News Around Town, January, '06

While I would love to comment on the Olympics, which I think are one of the five best things to happen in sports, along with the Super Bowl, World Cup. NCAA tournament, and unblurred female streakers, I know that I am unfortunately in the minority. Not many people want to here about my thoughts on Croatia or their ski team. And honestly, though I think bobsledding is totally sweet, I can't tell you the first thing about it.

On the other hand, I do know a lot about the city of Victoria. I can give you my take on the local news! Of course, if you don't like my totally biased version of what's happening in town, perhaps you can look at www.victoriagazette.com for someone elses totally biased version of whats going on in Victoria. Let's leaf through the Victoria news together, shall we?

• The Gazette has it's feature on Valentine's Day, and specifically, a family in town, that I won't name, because other than the Gazette, they aren't public figures, and I'm not in the business of naming anyone from that paper, unless they are. In that vein, let's leave the columnists alone too. But anyways, the lead story is about Valentine's Day. Hard hitting stuff.

• The Carver Country Sheriff has introduced some new officers to the city of Victoria. The most notable crimes are speeding and running the stop sign at 81st and Trillium. (I made the second one up. But seriously guys, do something about it, eh?) Thankfully, we're no Waconia, with it's vandalism, or Chaska with it's murder.

• There was something about a new fee for adding turn lanes and stop signs. How much does a stop sign cost, exactly, that an entire city needs to be billed for it? Also, if you are printing articles online that have previously beein in print, do us all a favor and get rid of the hyphens.

• There is an entire webpage devoted to the construction of a water treatment plant. The city council was photographed waving for the camera. Holy moly. Can you imagine if the town was actually large and these people had things to do?

• Most of the paper was pretty dull this month. New tax bylaws. New plans for the city that will never reach fuition. A new finance clerk. Oh, and Victorians are, in fact, in favor of water and roads. What is this, Sim City?

• The most important thing to me, and probably anyone I know that reads this is that there is a new ban on snowmobiles brought down from the Hennepin County Regional Railroad Authority on a trail that runs through town. This trail was known as "The Trail" all my life, as it terminates within blocks of my house. It's awesome. Personally, I'm delighted that there won't be snowmobiles on the trail anymore, because at the end of the trail, the sleds don't just turn around, they buzz my neighborhood like idiots. Of course, the realistic part of me says if they aren't on the trail, they will be riding along highways like idiots. That's how people get hurt.

So that's it, the January news from Victoria. The sad thing is, this wasn't a slow month. - Ryan