Neighborhood - Blue Collar

Lock and Key

Here is the last picture in my neighborhood series, I promise. :-)
This is a photo of the old Schlage lock factory that used to be headquartered in this neighborhood. It has been closed for many years now and there are always occasional meetings held about how to use this land. It would be great if it could be turned into a nice area for shopping and relaxing like the Ferry Building. Perhaps that is expecting too much.

By the way, I went to Banana Republic today to see what type of clothes they were selling this fall season and I was not impressed. The clothes were all 70's inspired silky thingies that are supposed to pass for professional tops. If there's one thing I don't like, then it's silky tops! Since when did it become appropriate to wear shiny and shimmery clothes out? It reminds me more of underwear and intimate wear. In addition to the silky tops, I saw some of the sweaters with big plastic buttons on them that just looked incredibly cheap. The only thing I saw in the store that was decent was a pair of trousers, but I didn't buy anything today. Maybe I will have more luck at J. Crew.

Actually, I don't like shopping much. I only go shopping if I have specific purchases in mind. Acquiring material things don't make us any happier. Let's just face the facts. It may make us happier for a brief moment when we have new shiny baubles and toys to play with, but this type of happiness is fleeting. Accomplishing goals that you've worked hard towards, learning something new or having a good conversation with friends is much more rewarding in my humble opinion. But all of these things take time that we are all short on, so we substitute this with shopping. It's quick and provides instant, albeit brief gratification. It's all about instant gratification these days, unfortunately. Similar to the slow food movement, I propose that we all start and support the delayed gratification movement.