing, baseball, softball, running, football, hoop, golf, swimming or gymnastics... whatever it is, I know it becomes an addiction to the parents--to revel in watching your child PERFORM--that is tough to leave behind once they go off to college, or the service, or the workworld.  But that is where my wife and I are now--and we wonder how we had time for "real life" or even a full workweek--when we were in the full throes of that fanatic fandom.  

My daughter and my second son, however, are glad that those days are over, and we can now cater to them in different ways.  Life with multiple children is a balancing act at any given moment, and I feel true compassion for anyone with more than 3 to schedule for, and chauffeur.  

                                                                        ***

Perennial Dilemma of Spring:  Yellow Flags, versus Dandelions...

The excellent weather that has finally arrived brings both good and bad.  Whereas last year we were mowing the lawns in late March, it seemed,  but it is May now and we are just beginning to worry about it.    But I am kicking myself for not preparing for this moment a couple of months ago, when I should have written and emailed a letter to the members of our HOA, pleading the case for ORGANIC methods of fertilizing and pest control for our median and common areas, as well as on their own lawns.  I cringe and grit my teeth when I see the "Little Yellow Flags" sprout up, in our neighborhood and others, as it means the chemical taint of PESTICIDES has returned for another round.  I got out of my car, 9 miles west of Saratoga, way out in the countryside, and I could distinctly smell the contamination of commercial poisons, which had just been sprayed or spread that day.  Anyone who tells me this kind of thing is safe has got to be oblivious.   I find that the same people who will solicit fundraising for research for cures to common diseases are often the same ones who are treating their lawns with suspected carcinogens, and not seeing any contradiction in that.  Personally--I don't want to focus on finding a CURE for cancer, for my own life and my family, I want to PREVENT it.  And I don't mean to be callous about this--no one contracts those epidemic illnesses voluntarily--but I believe there is no mistaking a connection between a petro-chemically-saturated environment and the toxic buildups in our bodies that lead to dis-ease. 

I am especially concerned about the people who treat their lawns to make them greener and more homogenous--more suburban, in other words--and then let their kids or grandkids or pets romp around on the grass soon afterwards, because the company that performed the treatment told them--"it only lasts 24 hours or so." O really?   Whether bare-skinned feet  or shoe-bottoms or paws,  there has GOT to be some trace amounts brought back into their homes and insidiously absorbed into their bodies--but the population continues to do what TV commercials are brainwashing them to do--  FEED YOUR LAWN, LADDIE, FEED IT! Or in the case of the Ortho commericials, shows a man squirting specific poisons at dandelions like they were guerrila insurgents.  As with aboriginal cultures, wild flowers and perennials were here first.

My lawn, and that of my two nearest neighbors, thankfully, is sprouting dandelions this time of year, which my wife hates but I take pride in.  I am a contrarian, a naturalist, and co-existing with dandelions (referred to as "weeds" by the advertising world) is acceptable to me-- the least of my worries, in fact.  I can walk on my lawn barefoot and not come away with anything other than grass-stains and organic dirt.   That will be the extent of my environmental sermon for now, except to add that the personal inconvenience of smelling the pesticides and bemoaning their yellow-flagged presence in my neighborhood pales next to my fears of what the chemical treatments are doing to the clear-running tributaries and streams in our immediate vicinity-- notably the sacred KAYDEROSSERAS Creek, upon which the mills of Middle Grove and other nearby towns were founded.   When we first moved out here, the trout could be heard and seen jumping out of the water on a regular basis; now there are no minnows or fish of any sort visible, and a former Grade A Trout Stream now seems devoid of life.  Coincidence?

  As with the honey bees' colony collapse disorder, I have no doubt in my mind or my gut that pesticides and toxic chemical ubiquity are responsible, and I will try to convince as many people as possible in my lifetime to understand the connection between an organic lifestyle, and trying to improve an already-contaminated world that we are leaving our children.   Peace to all who read this, and aside from my tirade on pesticides, I wish you all a joyous and healthy spring season.

Thirty years ago I wrote a poem with the same name as this version of my blog. It was roughly the same time of year, when just about all of us (except the most hardcore skiers) are sick of the lengthy duration of a "normal" upstate winter-- four if not five full months into it. Back then I was renting a second floor flat on Walnut Street-- the westside of Saratoga-- with a friend of mine, and it wasn't supposed to be my job to shovel the sidewalk around the corner property's perimeter, but I was doing it.

With every stroke of the snow shovel, I was heaving heavy hunks of winter away-- not just the frosty layered corn snow, but also scraping up the ice chunks underneath, adhered to the concrete surfaces in its freeze-thaw cycle. If you had a good sturdy metal shovel you could get beneath that stuff and leverage it upwards in large wedges, and it was quite satisfying to pry it up and toss it off to the side. But it took some effort, and a bit of aggression. My mental state, however, required such exertion-- I had just broken up with my long-term girlfriend (almost 5 years together) and was inwardly freaking out about it (her idea, not mine). To keep my composure and feel I was doing something positive to get over and past the emotional upheaval and rejection, the physical ordeal was just what I needed at the time.

During the exertion, that phrase kept running maniacally through my brain-- "I'm helping Spring arrive; I'm helping Spring arrive..." as if Spring needed my help.

I had wrongly thought that I was going to marry that particular girl some day, and thought I loved her-- we had been through a lot together. But I wasn't saving any money and she was, and she was ready for a change, thinking things had gotten predictable and stale. So in my shell-shocked, humbled mind, I reverted to primal, Druid mode and started thinking of Spring as the point that would change everything, and renew my spirit.

That's what my not-so-great-nor-memorable poem was about....albeit was written in February of that year, roughly a month before Spring was actually due on the calendar. The catharsis of shoveling, and/or the poem I wrote to process it, seemed to help almost immediately. Within a week of that episode I had met another girl who became a great, enticing flame and a revelation in a lot of ways, and I would not have met her had I not been a free man again at that point.  So certainly I knew that something cool could come from that symbolic sense of renewal...

So I thought of that period again, 30 full years ago, the day I began this episode of my blog-- Sunday the 24 of March-- by which time, in 2013, we are well past the Vernal Equinox already.   Last Tuesday was, most likely, the final major snowfall of the season, when about 10+ inches of heavy, wet snow came down over the course of almost a full day, like we were in a perpetual snow-globe, or a scene from the Austrian Alps. It had turned cold after that so the quick thaw you usually get up here this time of year did not occur, and consequently the snow-pack, at least up in the elevated hills where I live, remained in place till now. Compressed and slightly softening with the sun's warmth today, the L-shaped part of our driveway still harbored a half-foot of white stuff.  This is where I spent part of the afternoon, hacking and smoothly attacking the slow-blizzard's remnants, even though I knew it would melt on its own in a week even if I just left it alone.

So I began my mantra again, "Helping Spring Arrive..." This time I was NOT going through a romantic break-up, although a day before I hadn't been so sure. My wife and I were in our 25th year together, and it would be ten times as devastating now to have to start all over, compared to back in 1983. I had just said to an unmarried guy in my office the other day how proud I was to have persevered in a long-term marriage in an era when, as he put it, " like 70% isn't it?" of those who get wed end up splitting from each other. As the Dead said: ""Cuz When... Life looks like Easy Street...there is Danger at your door."

 In this past Sunday's case, then, I decided I was not looking for romantic rejuvenation, unless it was with the woman who had accompanied me, with little complaint, through a quarter century so far.  It was a different kind of springtime renewal I needed and craved... a surge and continuation of positive synchronous energy that allows one to not just accomplish more, earn more, & contribute more to the economy...but to help and serve more people than just oneself.  To be centered in the proverbial flow we hear so much about but maybe rarely FEEL.  To aspire to be a conduit for good, and problem solving; not mucking up situations but clearing them up.  To believe the world was still a vital, exciting, and improving place, not doomed nor declining but bright enough for the coming generations to thrive in for years to come.  New children, new families, more and more people who are spiritually attuned, and looking for the sustainable good life.  This is my hope for 2013, in an era when a lot of people are expecting the worst and hoarding ammunition and thinking of drawing a line in the sand around themselves and their own family, instead of drawing together into a larger community.  It's still touch-and-go I suppose as to the fate of the world, but if all politics (and economy) is local, the recovery is starting to do just fine around here.  Check my real estate site for more on that, if you like. 

********

On a side note, an increase in business demands due to this putative recovery has made me think hard about how much time I can devote to this blog.  I am coming up on my one-year renewal for this site, and have to decide whether to continue or not.  Some months there has been great readership, other times not so much.  I have gotten a grand total of 7 comments for 34 pieces I've written here.  Much as I love this site overall, the Blogs are a very small fraction of it, and I may seek out a more visible venue.  If you like what I've posted here in the past year, let me know and that may help me decide.  Thanks for reading, if you've gotten this far!

Take care and be well,

Wayne, for www.saratoga.com/WaynesWord2

Copyright 2013 Wayne Perras

One of the blessings of life in this area, as I've said many times before on this blog, is the listener-supporter public radio station WEXT, 97.7 FM. If it weren't for them, I would not have been likely to venture to Central Avenue in Albany to finally visit the converted bank, now music hall, dubbed "The Linda" one cold February Saturday night recently, to see the California-based band MILO GREENE. It was a revelation and a pleasure for my wife and I, and I am now hooked on yet another group after seeing their live act.

Like most of the audience (I'm guessing), I knew them only from one song played prominently on WEXT, which is a haunting, jangly harmonic song called "1957"-- and that title is still a mystery to me. They were described as a "Folk-Pop" aggregation from LA, which is and was a gross understatement, but then attempts to categorize music are always a bit hazy. Local writer Brian McElhiney also helped pique our interest with a Thursday preview my wife picked up on in The Daily Gazette (a fine Schenectady newspaper, for those of you outside our immediate area), so thanks to him as well.

After a great and enthusiastically received warm-up set by solo artist (for this show at least) MaryLeigh Roohan, the headliners came out and launched into a torrent of intertwining guitars, rhythm, and drum-thunder which bore no resemblance to the adjective "folk". The closest "folk-pop" reference I could come up with days later was maybe The Byrds, circa 1966, but then then David Crosby, Chris Hilllman, Roger McGuinn, Gene Clarke and the rest did not have a female singer like Marlana Sheetz to balance their male rock energy either.

The group was touted as being thoroughly democratic-- no leader, or four leaders, depending on how you looked at it-- and everyone but the drummer (the excellent Curtis Marrero) took a turn at the front-and-center mike, and they interchanged instruments on a regular basis to prove their versatility, and create a variety of sound tapestries.

Robbie Arnett was seemingly the spaciest rocker of the bunch to start with as he strummed an acoustic with ferocity and roamed the stage, wearing mismatched print shirt and slacks that looked like rummage sale pickups. I would've thought he was the northern Cali guy of the bunch at first, but no, he was the L.A. representative. To his left on the stage was superb guitarist Andrew Heringer, with a close-cropped reddish-brown beard and hair, a neater look than the dark-haired leftover-hippie style that Arnett wore so well. The tallest member with long black bangs swept to one side was Graham Fink, who started out on bass and later played guitar quite emphatically as well, and seemed like the anchor of the group, while the lovely blonde Ms. Sheetz started out somewhat in the background on keyboards, picked up a guitar now and then along with percussive devices, and slowly moved more into focus after the boys got their rock groove going on the long instrumental opener. From the barrage of sound which with they began, I would've called the music "Psychedelic Funk" more than any form of folk, which was too tame a phrase for the power they exhibited right off the bat.

The song titles were not really announced as they started out, and only later, after acquiring the vinyl debut album did I put together what some of them were, but it didn't matter much while we listened; it was an enchanting sequence. On the second song Graham Fink caught my attention with an Edge-y guitar (like U-2-ish, I mean) and I never did figure out what that tune was. The third selection featured wicked harmonies as they sang a line "Maybe when we're older/ Can I still come over??" and that turned out to be entitled "Silent Way." Marlana stepped forward to sing lead at the start of a great tune called "What's The Matter?" which repeated that questioning line and then the lyrics: 
"All your love is never good enough/ All your love is lost on me..." which caught my ear, and as it accelerated with intense, twining guitars into a frenzy at the end I recall Graham
Fink really taking over the vocal lead with full-throttle, reaming the chorus-- "WHATZ THE MATTER!!  WHATZ THE MATTER!!", and inspiring a rousing reaction at the climax.

I might have the order wrong here but my scribbled notes-in-the-dark indicate a phrase with the words "olive branch" in the next song, with the chorus line: "I will never run, I will never run you away" and the liner notes tell me that was called "Son My Son", for whatever that's worth. My wife and I had been talking earlier in the day about where the peace-making significance of "olive branches" had originated, so I thought that was a sweet detail of synchronicity.

The following tune was another harmonic beauty, more of a ballad, called "Don't You Give Up on Me"-- which on the album features the female voice but in concert was a group vocal that gave us chills-- a song about hanging together in a relationship through thick and thin, apparently: "I'll dig our own little hole/ and put the walls around us/ and call it our home/ 'cause you're all I got/ and time won't stop." Nice.

Then they took a breath and performed a cover by a guy I didn't know named Sufjan Stevens, called "Chicago." Again, great guitars, and something I have to hear again on YouTube if I can, as apparently it's a common thread in their performances.

Another piece that started out ballad-like and evolved into what I likened to a Band-of-Horses vibe was noted as the last tune on their album-- "Autumn Tree." I was really starting to love Andrew Heringer's guitar work and high-quality vocals by this time-- if there was a star of the group it was him, for me, but there was no ego involved on his part at all-- they truly seemed a democratic bunch.

One of the supreme moments was the last tune they played before the encore-- a rousing vocal and instrumental extravaganza that I noted seemed to start with an electronic clave kind of sound as Marlana chanted something to the effect of: "As Years Go By..." which is from the tune called "Perfectly Aligned" on the CD and album, which then, if I'm not too confused, segued into a longer jam which then later featured all the singers aligning to wail: 

"And even if your heart stops/ I'll be there to hold you up,/Even as the world turns/ I'll be there to watch the fire burn/ I slipped softly through/ All I've waited for my dear is you..."  It was amazing, an uplifting ending, and I discovered later the last tune was called "Cutty Love."  The lyrics from the album notes end like this, a cryptic Valentine's Day poem if there was one:

"All your doubts will fade away/Questions bred by years at bay/ I can be an answer to it all"

But what I remember was all four of them up front singing, led by Fink, who looked large enough to do so, on top of the thundering cascade, repeating over and over again: 

"EVEN IF YOUR HEART STOPS, I'LL BE THERE TO HOLD YOU UP!"  and I could not think of a more soul-rending testimonial to rock'n'roll love than that.

We all took some deep breaths and I looked around at the clapping, cheering crowd at that point-- noting that it was one of the most well-balanced in terms of age that I'd ever seen, other than at a Dave Matthews' concert at SPAC.  There were many bearded and grey audience members, as old or older than me, and also college kids, 20 and 30-somethings, couples and groups of young  fans, everything in between, and an even mix of males and females.  Somehow, that was gratifying to me, as a testimonial to the egalitarian reach of WEXT, who had had Laura from the "Hello, Pretty City" show introduce MaryLeigh Roohan, and Chris Wienk-- one of the founding masterminds of Exit977.org -- introduce Milo Greene themselves.

When the band exited to the rear out a door that led to the parking lot, I recall thinking-- geezus, they're from California, they're going to freeze out there, and fortunately, they hustled back inside and played two or three more songs.  The first was a Wilco tune about late-night drinking and subsequent hangovers, I believe, and had a real country feel.  There may have been one other in between, but by then everyone was hanging on for the big closer, the most familiar tune they had save for last: and when they finally broke into the gorgeous opening stanza of "1957" :

"Your house that sits behind me/ is covered in... ivy green.../ the windows that we watch from/ are old and chipping at the beam..."  it seemed everyone in the crowd wanted to harmonize with the enchanting chorus:  "TAKES ME AWAY...TAKES ME AWAY...TAKES ME AWAY..."

and when the simple songlines continue-- (with Marlana and Robbie so earnest in mutual alignment, Andrew and Graham behind...)  "the scent you wear moves in lines from/your apartment in-to mine.../ You act like you don't know me/ My God you tempt my anxious mind..."  and then the series of ascending ahhh/ ahhh/ ahh/ ahs-- it became almost rapturous.

The "Takes-Me-Away" chorus returns again, till they sing a line we have all felt about SOMEBODY we were dangerously in love with in our youth-- "Would it be much better/ if I knew/ NOTHING about you??" a few times through, the tension mounts, and they take it out with a group harmonic chant:  "I'LL GO I'LL GO I'LL GO I... I'LL GO I'LL GO I'LL GO I...I"LL GO I'LL GO I'LL GO I!"   and then it abruptly stops, and they put down their instruments, and you know it is over, there is no more, and yet you want to hear it again.  That is what good tunes are made of.  Whew.

                                                            ***

In listening to the vinyl version of their self-titled debut album which came out in 2012, I realize that the folk-pop (or cinematic-pop, as they prefer to call it) label is actually appropriate for the recording, although the concert was really pure rock.  The vocals of Ms. Marlana are featured on the album more than they were in concert, and frankly she was subdued that evening compared to the more dynamic alpha males, but that was fine.  The tunes are short and to the point on the vinyl, and they improvised upon and extended them out nicely with some jams. The short instrumental tunes on the recording, which are just interludes, really, like "Orpheus", "Wooden Antlers" and "Moddison"-- which was the name of their short film-- are vehicles for stretching out live as well.  While the album has been stuck on my turntable for a week afterwards, it does not capture how good the concert was, just hints at it.  I would see this group again in a heartbeat, and for $15. per ticket it was one of the best bargains of the year.

I spent some time on their website and was shocked how little they promote themselves individually-- no pictures with names, no brief bios, no traces of who wrote which tune or who is featured on any of them-- it is all a collective, inter-mixed with no pretentiousness or ego whatsoever.  Even on the liner notes, all tunes are written by Milo Greene, their fictitious group moniker.  I commend them on that, and how well they make it work.

Knowing their talent level, I guess I wasn't surprised to see that they had already been featured on The  David Letterman Show (t.v. debut last July), The Tonight Show with Leno, and Conan O'Brien's Show, though I will forgive them for the latter, since I can't stand him.  If it weren't for YouTube I wouldn't know any of that as I just don't stay up and watch late night TV.

My wife told their equipment manager, whom I had freed from the back of their traveling van--as we walked out to the frigid parking lot and heard him yelling inside!-- that we thought we'd be seeing them on Saturday Night Live someday soon-- and he is the one who gifted us the copy of the vinyl.  Thanks to that dude, too.  The only problem with vinyl is that you can't listen to it in the car on the way home, so I'll be looking for that CD soon.  Check out this band if you haven't already.  A couple hundred people in the packed Theater that night know what I'm talking about, right?

Thanks again to Chris Wienk and the WEXT staff, and the great hosts at The Linda, a dynamite place to see music, for introducing us to this band.  Even though I'm writing this for a website promoting Saratoga Springs, NY-- keep in mind that we are all part of the Capital District in upstate NY, and Albany's music scene is well-worth a 30-40 minute ride on certain specific occasions!

PS-- For those of you reading this in the first week it is posted, WEXT will be featuring an interview with the bandmembers of Milo Greene, and presumably a few live studio songs, on Friday, Feb. 22nd, 2013, at NOON, during the beginning of Chris Wienk's time slot--check it out!

Copyright Wayne Perras 2013

Even though Rumor had it that schools would be closed on Friday the 8th due to an impending "perfect snowstorm" named NEMO, I still got up at 5:30 to check both the Weather Channel and Channel 9 to see if the pending blizzard was real enough for Saratoga Springs HS to cancel school that day. Since the north country (as opposed to the core of the Capital District, south of us) was receiving steady snowfall already as early bands of lake-effect whitestuff passed through, I was elated to find out that YES, SSHS was on the "CLOSED" list-- not just late arrival or early dismissal. This not only saved me some driving in terms of not having to chauffeur my darling freshman daughter to the West Ave Campus, but also freed up my day in that I had no other appointments scheduled. Breathless newscasters had gotten the population worked up to expect a Snowmeggedan like we hadn't seen in years, and most people had postponed their real estate plans till it was past.

YIPPIE!! I felt the primordial elation of an 8 year old, free to play for a winter day. But instead of putting on my snowsuit and galoshes as in days of yore, my mind started flooding with all the ideas of how I might spend the day...

Here was my partial list of Things To Do on a Snowday:

1) NOTHING! (This was my first choice, but the least likely...still, a tempting thought)

2) READ! (I had another William Kennedy book at hand, also "Cloud Atlas," or Thoreau's Walden to re-consider...or if I went the self-improvement route-- Miguel Ruiz's "The Four Agreements," or Eckhart Tolle's "A New Earth" were beckoning to me for review. I also
had a pile of magazines to choose from-- two recent issues of Rolling Stone, a year's worth of REALTOR Magazine, and some beguiling OUTSIDE adventure mags I hadn't even opened up yet. There was also a new METROLAND, and the Cambridge, NY-based Hill Country Observer I'd picked up fresh at Spring Street Market the day before. Too many choices, still not enough time...)

3) BLOG! (My own writing output had been nil for a while, so why not catch up? I had a long unfinished piece on WEXT's Top 977 rock songs I wanted to wrap up and publish, but it was turning into more of a manifesto than a blog... and I had started another piece called, tentatively, "The Million Reasons Why I Can't Finish My Novel..." but I kept getting interrupted, which was exactly the point! Then I thought about writing my SnowDay List...this!--and yet still did not get to it till the next day, which shows how I procrastinate!)

4) RESEARCH! (I still had real estate chores I could tackle, as there are always new searches to be run for this client or that, to stay on top of what's out there, or comps to be studied for the presentation of the next offer I have to present...)

5) EMAIL! (Likewise, always a good indoor task which can be accomplished in any weather, wherever one is...as long as RoadRunner of the 4G network don't go down...but you know what? I do email religiously every day, so who not take one day off?)

6) HANDWRITTEN LETTERS! (I had a list of former clients and casual friends and unresolved would-be leads I could take the time to appeal to in an old-fashioned manner...how many Realtors still do this?? It would give me practice at writing cursive, which I hear is becoming a lost art among our youth...)

7) WORKOUT! (The weights in the basement, the bench, the kettleballs, were all awaiting me on a day like this...why not break a sweat?!)

8) CALL SOME PEOPLE! (Come to think of it, I still had some work calls to return, or appointments to set, or listings to arrange...aw man, I guess it can't really be a COMPLETE day off after all...)

9) UPGRADE MY SKILLS! (If I am going to thrive as a Realtor I know there are some technical tutorials I could be watching and studying today... DocuSign, Paragon's intimate secrets of the MLS, Internet Tracking mechanisms, etc etc etc... a perfect day to do it? Naw... not right now...)

10) GIVE MYSELF REIKI, and SEND SOME... (It would be a great time, I decided, to recharge my own Reiki battery, and to silently offer some healing energy to those who I know need it... a noble and worthy use of some rare quiet time...)

11) MAKE BREAKFAST! (Which is one of my favorite things, actually-- my current specialty being a slow-carb version: mushroom/yellow pepper/spinach/red onion and asiago omelette, with a side of natural chicken sausage and black beans simmered with
red pepper flakes...no bread, no pancakes or waffles like in the past... I feel energized yet not bloated...)

12) SHOVEL SOME SNOW! (Yes, I still perform the manual method, which would later augment my basement workout nicely, with some fresh air ingested at the same time, to balance my work at the desk...)

13) FEED THE BIRDS! (This would have to come first, as the snow coming down would obliterate whatever seed was still left on the feeders and the ground, and I had to offer more...)

14) TAKE A HIKE OUT BACK! (Pencil this is for later in the day, to go down and see how the Kaydeross Creek looks in the snowfall...)

15) TAKE A NAP! (I'd save this for later afternoon, after the workout, the shovelling, the hike, and hopefully a bunch of other stuff on the list... aren't snowday naps the best??!)

Well, truth be told, just making the list took me a while, and to some extent helped me prioritize, but also let me realize how busy a day off could be. So after I woke Bella to tell her to go back to sleep, and discussed with my wife whether we should worry about letting Daryn go up to SUNY/ACC up in Queensbury or not (we didn't), I began to accomplish some things on my list. I began with #13, the birdseed need, commenced to my own breakfast, #11, and then attended to an hour's worth of #8-- setting appointments for the days after the snowstorm.

Then I worked in a bit of #1 on the list-- NOTHING!-- simply listening to Dave Michael's chosen music on WEXT while watching the birds out back appreciate my scattered birdseed feast for them. That was pleasant, for a while, but then my anxious mind kept coming up with more urgent things to add onto the list--

#16 ORGANIZE TAX INFORMATION, (for my meeting with Tom Kubiak in two weeks, a great chore to perform when no other pressing matters were at hand);

#17 RUN INTO TOWN ONCE MORE FOR CERTAIN SUPPLIES, as we were low on the good Columbian coffee we love so much, candles and "D" batteries and all that "camping-out stuff" you need if you don't have a whole-house generator yet, like us...

#18 MEDITATE, AND JUST CHILL... (under the assumption that blizzards are God's way of slowing us manic Northeasterners down from our frantic patterns, and teaching us, however briefly, to look within, and hibernate for a day, OK!)

What I specifically left off my list was: WATCHING TV (avoiding more weather news, financial forecasts, tragic news here and there, ESPN recaps of previous day's action,
and old movies which some of my friends claim to be interesting, but which I can't tolerate... that would truly be a waste of the day.

I also AVOIDED reading the YAHOO Finance page for a change, the Top Trends of the Day, the Gossip on OMG! and TMZ! and anyone else's Blogs. That was refreshing, and
I wanted to keep my mind uncluttered. It worked.

Needless to say, not everything on my sacred list was accomplished, nor even dabbled in-- butit was still refreshing not to have to go anywhere (as I refrained from the supply run, and we decided to make due with what we had in the house). I did manage to pump a little more iron than usual, stretch out my lower back on the yoga ball, and shovel two or three times by the end of the day, feeling righteous about the physical exercise. And now, the next morning, I managed to file at least one of my intended blogs. There is more shovelling to be done as the storm is over now, and I have ordered my mind in certain ways, and breathed deeper, and slowed down a bit-- have you?? I hope so,for we all need it.I'm sure you have a huge list of things to do when there's NOTHING MANDATORY to do, too... let me know!

Take care, and I promise to come up with something more interesting soon...

Copyright Wayne Perras 2013

If I really aspired to be Thoreau-like, I guess, I'd be taking a long hike on this Sunday-in-January morning but here I sit at my desk, hoping my family members all sleep late so I can get this underway before the day truly intrudes.  My problem with blogging is not the lack of ideas but more of an ADD-type confusion of which topic to focus on...and honestly I might as well make a smorgasbord (that beautiful Scandinavian word again) out of the potpourri of scattered appetizer ideas that swirl in my mind. 

The town is changing week to week, and that's how often I am supposed to blog here, yet it's hard to keep up with the various movers and shakers of Saratoga Springs who make things happen.  From the deep primordial construction pit on the center of Broadway has risen a half-skeleton of iron beams and risers which have required the use of the hundred-foot crane that has loomed like a majestic metal stork over the downtown area for most of this month.   Hardhat steelworkers are doing their thing daily, no matter the weather-- you pass the site at 7:30 and they are well underway.  Sonny Bonacio knows how to make things happen, and so do the subs and the partners he chooses.

His end-game on the end-of-the-block transition of Railroad Place at Church Street is moving a bit slower, but will ultimately be even more transformational than the fill-in site between The Cantina and Lillian's.   This grand 11-screen intown movie theater strikes me as something that was long overdue, as Jimmy Kunstler correctly pointed out about 20 years ago in one of his localized diatribes about the shabby side of Saratoga's architectural progress.  For as long as I've lived here, incoming traffic from Church Street to Broadway-- also known as  State Route 9N-- has faced the, um, butt-end of the former Price Chopper's nondescript blockwall posterior, along with dumpsters and stacks of cardboard and misplaced shopping carts.  Not a view the well-to-do, or any people of taste, would approve, and that's why it was lovingly dubbed the ghetto Chopper, as opposed to the suburban versions, I presume.  While I don't think the facade will rival the new Barclay's Center in Brooklyn, the upgrade of a glassy cinematic entrance on that north-facing, prominent block, will certainly be
most excellent.  I commend the Galesi Group, Bonacio's partner on the construction project, and Neil Golub of the grocery chain that invested in a major manner in this westside-of-Saratoga downtown project. 

Down the hill from the Olde Bryan Inn, just below the Courtyard Marriott, across from the Old Red Spring, is another project underway-- a large new banquet hall facility that I believe is linked to the Marriott as well.  Instead of brick and mortar it is almost entirely a wood frame complex, a very deep building with interesting roof lines.  Almost within view of my office window, I watch it approach weathertight status, slowly, during this coldest time of the year.   Off-season is construction season in Saratoga Springs.

On Lake Avenue across from the Hampton Inn's 6-story facade the backhoes and bulldoers were skimming the pavement on the site of the long-anticipated Pavilion Grand project, just west of The Parting Glass (which I hasten to add is still intact), and just east of The Saratogian's HQ, (for now).  There may well be a large crane on that site soon. 

Where Ellsworth Ice Cream plant once stood, the rubble field has not changed much in the last month.   The ground is resting a bit there I guess, getting ready for a major spring makeover. 

On Seward Street the upscale apartment complex is well-underway near Birch Run. 
Those buildings too are wood-frame construction, and the site seems to be supporting a good number of carpenters, roofers, and tradesmen.  The overused (in Saratoga anyway) descriptor "PARK PLACE" is worked into the sign on the corner of Morgan Lane and Seward somehow, but I hope the owners come up with something more distinctive than that when they actually get ready to rent out the units, which are still in the early stages of assembly.

Toby Milde's group is busy restoring The Adelphi Hotel, which I wrote about a few months' back.   The vividly-named Fingerpaint Agency is taking over the Border's Building and doing a colorful renovation which will soon revitalize an empty space downtown.  With another great bookstore going in across the street anyway, their is a net gain for Broadway with this diversification in tenants. 

In short, things is still booming around here; if I may be grammatically incorrect, I am still telling the truth.  Other upstate towns may hibernate, some are dormant year-round, but Saratoga Springs does not rest on its past laurels, it continues to evolve...

                                                                    *****

William Kennedy's Latest, and One Old One...

Speaking of past laurels, Pulitzer Prize- and MacArthur-award winning author William Kennedy is more famous for celebrating the history,  working-class legacies, and political chicanery of Albany, but the grandeur of old Saratoga Springs is brought to life in two recent books of his I've read this past month.    In his 2011 masterpiece-- Chango's Beads and Two-Toned Shoes-- we are witness in the first chapter to an impromptu scat/jazz session featuring Bing Crosby and a semi-fictional pianist.  Even though the episode occurs in an Albany mansion, they recall how they met in Saratoga during racing season at one of the Prohibition-Era Casinos functioning at the time.   Later in the book, the main character, one Daniel Quinn, has his own Saratoga experience, after having met Ernest Hemingway in Florida, and Fidel Castro in revolutionary Cuba.  Without giving a full review, which others have done better already, I can tell you it is a riveting, action-packed ride that I consider a crowning achievement for a writer I first met in 1980, when he was not particularly well-known  and certainly not famous yet.  Now 84 years old or so, he is an exemplar for how much can be accomplished in the 3 and a half decades AFTER 50.  

The second book of his I turned to after being so enamored of "Chango's Beads..." was simply called "Quinn's Book" and is obstensibly narrated by yet an earlier version of Changos' main character-- also named "Daniel Quinn."   Replete with phenomenal re-creations of Albany, Troy, the Hudson River, and the Erie Canal prior to 1850 in its opening scenes, it too alludes to Saratoga during many key points in the book, and the final section takes place in 1864 Saratoga Springs-- noted in the book as the first full summer season when the famous Racetrack was opened to the public.  It details characters who may or may not have been modeled on Madame Jumel, Big John Morrissey (of Congress Park Casino fame), and other actual dignitaries of Saratoga's past.   The United States Hotel porch, the Lakeside Inn on the shores of Saratoga Lake, and the Racetrack all figure into the story in a beguiling manner.  Set a full century earlier than the book he published most recently, "Quinn's Book" was published in 1992 as a continuation of his "Albany Cycle" which most famously featured "Ironweed"-- made into a film with Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep back in the '80's.   Kennedy is one of the living powerhouses of literature in  America at this point, and the Capital District is lucky to still have him residing here, still producing fine work, and reading at UAlbany and Skidmore once or twice a year.  His body of writing is a treasure.   And with these two books above in mind, he should be made an honorary citizen of Saratoga Springs as well!

                                                                  *****

The Propitious Birth of One "Miles Perras"--

1992 was indeed a good year for creative production for my wife and I as well, as it turns out.  My eldest son, Miles, was born during this month of that year, and his birth, as I've noted in brief fashion in my bio notes, was transformational to my life.  I mean that in a couple of ways.   Melinda and I weren't at all sure of the status of our commitment with each other, (as with many early-stage romances) much less the prospect of family to follow, in the spring of '91.  We had our tumultuous times.  She thought I might still be too flighty, or a committed bachelor, during our courtship and then in the co-habitation years, while I thought she was a bit too cautious and bitter about men in general after being married too young to the wrong guy in her early 20's.  I was still struggling to figure out how to be a proper step-dad to her son from that marriage when suddenly we seemed to discover she was pregnant.  Once I came to my senses, I had to learn how to be a real dad from the word Go.  I was 36 years old, not a youngster, but not a geezer either.  After the shock of learning the pregnancy was real, I buckled down on my job and began to work like a fanatic, whereas I'd been a bit casual about my career up till then.  We took LaMaze classes together and did all those things new parents do, a bit choked up with anticipation, I must admit. 

We were worried once January came in 1992 that the winter weather itself might pose a problem when it came time for Melinda to deliver, and god forbid we'd have to drive north to the Glens Falls' Snuggery during a blizzard, in the middle of the night.  She was a week past the due date when we were still walking land together with a mutual real estate client that month, crazy as that seems in retrospect.  Two weeks past the due date she was very large and when the water broke she woke me at 3:30 am or so on January 23rd and we urgently hustled up Route 9 before daybreak, fortunately with dry roads all the way.  I was so relieved when they wheeled her into her room-- with a view of West Mountain-- before the doctors were even on duty for the day, and all seemed well.  I had no idea what an ordeal it would be for her as the day stretched on, so to speak, but her cervix did not want to dilate.  We had fully prepared for a "natural" birth but it just wasn't going to happen.  She (or we) had nurtured a very robust baby, and he was too large, or stubborn, to slide down that birth canal on cue.  Therefore a belated decision was made to induce, and then an even more belated decision for an emergency C-section, late in the evening, about sixteen hours after our arrival.  I remember it was a Thursday night, and CHEERS was on the hospital TV as they ushered us up to a surgical room.  I HAD NO IDEA AT THIS POINT WHAT TO EXPECT.   I am proud to say the doctors let me stay-- in full gown, hat, and mask-- cradling my wife's head while she went through the ordeal of a caesarian birth, and saw her face through the whole process of fear, anticipation, mild agony, and relief, then delight.   For both of us it was a magical, biological trial-by-fire, and I had never been happier that there were trained medical professionals in the modern world, and drugs to assuage my wife's pain.   When Miles finally emerged in the doctor's hands from beneath the white-sheeted curtain, and made his first appearance he was purple!  Purple and squirming and with a robust, almost chunky, little body-- over-ripe if anything-- and with eyes scrunched shut he seemed glad to be out of there finally but bewildered as to where he was.  As with my other two children, I got to hold him and talk to him and greet him into this world, as they tended to my wife's incision.  I had a feeling like the sum total of exhilaration of every Christmas build-up of my childhood rolled into one day.  As I had come from a family of fairly slender if not puny babies in my family, his 9 lb, 10 oz. size came as a surprise.  My wife had eaten carefully and taken tons of supplements and vitamins during that pregnancy, as she does to this day, and had produced a whopping, healthy specimen of a boy.   I was thrilled out of my mind, and the euphoria lasted a long time.  I thank my wife not only for going through that process but for letting me name him after one of my musical heroes from college and post-college years, Miles Davis, and like the best musicians and athletes, my kid has always had a fully inter-racial array of friends and
classmates, and teammates, and rivals. 

This is not to take anything away from the miracle births I witnessed with my other two children, but for a father-for-the-first-time, there is no other single event which transcends seeing the first birth of a child.   So, to anyone reading this-- or anyone I tell this story to subsequently-- no matter who you are or how old you are, or where you are in your life, never take lightly the advent of birth of a child-- it is truly WILD and SACRED and AWE-INSPIRING to the N-th degree.  It gives you faith in the future of the world. This is what I decree, on the Anniversar-eeee, of my son's 21st Birthday.  Thanks for being here, Miles, and being a stellar son for two-decades-plus..& good luck in your return to LeMoyne, for the climax of third-year classes.

That's it for now, Business is picking up and the Spring market is well underway, well in advance of any improvement of the weather. 

I wish you all well till next time, when a musical topic of some sort will be explored...

Ciao-- Wayne, of Saratoga

Copyright 2013 Wayne N. Perras

AS OF LATE NOVEMBER, EARLY DECEMBER 2012... I can't imagine there is any town in the entire Northeast, aside from NYC itself, that has this many commercial construction projects underway on a per capita basis, not to mention those recently completed.

Most of the major projects, as usual, are under the aegis of Sonny Bonacio, in partnership with various other entities.  He has finished the 124-apartment building on the site of the former Price Chopper parking lot on Railroad Place, and it now starting in on the already-famous 11-Screen Bowtie Cinema Complex at the north end of that site, abutting Church Street.   He also erected the long-discussed and oft-delayed parking garage on Woodlwan Ave. in record time, once they let him get going this summer.  Adding about 440-car  free parking within a block of Broadway was pure genius by the City fathers, and will only help ignite the success that was already smoldering downtown.

Only someone of Sonny's current stature (and no one before him, in my time here) could have gotten swiftly-approved permission to block off one lane of northbound traffic in the heart of the shopping district, between Gardiner Lane and Caroline Street.   Like a mini-Manhattan construction site, the base pit was dug out 20 feet below street-level, it seemed, so that, when viewed from above, on the south side of the adjoining Walbridge Building, it looked like an archaeological site until they began pour concrete into it, marking the return of civilization on a spot where a badly-designed and then-decrepit parking lot had afforded the homeless a dangerous subterranean shelter for a brief span of  recent Saratoga history. 

Lillian's Restaurant to its south, and The Cantina, to the north, are the ground-level businesses bearing the most proximite brunt of the construction impact, but they should benefit greatly in the aftermath of this grand "fill-in-the-gap" project.  The billboard ads on the fortress-like wire-mesh fencing out front proclaim it will be built in "Summer 2013", and Mr. Bonacio does not make idle promises along these lines. Another banner welcomes you to park instead at The NEW PARKING GARAGE ON WOODLAWN AVENUE, and given how hard a time I had finding a free-spot in said garage a few days ago, I'd say people were getting the message.  I circled upward over 3 levels as you would in a pay-for-parking garage in Albany, and no space was available till I neared and hit the top.  The four-story view from up there, looking over park of downtown and the backside of Broadway, proved to me once and for all that the Facade-Repair-Project signs I had seen adorning the main drag of this town in 1976 had resulted in this, roughly 36 years later-- a substantial and mature, densely-compact City which is entering a new age of prosperity for the rest of the 21st century. 

What you are seeing in Saratoga now is the culmination of a movement that was begun in the late-80's really, when Bruce Levinsky started the condo-conversion trend of infilling the streetscape.  Near downtown Mr. Levinsky turned a beautiful stone church at the top of Caroline Street and Circular into an 8-unit condo project, and did the same with another leftover church on the corner of Spring Street and Regent. He encountered considerable resistance as I recall-- who was going to buy CONDOS in Saratoga Springs?? What a strange concept... and did battle in City Hall on many occasions with the powers-that-be and and disgruntled neighbors on these and other projects.  But the sum total of his efforts was part of the move toward improvement in downtown Saratoga, no doubt about it.

But  it worked with the churches, and buildings that were historic and architecturally unique were put back on the tax rolls and became the home of new-urban Saratogaphiles who wanted "to be within walking distance of downtown" and did not care to own their own lawnmower or snowblower.  In fact, it attracted a type of person who travelled elsewhere in the "off-season" and yet wanted a place for summer use, which had always been a Saratoga tradition anyway.  The difference with condos was that no upkeep was required in the 9 months the owner was away-- for those that could afford the fee.  Eventually, the idea caught on. 

Mr. Levinsky went on to convert a few leftover original Skidmore Campus buildings on Union Avenue and Clark Street (formerly an arts building, with a stucco/tudor look to it) to condos as well, with varying degrees of success.  The it seems almost a decade went by before Robert Israel picked up the concept and used it to continue the condo trend with a then-scruffy-looking lot on Railroad Place, perpendicular to Franklin Square.  That was completed back around year 2000, and then Sonny Bonacio joined the fun and contributed 3 or 4 more projects to fill out that entire block on both sides, before he did 18 Division Street and then Congress Place, adjacent to Congress Park on the former site of the old (and beloved) YMCA.

But an infill project, or a downtown condo, is only as interesting as the urban scene-- if any!-- that surrounds it.   The Bohemian scene that I first encountered here was represented by The Tin & Lint, The Parting Glass, Caffe Lena, D'Andrea's Tavern (where Zack's Stained Glass shop is now), The Golden Grill (now Bailey's Cafe), Barclay's (where Impressions of Saratoga, a gift and souvenir shop now holds forth), Sage's Casa 13, Madame Jumel's (now Dangos), The Montana Book Store, and Saratoga Trader's (the protogenesis of Gaffney's).  There were also music joints like The (original) METRO, Our Place Pub, Jackslands, plus The Tin Shop, but not all of these survived-- and this contingent slowly became augmented by more upscale places.  Sperry's and Lillian's were always there for the semi-genteel set, but then came One Caroline Street, 42 Phila (now gone), Bailey's Cafe, Wheatfields, and Maestro's (when original owner Joe Devivo ran the place), paving the way for restaurants like Chianti's I & II, Forno Toscano, Limoncello (in-filling the spot of an old KFC), Capriccio Saratoga (which was dubbed DINE before), and Max London's.  There now is a mix of old stand-bys mentioned above, and newer, always changing, competition.  The Grey Gelding, Brindisi's, and, recently, TizNow, are among those that have closed in recent years.  Scallions, which once graced Broadway, occupying part of what is now Uncommon Grounds, moved over to Lake Avenue, just down the hill from the Fire Station.  The Irish Times took over the great old brick building that long ago housed the Tin Shop at 14 Phila Street, and has seen a few brew pubs come and go since then.  The Stadium Cafe a decade or so took over a spot on the west side of Broadway formerly occupied by a kind of countrified rock bar of ill-repute whose name escapes me.  But I digress...

The point of this blog was supposed to be the current state of "infill" projects, but sometimes it turns into 35 years of memory lane.

Here are a few more spots changing as we speak:

The long-dormant Ellsworth Ice Cream plant, in the center of the westside, just a block west of Franklin Square, is now under demolition.  The metal cooler sections were shredded for industrial grade recylcing, and they seemed to be sorting the massive debris field into wood frame components, concrete block & slabs, along with the metal pile.  The brick section which was the original office bearing the founder's name, remained last I had looked.  The remainder of that entire block-- bounded by Division/Beekman/& Cherry Streets, and Marvin Alley -- seems to be getting cleared within its fenced area, including the large parking lot and paved truck storage area. 

While some people bemoan the loss of a family-owned business that was an excellent local employer and a vivid part of west-side life for a good part of the past century in Saratoga Springs, the changeover was inevitable, really.  The plant had been a bit outmoded for years, and closed down four years ago.  As witnessed by what I detailed in my last real estate-related blog-- 50 or 60 foot wide lots going for
$100K or more nearby-- this patch of land was too valuable to sit dormant for long.
 The same improvement that took place 12 years ago on Grand Avenue-- when the infamous "roadhouse" Tom's Lodge came tumbling down and some classy new urban townhouses adorned the re-gentrified site-- will occur on a larger scale here.  The advent of the new townhouse project there will reportedly be a collaboration between Peter Belmonte Builders, and The Eastside Group, led by Steve Ethier.  Mr. Belmonte has built hundreds of excellent single family homes in Saratoga County for twenty years or more, appealing to upper-middle class buyers with evolving designs. Mr. Ethier has established himself with infill projects on the southside's previously underdeveloped zone--  contributing condos over near Pennell's Restaurant on Jefferson Street, and a sprinkling of single-family homes in the Doten Ave.area, as well as a nice duplex on lower Warren Street.  Between the two of them they bring liquidity and a successful track record to a project that had hit some snags during the economic downturn for the once-ambitious original developer.  His plan would have been to include first floor retail or offices with residential units above, but that proved impractical compared to the more basic demand for more in-town housing, walkable to downtown.   It will be increasing the core density of population that the local stores and restaurants and bars and retailers crave, the same as Sonny Bonacio's Market Square project.  Saratoga's population, which was static for most of my real estate career, in terms of those "within the city limits"... is now set to increase even more than during the condo-wave.  The upgrade in new housing should continue the boon of the west-side, as myself and others have detailed. 

*

                                              "Pavilion Grand" Back on Plan...

Another long-stalled project has also taken a different tack, given the changing winds of the economy as a whole and Saratoga's specific demands.  Full disclosure here: this project is co-owned by one of the owners of the real estate company I work for-- Ken Raymond, also a co-owner of Coldwell Banker Prime Properties.  At first it was intended to be a ground-level, high-visibility Office for this company, with condos above, a five- or six-story building.  But that was back when CBPP was based in the Post Office on Broadway, at Church Street, before the company took over the lease from RE/MAX Premier at 90 East Avenue, where we are now. 

The site where Pavilion Grand will be built is on Lake Avenue at the corner of Pavilion Place, opposite the Saratogian newspaper's parking lot at 20 Lake, and the well-known Irish pub dubbed The Parting Glass, at 40 Lake Ave.  It will face the still-newish Hampton Inn.  Just to illustrate how much Saratoga Springs is changing: ten years ago there was Mohr's Mobil Service station at 32 Lake, across the street from a sprawling-but-ugly Chrysler Jeep Dealer which took up the whole block where the Hampton & its companion condos at High Rock Ave. now grace the space.  This section was one of the most important infill projects in Saratoga's recent history-- an obvious upgrade in the true core (gut) of the City.

When Pavilion Grand breaks ground on a lot that was purchased from Stewart's Corporation for the mad sum of $1.15 million in 2007, it is now intended for first floor retail, 2nd floor office suites, and upper floor high-end apartments and lofts.  There will reportedly be on-site parking as well.  At the low spot down in the dip between Broadway and Circular Street, another (relative) high-rise will be a perfect balance to the heft of the Hampton Inn across Lake Ave., and will only lend interest and more pedestrian traffic to that area where not just The Parting Glass and Scallions and Jacob & Anthony's now exist, but Sperry's and The Living Room and Dango's are a short block behind there, on Caroline.

As one parking lot there on Lake, and another one on Broadway next to Lillian's get torn up to prepare for a new structure, there is one other lot that has gone the other way, near the Track, which will have higher and more pleasant visibility next year-- when Saratoga Springs will be celebrating 150 years of Horse Racing.  I am talking about the corner of East Ave. and Union Ave., across from the main entrance to the Racetrack, where for years a bereft CITGO station stood.  The ugly block building is now gone.  The busted pavement all around it has been smoothed out and small cedars planted along the back perimeter.  Stewart's Corporation, which was denied permission to put up one of its convenience stores there, should be commended for cleaning up the site, and much improving the view near the grand old tract in the process.

There is more I could add to this list, but I think I have hit the high points, and will update this particular story on a regular basis.  The point is that Saratoga Springs continues to evolve and morph in grand fashion.  As a wise man told me many years ago, long before there was tangible evidence of the recent boom:

"When the rest of the world looks like it's going to hell-in-a-handbasket, this town will be just fine, and thrive..."  (Stafford Rouse, c. 1982)

--Copyright Wayne Perras 2012