What is in an 'E'????

You will see a sign on the guest door of the Casimir Pulaski Post Number One of Polish American Veterans on Central Avenue. The sign reads that the permitee it one Micheal E. Rix.

Many people have asked what is Michael Rix's middle name. He is evasaive in his answers. He isn't ashamed of his middle name, but he isn't proud of it either.

Various guesses have been offered up, all them worng. The 'E' doesn't stand for Edward, Edgar, Ernest, Ethelred, Ethelbert, Ellsworth, Ebert, Eccard, Edmund or Ezikial. Your intrepid correspondent has combed through the microfiche files at Lawrence and Memorial Hositpal dating from the 1950s. It iturns out that Micheal Rix shares a middle name with a city in Oregon. Geography students will know what it is. Those how are unfamiliar with Oregon's urban areas will have to resort to an old atlas or Google for the answer. If you are too lazy, it is Eugene.

Gang Infiltration

Planet Fitness, a new gymnasium that has opened on Boston Post Road just over the New London border in Waterford, has rules for people who want to exercise there. The rule is that members cannot wear, skull caps, do-rags, bandannas, or other gang-related insignias.

A pale, Irish-tinted, fresh-faced, freckled, red-headed woman went one morning to Planet Fitness wearing her frayed, beige bandanna to keep her sweaty hair out of her face as she pushed her muscles to the limit on the elliptical machine. The well-trained staff at Planet Fitness recognized trouble when they spotted it. The beefiest bouncer on staff approached this woman and told her she had to remove her beige bandanna. She asked why. Well, the jig was up. She was informed that Planet Fitness Headquarters had been informed that a chapter of the notorious Bolton Notches had begun to infiltrate southeastern Connecticut.

The Bolton Notches are one of the toughest gangs in Connecticut, based in a clubhouse on Birch Mountain in Bolton, Conn. They are known for mailbox thrashings, newspaper theft, forest bonfire keg parties and other mischief too horrifying to report. Their colors are a beige bandana matched with lavender medical assistant uniforms purchased at Wal-Mart. The Planet Fitness Intelligence Department is up to date on gang activity in Connecticut. They know how to recognize trouble as soon as a hint of it happens.

The woman was asked to remove her bandanna and never wear it again on the premises. She is also not allowed to wear lavender scrubs, of the type typically worn in medical offices, either while entering or exiting the premises. Planet Fitness is a place known to be free of criminal activity and the proprietors intend to keep it that way. If you are thinking of wearing beige or lavender to exercise at Planet Fitness think twice. This is a clean gymnasium and they intend to keep it that way. They don't check for steroids or foul language, but they like to keep the color scheme royal purple and sweet corn yellow.

Keep your gang colors in your car. Build your fighting muscles at Planet Fitness, a Judgement Free Gym, just don't let on why you are going through your cardio routine or weight training. You are advised to keep your switchblade in your glove compartment as well.

The Shaw Street Stangler

Shaw Street runs between Garibaldi Fountain and the first traffic rotary before Pfizer's Global Research and Development Headquarters. This is old Italian-American turf. This is a working class neighborhood. The Nutmeg Bottling Company used to produce locally brewed sodas for distribution around southeastern Connecticut and the region's Pepsi bottling plant was located here in an old cow pasuture before it relocated to Norwich in 1977. This was a carbonated neighborhood full of fizz and vapors and sweet, fruit flavors.

It is an office park now. This was once a stronghold of Demorcratic politics, where the local party bosses were guaranteed votes and city policy was made. Now it is an office park, as sterile as anything found off a highway exit ramp in Waterford or Groton, in East Lyme or Uncasville or Stonington outside of Mystic's tourist brochures.

What was once a part of New London's guts, is now a complex of six tinted glass and brickface, three-story boxes without any stories in them. Who strangled Shaw Street? Look no farther than City Hall.

Crystal Clear

The air in New London today is as clear as the crystals hung on the world's largest chandelier which happens to hang over the food court in the Waterford Mall. Yes, the Crystal Mall rivals Versialles, the way New London rivals old London.

Whalehead King found a shiny dime today in the Henny Penny parking lot. He held it up in his ungloved hand, risking chillblains, to marvel at its sparkles that caught the New London sun as crisply as the clouds overhead and the whitecaps in the Thames River. The dime made him squint to see it. He had found it tails-up, the New London way, so he knew today would be lucky.

How lucky was today? It is too early to tell, but if it is like another New London Day, it will be full of surprises, good news and constant change. It will be chockablock with timely topics addressed in depth. It will inform, delight, entertain and inspire. A New London Day will encourage effective democracy to action. I am sure this Day will be full of what makes New London, Conn. what it is.

You cannot make a phonecall with a dime, not even at the Dutch Tavern. You can't put a price on New London, Conn. The city has a value hard to measure with coins. Every yardstick aligned next to New London has the wrong marks. The voice of a people is written on paper. It is inscirved on the charter and the newsboy will bring a more current form to your doorstep. New London, Conn. is a place that wears its heart on the inside of its sleeve.