ocono.com

One of Oconomowoc’s favorite daughters celebrated July 4 in style in New Berlin this year. Who? Bessie.

Bessie is a 2002 Mini Cooper who calls Oconomowoc home. She travels all over the nation representing her own bad self as well as the City of 1000 O’s. She Motors. She’s a car. She has a blog called “The adventures of Bessie the Mini.”

We had a short conversation with Bessie’s owner and Ghostwriter and chief car-warsher Caren Pilgrim a few weeks back. Said Caren:

“Bessie was ordered on my birthday in November of 2002. I had been looking at buying a Mini since about 1999, but as a poor college student it was really just pipe dreams. But out of college with a couple pitiful jobs and a set of loving parents with money to loan, I was able to order the car of my budgeted dreams. About a month and a half of exhaustive waiting, she arrived.

“Bessie was a celebrity of sorts for a while. People would walk up to me and ask me “what is that?” And what celebrity doesn’t have a fan page?

“The site went up after a Road Trip down to Texas and back. Owning a MINI really inspired the trip. Who goes from Wisconsin to Texas with three girls in two days and all our luggage in a little, British sports car? We did. It was great! No boring vacation photos website for us. We’ve got the Adventures of Bessie the MINI.

“Now, I don’t really write from the perspective of Bessie. I’m more of her scribe, since she’s a simple machine with a small vocal vocabulary and prefers to evoke emotion with her performance. I almost wish I too could stop using words as I’m running out of ways to say ‘Bessie drove us to ___.’”

Pilgrim suggests that the most inspiring of Bessie’s adventures are the Ice Cream Escapades.“This is not surprising as everybody loves ice cream,” she said.

We promise, Ocono.com is not turning into a car blog.

Ben Nelson of Oconomowoc is a “Hypermiler.”

Hmmm, should we be worried?

Naw, it’s just a fancy way of saying he drives carefully to save gas…

See the full story: Hypermilers strive for maximum mileage; Increase gas mileage, help environment

Ben Nelson of Oconomowoc does not seem to mind filling up his tank – even going so far as to describe it as “fun.”

…Nelson said it is a win-win situation. Driving differently saves money and is good for the environment.

Although with all the damn detours in Oconomowoc, I don’t know how you can possibly save any gas since you have to go a bit out of your way, no matter where you are going, just to get around town.

Oh, and not everyone is happy about the new roundabout that is coming…

Excuse us if we can’t stifle our yawn at the news that the Oconomwooc School Board might have someone interested in developing the former Oconomowoc Middle School. Wouldn’t it be nice if the former Oconomowoc Middle School were sold to someone who could turn the historic building into something great?
The school is located in a fantastic location, practically in the heart of Oconomowoc. Walking distance to shopping, downtown, highschool, and even (should sidewalks ever actually extend that far) Pabst Farms; the Oconomowoc Middle School would be a great place to put affordable– but not cheap– apartments for those who are serious about making a break from their cars in the suburban environment.
But, our penchant for urbanmilwaukee.com-esque screeds against driving and in favor of mass transit and sustainability aside, Oconomowoc is woefully lacking in “affordable” housing.
In defference to the beliefs of former mayor and good guy Tom Foti, Oconomooc does _not_ currently possess affordable quality housing. There are precious few rental properties within purchasing range of the sub-$40,000 per year set, and of those, there are even fewer that make the consessions nessessary to the non-driving in our suburban, un-transit serviced community.
Nobody is saying what is planned for the former school building yet, but if past precidence dictates future proposals, we have only to look forward to an announcement of a new, soon to be underused shopping mall or senior living apartments.
Why, Oconomowoc, do we only develop for the old or the rich?

What’s that? You are looking for a Forum of Eco-ideas in Lake Country?

We’ll, you’re in luck!

Check out the blog Every Shade of Green. Here’s part of their mission statement:

Living in a more sustainable way is about abundance not deprivation. It can be about more fun, more community, new possibilities and cool technology,

You’ll find mentions of Oconomowoc and neighboring communities. Check out such challenges as “Green Parenting” or “Purge and Reuse” for good info on saving this planet of ours…

Does Oconomowoc have a problem with stray animals?

In the last week we’ve seen a stray dog around the neighborhood, and it’s not looking good. It has no collar, and the looks a little mangy. People have been putting out food and water, but anyone some goes near it, the thing runs off. I tracked it for 2 blocks before it lost me last night. The authorities won’t come to get it unless someone can contain it. No luck on that so far…

So last night we say a cat that kept falling over (if it was a person, I would have pegged it as drunk.) The cat would walk a few steps, then fall on it’s side and roll. I managed to follow it to some bushes where it just laid there. We called the police non-emergency number and they came to get it (as no animal control was available until Monday.)

The police would not come until I had the cat in my possession, so with some gloves, I picked it up, then held it down until the authorities came. We were mostly worried about it getting hit by a car or a Brownberry truck. After talking with someone later, they suggested an ear mite infestation may be causing the cat to fall over. Hopefully the kitty can be helped. Still no luck catching the dog though…

Here’s a short video we shot with a hand-held camcorder at Memorial Park yesterday. See! We really to come into the city from time to time!

We have proof.

So that’s what $24 Million buys you? A Holiday Inn derivative and some-kind of industrial complex, maybe? Where is our Super Mall? Where is our fantastic shrine to capitalism? Where are the world-class amenities and municipal infrastructure? What about publicly accessible green spaces and smart and well designed, pedestrian friendly shopping and lifestyle spaces? Where are the golden “Welcome to Pabst Farms” signs?

Oh, wait… We have the golden signs? Well then. Carry on.

We can’t help but wonder what our friends at UrbanMilwaukee.com think about adding _yet even more_ hotel capacity to a community of 12,000 people.

(Historical note: Local historians will snidely note that the Olympia Resort and Conference Center was at one time, branded as a Holiday Inn. They will then go back to indexing their post card collection.)

Hey Oconomowoc! Have any good storms this weekend? This photo from the AP says you did.

Normally, we try to stick with Creative Commons licensed material here on Ocono.com, but we’re going to make an exception because we like the photo so much, and for a couple of other reasons:

1. The Photographer, John Hart, of the Watertown Daily Times, is an Oconomowoc resident, and one of our very favorite photographers. (At least one of the Ocono.com editors has a thing for The Watertown Daily Times. Don’t ask.)
2. This photo is getting “Digged” right now at the inexplicably popular voting/not voting site Digg.com. If you were to go over to Digg and “dig” the thing being dug, it would have more diggs. That’s a good thing, I guess. Click here if you’re a Digger and want to digg it.

Do you have any good pictures of the storm?

Here’s a shout-out to 19-year-old Joseph Trione, the Okauchee born filmmaker who recently released his third horror film on his website.

We watched “The Old Country Inn” and “Blood on the Glass Slipper” today. We don’t recommend you watch them with kids within earshot. But, hey, it’s horror. And if dropping the F-bomb makes a linguistic case for horror, we’re all for it. While the films we typically watch are a little more cerebral, we’re extremely pleased that the home-brew horror makers of today still make films the caliber of those we were making 15 years ago.

The films are homages to Quintin Terentino-style homages to the “exploitation” films of the 1970’s. What that basically means is that they used the “age and decay” filter on the films. And punch up the brighness on yoru non-apple displays. That’s all I’m sayin.

Anyway, we congratulate the Okauchee native! Call us, we’ll happily talk with you about how Creative Commons licensing can help your films get the attention they deserve.

Why can’t we all just get along?

Back in our days covering the Town of Oconomowoc police department, we would regularly read the police reports detailing the alleged shenanigans going on between these not so neighborly neighbors. They usually involved the words, “I told them to grow up, and told them that If I had to come back out here, someone was getting arrested.”

From the UPI story:

Donald and Susanne Dysland claim in the suits, filed in Waukesha County Circuit Court, that neighbor Charles Stelter “intentionally shines spotlights” into their backyard and has a video camera pointed at their hot tub, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported Thursday.

The couple claims another neighbor, Ronald Borowski, shines spotlights into their bedroom at late hours and has built a retaining wall that encroaches onto their property.

We don’t mean to make light of the very serious crime of tub shinin’, but the a quick check of the Waukesha County Tax Records shows that the three properties in question have values of roughly $400,000 each and are packed into about 200-feet of frontage. Think about that. Each foot of north-south space is worth roughly $2,000. That means you could stack all three properties  on a football feild and still have room for a practice scrimmage in the opposing team’s redzone.

With the properties packed in that tightly, no wonder the neighbors have trouble getting along.