ACLO Musical Play About West End Was Completely Inaccurate

Dear Roger,

I think the Alameda Civic Light Opera needs to choose better shows to put on. Last weekend, I went to see their musical play about Alameda's West End, and it was completely inaccurate. As someone who lives on the West End, I can tell you that although the neighborhood is certainly full of cheeky young Encinal Jets, there is no school with sharks for a mascot at all. You'd think that anyone writing a play about Alameda would know that. Whoever put that West Side Story together needs to learn more about our town.

And now I hear that the ACLO is trying to do some production about Greece. Well, if their ancient history isn't any better than their knowledge of Alameda culture, that won't be much good either. ACLO should stick to things that are entertaining, and not try to go all highbrow with history and current events. I don't want to have to think and get annoyed when I go to a show, I just want some singing and maybe a polka or two.

Yours truly,
Lynn Irving

Jimmy Ward: "The Li'l Jets Review: That Stupid Excuse for a School Noosepaper"

Dear Mr. Grumbel,

I hate being stuck in stupid summer school. Why don't they stop making school go longer, and make it better like with longer recess and better lunch food? During the reguler school year I was always asking the student counsil why there isn't more pizza for lunch and they never even answered my question. They shook there head and rolled they're eyes and shrugged thier shoulders and said that the student counsil doesn't control lunches. What kind of answer is that, they are hiding sumthing. Their a bunch of bums that should all be in peached!

The Li'l Jets Review: that stupid excuse for a school noosepaper. A lunch crysis in our school and all the stupid editer of the stupid Li'l Jets Review can do is write a bunch of stupid words in stupid ink on the stupid editoreal page telling the students of our school to tighten there belts and take they're punishmint while the stupid student counsil ignores that thair is no pizza for lunch. Well hardly any only on Wensdays. I bet that stupid paper never won an aword not even a small one, not like your gonna Mister Grumbel, your great.

Its just like that stuck-up Elena whose always the teachers pet. Las year, our teacher Miss Harris let her help with sorting out homework papers just because she was the first one to finish her reeding. That is not fare, and also its not fare how much homework we have to do. Now that Miss Harris has taught Elena how to sort homework papers, Elena's going to start making us do even more homework that everybody but her is going to have to do. Thats because Elena is just mean and Miss Harris is mean also and prolly told Elena how to make up homework questions the same way Miss Harris does. We already have too much homework! Its going to be horrible! All the kids need to know about this and tell there parents how mean Elena is so she can't do mean things to us.

Sincerly,

Jimmy Ward

Big Praise for a Big Thinker with the Courage to Think Short-Term

Editor,

David Williamson is a great Alamedan. His letter about trees got right to the root of the problem. Who else in our community has the courage to reject long-term plans for "improvements" that won't benefit anyone right now. We need more big thinkers like him! It's that sort of bold, short-term thinking that has made our great country what it is today.

When I look around me at all of the things people spent tax money on long ago, I realize what complete idiots they must have been. What do we need all those bridges across the bay for? No-one who was so gung ho to build them is alive today, especially not the yo-yos who thought the Golden Gate bridge was such a good idea even though it comes nowhere near Alameda. It would have been a lot simpler if they had just floated some logs out across that stretch, if it was so important for them to get from one side to the other.

And then there's the Hoover Dam, our Interstate Highway System, and, on a grander scale, Alameda City Hall. What's the point of any of those things for the people who paid hard-earned tax money to finance them? Take Alameda City Hall, please. Why did those boneheaded citizens back in 1896 bother to build a structure substantial enough to outlive them all? They could have pitched a tent, passed Alameda's Tartan-limiting "Measure Angus," and called it a day, but no, they had to waste precious taxpayer dollars on frivolously permanent things like stone and brick!

It's only through constant complaining, backed up by the finest facts we can devise, that we can prevent this kind of flagrant misuse of public funds. Thank goodness for the intrepid Mr. Williamson, and thank goodness for the Alameda Daily Noose and you, Mr. Editor!

Sincerely ticked off,
Karl Kurzfristig

How Many Alamedans Will Be Alive After 40 Years to "Benefit" From Newly Planted Trees?

Rog,

For far too long, Alamedans have failed to ask the tough questions about trees. I am the only person who is independent-thinking enough to ask why the City is spending our tax money to plant spindly little trees that will take decades to reach their full height, if they survive that long. How many people who are paying taxes now will be around to "enjoy" these full-grown trees forty years from now?

Even if a tree planted today escaped such pitfalls as Squirrel gnawing and runaway skateboard damage, and reached its full height, how do we know that there would be any actual advantages to having it in our town? Some claim that trees prevent run-off, but I tried pouring some water over a tree in my neighborhood and it was abundantly clear that all of it was running right off the branches and straight down the trunk. Then there's some nonsense about trees providing shade for parked cars along the streets. Well if it's so important to have shade for parked cars, why isn't the City bringing in fully grown trees so that we can have that shade without waiting for it? With today's technology, it can't be difficult or expensive to uproot a twenty-foot oak tree, truck it into town, and excavate a space for it on some shade-deprived street.

But it's blatantly obvious to anyone who is paying even the slightest amount of attention that everything is always a zero-sum game - where somebody wins, someone else loses. So who loses? Right-Thinking Alamedans. Planting trees shifts the so-called benefits of forestation away from Right-Thinking Alamedans and over to the Squirrels and the politicians who do their bidding TODAY, with a promise of a future benefit (shade for the precious parking spaces in front of one's house) to Right-Thinking Alamedans in the future. 40 years into the future - the typical lifespan of a quote-unquote tree. How many people are aware that Muir Woods is NOT covered by Alameda's Master Tree Plan, and yet Muir Woods was somehow able to grow redwood trees big enough to drive a car through without government subsidies? Were there any studies done to examine if the recently planted trees at Wood Middle School could have been similarly grown without the use of funds from City coffers?

Consider the Master Tree Plan - a scheme more diabolical than any hatched in the twisted brain of the most evil of Squirrels. What's in it for the current residents of Alameda to plant any trees at all? While Big Arborist and the Squirrels will make money and gather nuts, respectively, and the politicians will declare "victory" over "sun" and for creating shade, we Right-Thinking Alamedans will have to wait 40 years to see any supposed protection for the precious parking spaces in front of our houses. How many Right-Thinking Alamedans reading this can imagine that they will be here in Alameda 35-40 years hence to realize the so-called benefits of these trees when they mature?

Dave Williamson

Scoop! of Crisco® Icing: When Squirrels Attack a Sacred Alameda Instituion

Mr. Grumbel,

Are you not the person keeping track of the travesties perpetrated by Squirrels? Have I got something for you! Squirrels attacking one of our most cherished values! That's right - marriage.

Here's a picture of a dastardly Squirrel trying to take by force what it can't (and shouldn't) have by law: a tasty wedding cake.



Marriage is a sacred institution defended as the cornerstone of society, and the law makes it clear: marriage is defined as between between a person and a person, not a person and a Squirrel!

Keep up the good fight!
Mrs. Ada Witherton

Letter-Writer's Epiphany: The Alameda Daily Noose and I Were Right All Along! Oh, and Some Stuff about Trees

Dear Sir,

I was one of those who thought your defense of Measure Acorn a bit extreme. All that going on about Squirrels and whatnot seemed, well, a bit unseemly. That all changed last weekend as I walked down one of our fine Alamedan boulevards and felt a chill run down my spine. Was it a Squirrel? No - a Tree!

You see, a Tree was wantonly, with no consideration for me, casting its shadow onto the sidewalk, blocking the sun and making me cold. I know - such effrontery! But it actually happened! Now I see why you are so concerned about Squirrels. Squirrels move acorns, acorns grow into Trees, Trees make our world colder, and what do you have? Global Chilling! Their coniferine agenda is clear! Where is Al Gore when you need him?!? Accepting some bark-covered award or other, no doubt, ignoring the needs of the fine people of Alameda!

Never relent, Mr. Grumbel, never relent!

Saunders Van Melderkind

Germans on the March

Roger,

Like you, I am an aficionado of the exquisite foreign fare the island's many exotic restaurants have to offer. From Ole's Hardtack & Gruel Shack to Gym's COffee Clutch, I enjoy all attempts to prepare food for me, as long as they don't get too uppity with the spices.

Imagine my shock while walking past the doomed-to-failure Megaplex-That-Everyone-Hates when I saw a new German restaurant opening right beside it: Burger Meister. (I think it means "Master Of The Burger"!) I happily perused their menu. Burger Shyster is more like it! $8 for a chili dog? How can our elected officials let such thievery go on within the city limits?

If it weren't for that other great German place, Der Wienerschnitzel, I would seriously question our fair island's relationship with the Hun. Why, I can get almost 10 chili dogs there for the price of one at Mister Burger! It's also much better than that Spice Camper place near the hippie prune store, and a far smaller chance of bagpipes!

To arms, to arms,
Fletcher Binghampton