This was unexpected: poking around the Census Bureau’s Factfinder, I discovered that each of the inner-city areas I’ve lived in as an adult is actually less integrated than the suburb I grew up in (where my parents still live). Throws a bit of a monkeywrench into both the ideas of segregated suburbs and of the segregated south, huh?

Or does it just say something about gentrification?

One of the biggest things I’d miss about living in a large urban area would be the ability to get around without a car. Even though I actually have one, I almost never drive it in the city. It’s just too much of a pain in the ass, given parking, traffic, and the alarming recent increase in the number of idiots on the streets. It’s usually easier just to walk most places I go, or sometimes to take a bus. My car is pretty much for trips to the supermarket and, more importantly, for trips OUT of the city.

Tonight, we took BART to Oakland for dinner, followed by a long walk. When I lived in Charlotte, we never took a train to Gastonia for dinner. In Greensboro, a fairly large city, I don’t think any of the bus routes even operate after about 6:00 at night. Tonight’s trip took maybe ten minutes longer than driving would have and the frustration level was almost non-existant.

I love having a car, but I also love not HAVING to have a car.

The last seedy hotel in Hamburger Square closed this week.

Hamburger Square was the closest thing to a skid row that Greensboro, North Carolina ever had. It got its name from two cheap diners, Jim’s Lunch and the California Sandwich Shop, which faced off on opposite sides of Elm and McGee for decades. This was the part of town where the few local drifters and winos lived. Until I was about 25, it was the only place in Greensboro I’d ever been panhandled.

I was always sort of drawn to the area, even as a kid. I liked the buildings and the seediness and the newsstand (with adult bookstore in the back) where I bought comic books and my dad bought the Washington Post. I liked the scary-looking people on the sidewalks and the railroad tracks and the old A&P. We lived in the suburbs, but I always begged to come along for rides downtown. I always wanted to eat in one of those divey old diners too. I never got the chance. This may be a good thing.

My great grandfather (who died about 20 years before I was born) had operated one of the hotels in the 1930s. It was pretty much a brothel, as its residents were largely prostitutes. I imagine my rather austere great grandmother was not amused at the thought of living there, but that’s how things were back then

My mom lived there for a few years as a little girl too. She used to be just a little embarrassed by it, but I think it now gives her just a little pride. We managed to get inside once when I was about 16 (with permission) and I took some great pictures.

My great grandfather’s old hotel is now a restaurant. The other buildings in Hamburger Square are being renovated one by one as expensive apartments, retail spaces, and restaurants. In Greensboro, a city which has bulldozed a disturbing amount of its past, this is probably a good thing, if only because it saves some great buildings.

But I sure do miss what Hamburger Square used to be. And I still find myself looking for it in just about every city I visit.

My heart really goes out to the poor bluebloods in Atherton whose garden parties have been disturbed by construction noise. It must be very distressing to them, and a real comfort to know that their economic clout can put and end to construction on weekends and holidays.

I understand their pain, because my neighborhood faces construction noise every day, and now we’re going to start hearing it every night too, since CalTrans has scheduled freeway retrofit work outside my window from 4-10 AT NIGHT for the next two months or so. I hate to think of the effect this will have on MY garden parties.

Of course, I didn’t pay five or ten million bucks for my house, so my predicament is naturally less important than the one faced by Atherton’s residents. My only consolation is that the yuppie idiots in the shoddily-constructed live/work loft across the street probably will hear (and feel) even more of the pile drivers than I will.

Speaking of idiots, check out David K’s intersting take on these idiots. Yes, I was quoted. Yes, I would have been amused even if I hadn’t been quoted. May be your only chance to read a Carl Jung citation on a smut site.

While you’re looking around, you might also check out this great page on the TenderNob, from a pretty darned good all-around site.

I’m now waiting for the UPS guy to show up. I hate UPS. As a company, they elevate incompetence and bad customer service to epic proportions. But that’s another rant…