dilemma...

Oh boy.

Do I go paddling tonight or do I go to the Brooklyn arena hearing?

Absolutely torn. Cripes. I did sail last night, but it was more of a motor than a sail -- the moon was amazing though --it would have been a PERFECT night for a paddle -- it made me really want to go paddling. Still, I live in Brooklyn, and I'm very curious to hear what people will be saying about this proposed development.

The deal, for anyone who's reading from outside the tri-state area, is that a big developer, Bruce Ratner, wants to build an arena & move the New Jersey Nets basketball team to Brooklyn. The arena would be surrounded by blocks of apartment buildings. I will probably get my okole kicked by various Brooklyn friends of mine for saying this, but to me, the proposed site for the arena doesn't seem QUITE as heinous as the one that was being pushed in midtown Manhattan - I'm SO glad that went away - but - in addition to some railyards, there's a lot of eminent domain involved. It's a nice little neighborhood - people's homes, shops, very nice, classic Brooklyn - & the planned development is kind of a big old THING plunked down in the middle of it. Our borough president Marty Markowitz is utterly enamoured of the whole thing (I emailed him a while back saying that I was really not looking forward to dealing with the crowds & also that it seemed like there should be space there to do something without having to take over homes & shops - he actually called me and left a very long message on my answering machine about how great it was gonna be!), there seems to be quite a strong grassroots resistance, there was a grassroots support group but there are questions about just how grassroots that bunch really is, something about Ratner giving them money...

anyways, it could be a really interesting meeting.

but it's really nice outside.

Oh sigh. I'll probably go to the meeting.

Thhhbbt. Hard to keep a kayak blog if you never get out to kayak.

Of course I did actually do some paddling-related writing over lunch hour today. Just kinda did it on SeaLevel's comments area. This was in response to an article about a guy who rented a kayak, did a lot of things wrong & ended up needing a rescue - the article's over there. This is just the sort of thing that makes me unable to be quiet.