Boy, this sure turned out to be some week, didn’t it? And not in a good way.

The week started out well enough. On Monday our months-long dry spell was finally broken when snow fell in the capital city. It was one of our stereotypical storms where it falls and melts all in the same day, but it did mark the first precipitation we’ve had since October, I believe. It ended a record-breaking drought, the longest wintertime drought we’ve had in quite some time, and the first December with no moisture since the 1800s. So a little bit of snow was a welcome sight.

I spotted this tree carving along Curry St, at Rupert’s Auto Body. I’ll have to keep an eye on it; looks like it should be interesting when it’s all finished.

Thursday started out ordinary enough. The winds were blowing hard enough to send small dogs skittering down the street, but that’s nothing new around here. In the afternoon, though, a small fire sparked at the north end of the Washoe Valley. Normally a little fire in a flat field would not be a problem for the local fire departments. Fires like that are sparked and put out all the time. But with the brush dry from a prolonged drought, and the high winds whipping around, the fire got out of control before anyone could get there. Within minutes the fields were fully engulfed, and it blew through the  housing developments in Washoe City before heading up and over the hill into Pleasant Valley. The time that it took to go from tiny spark to raging wildfire was a matter of hours. It ravaged Pleasant Valley, and by this time the highway had been closed down and nearly every firefighting resource in the area had been called in. It wasn’t until later that night, after the wind died down a little and a light rain fell, that they got any kind of control over the fire. And it wasn’t until Saturday that they got it contained and reopened the road. The final count was 3,177 acres and 29 structures lost, most of that in the first 8 hours. Before they finally got it under control it had crested the mountains and was on its way down into Reno, threatening the Galena area. Luckily firefighters were able to stop it there. It’s pretty wild to have such huge fires so late in the season. Normally the major fires are over by September. This year, though, the summer was calm and the major fires were in November and January, with a few smaller ones along the way like the one off Deer Run Road three weeks ago. What a strange winter we’ve had so far, and it’s not even over yet.

So I know you’re thinking the site is probably dead. It isn’t, but it has been in a coma for a long time. There’s no particular excuse, it’s just that as life changes your priorities shift, and Around Carson has kind of been bubbling lower and lower on the list for no real reason. The site has always been driven by me seeing something or reading something, and having this desire to talk about it and share it. Lately though that desire has given over to ennui, and when I see something or read something my response is a hearty, “Eh.” In a word, folks, I’m in a slump.

Probably the best way to break a slump, though, is just to push through it. I always said that I would never kill Around Carson, it would always keep going. I also said, though, that I would never force myself to write anything that I wasn’t into, because that kind of writing never turns out well. The result is a kind of heat death that has affected a lot of my online endeavors; not dead but drifting. Part of it comes from me getting a second job last year, so I don’t have the down time that I used to. It’s fun and exciting because I’m in a spot now where I never have nothing to do, but it’s also bad because now I don’t have time for the things I used to do when I had nothing to do. I think it’s time to start pushing, though. I always liked doing Around Carson, and I was proud of the work I do here, and from recent comments it sounds like a lot of you like it to. So maybe it’s time to stop being selfish and live up to the commitments I made when I started the site.

A lot has been going on during my slump too. The Nevada Appeal put itself behind a paywall, and at the same time kind of insinuated that bloggers (and people who read the paper online) were freeloaders, so I made a vow not to write about or link to any of their articles ever again. I barely even read the paper anymore, even though I get it at work every day and I could easily thumb through it if I wanted. I just lost the taste for it. I may be missing out on some news that way, but I learned a long time ago not to worry about missing news. The big stuff always finds itself to your ears somehow, and the rest of it turns out to be not that important in the long run. So there hasn’t been a single day in the last three months that I’ve missed the Nevada Appeal. (P.S.: Irony? The Record Courier article? That first announced the paywall? Is now behind a paywall.)

The Carson City IHoP reopened. I didn’t write a lot about the shooting, because I don’t like to write about things that make me uncomfortable, but the reopening was an excellent act of defiance, a way of saying that we weren’t going to let tragedy stand in the way of us enjoying some pancakes. It was a vocal rebuttal to those people (myself included) who said they shouldn’t reopen, at least not there, because the ground had been tarnished. It turned out to be more a symbol of resilience, though, kind of like rebuilding the World Trade Center, and in the end even I came around. I haven’t been back to eat there, but I no longer think it was a dumb idea for them to reopen.

Locals BBQ closed. This was sad, because I was always a fan of Locals, and it was a place to get some good Q. Even sadder because it seems like the closing may have been related to the IHoP shooting, during which Locals was hit with bullets while the owner and his son were inside. I never did find out the exact reasons for the closing; either the owner didn’t want to make them public, or a missed them as part of my Nevada Appeal boycott, but if they closed because of some lingering PTSD after the shooting, that’s just another sad footnote to an already sad story.

Other brand new restaurants opened, too. The Red Hut Cafe opened where Woody’s used to be, down south right next to El Charro Avitia. That’s a Lake Tahoe chain, with a few locations around South Lake. This is their first location down in the valleys. And also the Busy Bee Eatery moved out of their Winnie Lane location and opened up in the Carson Mall, right out front where the Deli Francesco used to be. It haven’t tried either of the new places yet, but it’s good to see people taking a bet on Carson City and opening new establishments in town.

Not everyone is willing to bet on Carson City. I already wrote about how Noble Studios, who I had admired for years for being a locally-focused web design business, ditched Carson City because it wasn’t “big enough” for them. I think they got seduced by the draw of the outside world; maybe they weren’t as locally-focused as I thought they were. On the other hand, though, DeBug Computer just recently closed their Reno store so they could concentrate more on servicing their Carson City clients. Turns out Carson City people and businesses are more loyal customers than those in Reno. Go figure. So saying that you have to get out of Carson City to be successful is kind of short-sighted.

After a couple of years of talking about it, the Nevada State Prison was finally closed and all the inmates shipped off to other facilities. The prison is a piece of Nevada history. Originally it was one of the first hotels in the state, built on the site of a hot springs. Abe Curry, the founder of the town, built it himself in the late 1850s. When the first territorial government needed space to meet in, he rented out rooms at the hotel. And eventually the government decided they liked the place, buying it outright and turning it into the state’s first prison. Now it’s closed, and its future has been unclear. There has been talk of opening it as a museum, kind of like Alcatraz. I think this is a great idea; there’s a lot of stuff there the public has never seen. Beyond the prison buildings there is the hot springs itself, a cave with prehistoric footprints, and the stone quarry where Abe Curry got all the stone needed to build the Capitol, the U.S. Mint, and the V&T Roundhouse. This site is perfect for a museum; I hope it’s able to happen. With Carson City still having the state’s only execution chamber, though, the prison system might be reluctant to give it up entirely.

In construction news, the freeway bridge at Clearview finally opened. Between that bridge and the one at Saliman, that officially marks the end of Phase 3.01 of the freeway project. It also, as far as I know, means that they’re out of money for the freeway and they won’t be building any more for a while. So who knows how long it will be before their shiny new bridges actually have traffic travelling under them. Also the Olive Garden opened, the new Discount Tire down the road opened, and the new gateway signs are taking excellent shape at the North, South, and East edges of town.

I’m sure there’s been so so much more that I’ve missed. I need to not let this happen again; I can’t get so far behind! I’ve missed doing Around Carson. I think it’s time to get back to work.

It’s been a very long time since I’ve been excited about a new phone book coming out. I pick up the phone book maybe three times a year, for those few rare things that it does more efficiently than Google. But if there’s one thing that you could do to get me excited about the phone book again, they did it.

They put my photograph on the cover.

Early last year they reached out to me to submit some photos for consideration. They always try to stick to local photographers, and the work I do here at Around Carson caught their eye. So I went around the area trying to find something that could represent Carson City. I photographed deer running on the west side, I took pictures of the Capitol and the Laxalt Building, I got snow and pogonip and expansive skies. But then I remembered this lonely flag along Hwy 50 heading up to Spooner Summit. Someone put this flag up a few years ago and I always wanted to stop and get a photo, but it’s tough to stop along that stretch of highway. Last winter the flag disappeared and I thought I lost my chance, but when summer came around it came back. So it’s not just some forgotten flag; it’s kept up by somebody. I finally did pull over along the highway and took some photos, mainly to capture an image of the flag in case it ever went away again, but also in the back of my mind I was framing the shots so they would look good on the cover of a phone book. You know, just in case.

Fast forward a few months, and what do you know, the flag was the one they liked best. I think it works well for a cover photo, much better than last year’s dismal shot, that’s for sure. And they were good enough to give a shout out to Around Carson on the first page, so maybe that will drive some new readers to the site. Hi to all the new people!

For the last few weeks the Brewery Arts Center has been under wraps, its entire east wall wrapped up in scaffolding and tarps. They’ve been resurfacing the bricks; since the building was built in 1865 the brick wall has gone through all sorts of degradation. It’s been painted, it’s been re-mortared, it’s had grout sealer applied, it’s been painted again, it’s put up with 150 years of being beaten down by the elements. Brick walls can last a long time, but they can last even longer if they’re properly taken care of, and this wall has not been treated the best over its life.

So they decided to give it a makeover and fix it up. After it was wrapped up in tarps they removed the old paint, they took off the grout sealer, they patched up the parts that needed repair, and they used modern techniques to preserve the wall and give it the best chance of lasting as long as it can. And then they took the tarps down for everyone to see.

And holy cow it looks good! I had heard that they were going to leave the paint off so the natural color of the brick could shine through. This building has been yellow probably as long as I can remember, but of course bricks are usually red. So now the whole east wall is a nice brick red, the way it should be, the way it was when it was built and probably for decades after. They didn’t go overboard either, and try to make it look brand new. These are old bricks, and they’re definitely showing their age. but what they did works with the flaws instead of trying to cover them up. I think it looks pretty fantastic, and hopefully we’ll see them wrap up the other walls soon and give them the same treatment. This new look gives the whole building a freshness that brightens up the corner. It’s good to see our old buildings getting fixed up and staying vibrant.

It seems like forever that we’ve been hearing about the gateway signs that Carson City is going to be building. The signs are going to be on the major highways coming into town, and they’ll be standard “Welcome to Carson City” signs. I’ve seen a lot of proposed designs over the years, but they never actually built them. Until now.

Construction has finally started on the signs. They’re building at the south end of town, across the street from the Fuji Park fishing pond, and out Hwy 50 east at the top of the hill before it descends into the valley. They’re supposedly also building along 395 at the north of town; I haven’t been out that way to see it yet. There have been signs welcoming you into the Carson Valley for years now, so Carson City is a bit overdue. But this is a good idea. It’s better than the standard green highway sign every town has, and it’s a big step up over the old white metal signs that used to welcome you to Carson.

I always thought of Noble Studios as a hometown pride story, a company that was making it work in Carson City. This web design firm used to be located right downtown, in a historic old building across the street from the Capitol Plaza. Having them there made me a little prouder of downtown Carson, that it didn’t have to be all bars and casinos, that real companies could be located there too and make it work.

Well, Noble Studios has betrayed us. They moved out of Carson City and into a bland office building in downtown Reno, one of a handful of companies that are making up what this article calls “a small tech cluster” that is coming together. The article is all rah rah positive about the development, but I can’t help feel anything but sadness. Carson City apparently wasn’t hip enough for them, wasn’t trendy enough or close enough to the airport. Instead of a local company serving local needs, like I thought they were, they turned their gaze outwards, at places like “Utah, Phoenix, L.A.,” places far away from here. And suddenly being in Carson City was a liability, not an asset. I guess I can’t begrudge them for wanting to spread their wings and follow the money to the big cities, but I thought the promise of the internet was that location didn’t matter anymore, and that you could live where you wanted, instead of where you had to. If a company, especially an internet company, feels like they have to move to downtown Reno (ugh) to make it big, well what’s the point of technology?

Seems like far too many people chasing the money these days, and Carson City is the worse for it. I’m proud to work for two companies that are based in Carson, serving people in Carson, and that are committed to making the community a better place. Around Carson has been kind of dead lately, and I’ve been feeling bad about that, but my mission here has always been about making the people that live here feel more connected, and I don’t want to lose sight of that goal. Hopefully I can muster up some mojo and get things hopping around here again.

The immediate shock of the IHOP shooting from last month is starting to wear off. The restaurant still hasn’t reopened yet, and I don’t know what their plans are for the future. The fence has come down, but the windows are still boarded up from the inside. Repair crews have been in to repair the damage done during the attack, so maybe the company is committed to reopening and is just waiting for an appropriate period of time to pass.

The community, though, has built this makeshift memorial in the parking lot, leaving behind flags, teddy bears, pinwheels, and handmade signs. It’s pretty moving to see it there, and I hope it can last for a while, and nobody decides to clean to clean it up as trash. That kind of thing has happened before, too many times.

We’ve known that our governor Brian Sandoval is a fan of Google’s self-driving cars. He’s gotten legislation passed to make them street-legal in Nevada. So Google’s people must be fans of Carson City as well. These photos sent in by a reader shows one of the robot cars parked in the Casino Fandango parking garage, spotted just a few minutes ago.

You can tell by the license plate that this is the same exact car pictured in this Google publicity photo.

I guess the advantage of taking a self-driving car with you when you go to get your drink on and hit a few royals is that you always have a designated driver! You know that tomorrow morning this will be in the car’s search history.

So far we’ve been lucky and fire season has avoided us here in Northern Nevada. Yesterday we were reminded that one of the perks of summer is the constant threat of wildfire, as a blaze sparked up south of Gardnerville, threatening homes and closing Highway 395 for a few hours. It looks like now the flames have been pushed into the hills, where they are continuing to run free, but they’re away from civilized areas for the moment.

Here are a few pictures from last night and the view we got from the valley of the flames looming over us.

If you drive between Minden/Carson Valley and Carson City at all, your commute is about to get a little more complicated. A major repaving project of the whole road, all the way between the two towns, is about to start. It’s needed badly, because in many spots the top layer from the last time they repaved it is starting to peel off, and the old asphalt from the time before that is showing. This repaving project has been a few years coming, and it’s about time.

A major repaving project is messy, though, and disruptive. If they’re smart they’ll do most of the work at night, like they did last time. Even when they do it at night, though, the signs are still everywhere during the day. Cones everywhere, half-paved sections of road, and even parts where the old asphalt has been scraped off. I think it’s unavoidable that there will be some lane closures during the daytime, and the traffic on 395 is always heavy enough that dropping it down to one lane could slow things to a real crawl. It will be worth it when it’s all done, but there’s going to be some pain while we get there.

Plus, they’re starting in the middle of August? Really? I know we had a long winter this year, but we’ve had hot and dry weather for two months now. Why couldn’t they have started earlier? Beginning a major project like this so late in the season means they run the risk of not finishing before winter hits, especially if we get an early cold season. We don’t want to go through a whole winter with the road half-finished. They better jam on this double time to make sure it gets done!