My (non)Father's Day + Old UAH Picture

(15:31:25 CDT)

My (non)Father's Day + Old UAH Picture

Yesterday was kind of rough for me. I guess it was a confluence of events. My father died a couple of years ago, in early June, and so we are about two weeks out from the second anniversary of his death. The day before (this would be Saturday) I had gotten a little overexposed to the sun and this is never a good thing for my mental state nor mood. On top of this, a lot of my friends have various levels of drama or micro-emergencies and everywhere in between, so a lot of my chatting and/or hanging out as of late has been me listening to, and occasionally responding to, the negative things of life. Those three things came together and while I was not depressed, I was definitely a bit of a slump.

For the majority of the day, I tried reading. I got a few backlogged blog posts out, and that felt good. I read a bit of news. That was so-so at best. I put off doing a homework assignment. That felt pretty good. Talked to my mom about medical conditions and advice. That was, well, much like talking to a mom about medical conditions and advice.

Relief finally showed up about six in the afternoon. Sarah and I went down to La Alameda and spent more money than we had on food and relaxing. I ordered a Chiles Colarodo and she got some stuffed poblanos (we actually shared, so we both got a bit of both). Mine was grilled steak tips in a spicy (and quite) peppery salsa. Hers was large poblana peppers stuffed with chihuahua cheese and then topped with more cheese and baked. Both dishes were really good.

We then headed over to Salmon Library and parked there, before heading across the campus and across Sparkman and over into the Executive Plaza. That is really an odd place. Lots of tech and tech-ish companies, but the buildings look sort of old and worn out. The parking lots have trash piled up in the corners, and water logged boxes full of construction supplies like siding and shingles. Walking behind the buildings, there are tons of air conditioning units, some of which are broke and laying on their side. Then, behind the first round of buildings, is a retention pond of murky water with strange bubbles and turtles and ducks. The bridges that cross it are all warped and bent. We went across a bridge that looked like it was run down when Reagan was president, and walked to the next pod of buildings, which are octagonal in shape and clustered together. Behind them is another row of buildings. We also had a couple-three security guards start watching us, one of which was walking up and down the outer edge of the parking lot like he was doing laps. We cut back through the place and saw even more rows of buildings. Oh, nearly forgot, one of the companies there is TMI Media. I'm not sure what they do, but it made me laugh.

Then we cut behind 511 Sparkman, which is a strange pair (?) of buildings. One seems to be relatively well kept, and the other one is an older brick building that is built up to it (I suppose I vice versa'd that, it was likely the other building built up to the old brick building). What is weird is, the brick building has well cared for grass, and a dumpster that is full, but vines have taken over a good chunk of it (including a small power station out back). What's more, there was an old, decrepit Huntsville Times box at the back entrance, like the back entrance used to be so popular that there was a call for people to buy papers there? Not sure, but will probably be taken a camera to photograph it if I get a chance.

Afterwards, we meandered around campus some and walked up into the parking garage and briefly enjoyed the view. Talked about a ton of stuff. Went to Frizzles to get custard treats. Came home and generally relaxed/collapsed. I ended up reading a hundred+ pages of The Strain, and avoiding homework, so that was all good.

Today, the UAH Library posted a tweet to an old picture of UAH. This old picture:

If you look to the left and slightly below the center, there is a building that looks like a capital-H with a flattend top, maybe a squarish U, or, as I first thought, like a *cough* Recognizer (you know, from Tron)? That should be Morton Hall. I think. Maybe proto-Morton Hall. I'm pretty sure the building now has a second "prong" and looks more like an "E". Go up from that, and you will see a multistory building with a single or two story building built up to it, like an "L" standing up. That should be Roberts Hall. Finishing out that triangle, about "4 o'clock" from Roberts, would be the original Salmon Library. Slightly down from that is what must be the original flavor of University Center, though it looks smaller by a notch. If you take the line from Morton Hall to the proto-UC, and extend it, you quickly get to Wilson Hall. Then, keep going and you go past what I guess is Madison Hall to the old Research Hall, what is now the Von Braun Research something. Looks like that "suburb in the middle of campus" is there, but I do not see any sign of Southeast Housing, so I guess this predates it? That surprises me, since I thought Wilson and Roberts showed up at the same time as SECH. Of course, there is a chance that those are other buildings that were lated co-opted to be rebuilt as campus buildings.

I am also curious that there seems to be a lack of a Jordan Lane surrogate. I'm sure Jordan Lane is there, but it looks like it used to run down the middle of a big block of houses. At some point between that picture and now, a lot of houses seem to have been bought up and turned into businesses and car crashes. Get it? Holmes and Jordan lane intersection? Car crashes? Anyhow, sharp-eyed Huntvillians will also notice the lack of 565 out behind the campus. This should be before it came through and changed the layout of the town.

Si Vales, Valeo

• See other entries for June 09
• See Journal Archives (sorted by year then month)