Colorado Springs – Life In A Word

Wings and Prayers

One of the must-sees on a visit to Colorado Springs is the campus of the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA). Besides a training ground for our future servicemen and women, the Academy hosts a high school, an airfield, two golf courses, and a cohesive campus of modernist buildings spread across 18,500 acres of the Rocky Mountain Front Range. But one structure stands prouder and taller than anything else on the property. Welcome to the USAFA Cadet Chapel.

If you’re following my blog posts on architecture (as I complete my LEGO Fallingwater model), you’ll recall Thorncrown Chapel from a few weeks back. The USAFA Cadet Chapel is a much bolder animal, dominating the academy campus skyline and easy to see from miles around. Instead of Thorncrown’s wood and glass, the Cadet Chapel boasts an impressive open structural steel frame, married with tall triangular stained glass windows. The main sanctuary is big enough to seat 1,200 (or about 25% of the USAFA student body); more like a church than a chapel. Frankly, the only thing the Cadet Chapel has in common with Thorncrown is its design inspiration: France’s Sainte-Chapelle.

The distinctive feature of the USAFA Cadet Chapel is its seventeen spires, marching from one end of the building to the other. The bold design, by architect Walter Netsche, took a little getting used to when the doors opened in 1962. Visitors described the structure as a giant accordion made of triangles. I describe it, more fittingly, as a series of fighter jets standing on their tails.

If you haven’t visited the Cadet Chapel you probably don’t know its biggest secret. It’s a chapel for all faiths. The main sanctuary is just the top floor of a multi-level structure. Hidden below, you’ll find individual chapels for Catholics (500 seats), Jews (100 seats), Muslims, and Buddhists. You’ll even find two “all-faiths rooms” and an outdoor area for “Earth-Centered Spirituality” (reserved for you Pagans and Druids). It’s safe to say your acceptance into the Academy has nothing to do with who or how you choose to worship.

The Cadet Chapel is a structural marvel, assembled from precisely one hundred prefabricated tetrahedral panels. Over the years its popularity has grown to where it was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2004. That’s the good news. Now for the bad. The original design called for a series of gutters to transfer water away from the building, instead of streaming directly down its panels. But the gutters were scrapped due to budget constraints…

Mistake.

Sixty years of caulking and recaulking leaks finally forced the Academy to close the chapel for remodeling in 2019. Now for the really bad news… they’re still not finished with the repairs. In fact, you won’t be able to walk through the doors for another four years. What’s taking so long? Adding all those gutters, the ones that were supposed to be there in the first place.

One more bit of bad news (the fighter jets are really nosediving). Getting construction workers to the tops of the chapel spires meant building an entire hangar-like structure around the chapel. No joke – they put the whole building in a box. In other words, not only can you not walk through the doors, you can’t even see the Cadet Chapel today. Trust me, absence makes the heart grow fonder. Mark your calendar for 2027, because you really need to see the USAFA Cadet Chapel. It’s the only place I know where a (jet) wing and a prayer can be found in the same place.

Now for the latest on LEGO Fallingwater…

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LEGO Fallingwater – Update #4 (Read how this project got started in Perfect Harmony)

I’m starting to wish I’d built Fallingwater before the LEGO Grand Piano, so you’d see me taking on a greater challenge versus the other way around. 30 pages (or 33%, or 118 minutes) into the build, this is what we have:

Pretty much the same as last week. We added some landscape to the left side (the green/brown pieces), more landscape along the back, and we raised the foundation a little higher up off the water. We have yet to see any of the distinctive house itself. Not so adventurous.

What IS adventurous is sifting through 800 tiny pieces. There’s no logic in how they were bagged (thanks, LEGO!) so I end up just spilling everything out onto the desk, searching for a lot of minutes followed by building for a few minutes. Tedious? Heck no, this is a blast. If “tedious” entered my brain I’d have no business building LEGO models.

LEGO Gamble House by Grant W. Scholbrock

Props to my college buddy Bruce for sharing this photo, an example of a custom LEGO build… and one you can’t buy. It belongs in a museum if you ask me. There are pedestrian model builders (yours truly) and then there are professionals. Way to go, Grant!

Tune in next Thursday as construction continues! Now for another nod to Frank Lloyd Wright…

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

I’m not a big fan of museums. Maybe that’s because, as Frank Lloyd Wright said, a lot of them look like “Protestant barns”. No wonder New York City’s Guggenheim Museum is radically different. When Wright set out to design it in 1943 he vowed to “make the building and the paintings a symphony such as never existed before in the World of Art”.

I can’t describe “The Goog” any better than the website of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. Their words: “… a white ribbon curled into a cylindrical stack that grows continuously wider as it spirals upwards towards a glass ceiling.” In other words, you the visitor climb in circles ever-ascending, enjoying the art as you go. The Guggenheim was the first museum design where the “physical home” played an important role in the experience of the art itself. If you’ve ever been to a museum that deserves a similar description, you have the Guggenheim to thank.

In closing I ask, is the Goog significant enough to earn a spot in the LEGO Architecture series of models? Why yes, it is!

Some content sourced from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation website, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Floral Fire

Billboard ranks “Firework” as Katy Perry’s best-selling single, with millions of downloads since its 2010 release. The self-empowerment tune “skyrocketed” to #1 on Billboard’s Top 100 at the time and ranked in the top five on twenty other charts worldwide. “Firework” also “sparked” an award-winning music video, and Katy has since performed the anthem live at two presidential inaugurations and during the halftime show of the Super Bowl. Searching Wikipedia for “firework”, therefore, it comes as no surprise to be asked, “Do you mean the song or the low-explosive pyrotechnic device?” Today, I choose the latter.

For the first time in countless July 4th celebrations I can’t speak to having seen a single overhead firework display this year. No giant “willows” with their graceful descending trails of sparks; no “peonies” where those same trails radiate in straight lines from the center; and no “horsetails” (my favorite) where each trail bursts a second time, followed by a crackling, glittering shower of fire. Also, no “grand finale” where it looks like the entire sky is splitting open to some fiery furnace beyond.

From the vantage point of our house, we used to count on the fireworks show from the nearby U.S. Air Force Academy. That show has been canceled for the last ten years because of budget cutbacks. We also used to bring blankets to the shore of a nearby lake, where we were treated to a “small-town” fireworks display funded by donations from the public. Today, that display has been swallowed up by a bigger all-day “Festival on the Fourth”, where you pay for parking and walk a mile or two just to secure a spot on the lake several hours ahead of the fireworks. Even so, we thought we’d see bits and bursts from one of the other nine shows scattered around nearby Colorado Springs. Nope, not so much as a snap, crackle, or pop.

Palmer Lake, CO 2022 fireworks display (photo courtesy of local resident Bartley Willson)

Fireworks are nostalgic for me, with two distinct memories from childhood. The first, in the 1970s, brings me back to the beach of the Pacific Ocean in Los Angeles. Back then the only commercial displays seemed to be over the ocean. My parents would grab a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken and several blankets, and the whole family would find a place on the beach where for several hours, we’d eat and play as twilight became dark, in anticipation of the late, late fireworks show from the end of the nearby pier.

The second memory, a decade later, also brings me to the Pacific Ocean but to a beach further south near San Diego, where we’d shoot off our own fireworks (from the “Safe and Sane” boxed collections my dad brought home every year), followed by an overhead display from the nearby county fair. Every childhood July 4th was the same: food, fun, and fireworks; lots and lots of fireworks.

In 1976 – America’s bicentennial year – the firework display in New York City included an unforgettable “waterfall” effect off one of the bridges. This year, that same July 4th display (sponsored by Macy’s) ballooned to a two-hour televised extravaganza with over 2,000 blasts and effects per minute. I’d say Macy’s department stores and their profit margins are doing just fine, wouldn’t you?

I shouldn’t be surprised to learn fireworks were invented by the Chinese (well over a thousand years ago) but here’s a less-obvious bit of floral fire trivia: Disney is the largest consumer of fireworks in the world. It used to be – back when their single amusement park was California’s “Disneyland” – you’d only catch a Disney firework show on summer evenings (directly above Cinderella’s castle), and only if you stayed until just before the park closed. Today you’ll find displays at any one of the twelve Disney parks, in any month of the year. For the record, only the U.S. Department of Defense purchases more explosive devices than Disney.

There’s more firework trivia, of course. The very first iterations were empty bamboo shoots, creating a mild popping sound when ignited because of natural air pockets. Seeking more pyrotechnics, the Chinese added explosive chemicals to the shoots to create firecrackers”. Eventually they figured out how to launch and propel their creations, and the overhead fireworks display was born, in an impressive rainbow of chemical colors. But take note; you won’t see a blue firework very often. Blue requires an infusion of copper at just the right temperature, and the “cool” color tends to get lost next to the “hotter” reds and yellows.

I’m still puzzled why I didn’t hear so much as a “BOOM! BOOM! BOOM” aftershock (to quote Katy Perry) of a firework display this year. Maybe most of my fellow Coloradoans kept the bursts and blasts to the ground instead, from what they purchased at the local firework stand. Those of you living in New Jersey, Massachusetts, or Delaware can’t relate because consumer fireworks are illegal in your states. Not so much as a sparkler in your hand. (Which may be a good thing since sparklers can heat up to 2000 ºF) So you probably did what I did this year – simply watch a recap of the Washington D.C. grand finale on your smartphone. It was the only floral fire I could find.

Some content sourced from the BuzzFeed article, “17 Things You Probably Never Knew About Fireworks”, the Macy’s Fourth of July Fireworks website, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

This is Dough-NUTS!

Earlier this week, Krispy Kreme held the grand opening of its newest store just a few miles from my house. You’d have thought the first customers through the doors won the state lottery. I’ve never seen such an amped-up bunch of doughnut-lovers, at least the ones who stepped up to the television cameras. Even the news anchors caught the fever, practically giddy with their coverage, which in turn had me thinking, “Hello? Isn’t there anything more important going on in Colorado Springs?” Welcome to America, where the opening of a fast-food restaurant makes headline news.

Full disclosure: I’ve had a Krispy Kreme doughnut and they’re positively scrumptious. Put a box of the original glazed in front of me and I’ll polish off at least half of ’em. But that was years ago, back when Krispy Kreme was new and novel. Today? I take ’em or leave ’em, and apparently I leave ’em because I can’t tell you the last time I ate any brand of doughnut. Regardless, doughnuts aren’t really my topic today; doughnut customers are. Specifically, the ones who would get up at oh-dark-hundred just to say they’re among the first through Krispy Kreme’s doors on opening day.

Maybe these nuts for doughnuts are the same people who purchase tickets to the opening of a feature film; the ones who wait hours in line, watch the sold-out midnight show, then fall into bed bleary-eyed at 3am. I want to get down on my knees and plead with them, “Hey you, the movie will be shown a hundred more times and will be just as good as the first showing”. Why give up a good night’s sleep to say you saw it first? Krispy Kreme will sell their doughnuts for years and they’ll taste just as good next year (and the year after that) as they do on “Grand Opening Day”. Why the rush?

Here’s something else I don’t understand. This same fast-food frenzy applied to Chick-fil-A, In-N-Out Burger, and two weeks ago, Whataburger when they opened their first stores in town. The local news gave us updates for months until their “big days”, then cars backed up by the dozens through the drive-thru, then all you’d hear from neighbors was, “Did you hear what just opened?” like it was the juiciest bit of gossip ever. I can think of a dozen local, family-owned restaurants opening in the past several years, and not one of them earned the same hype as these national-chain fast-food commoners. It’s like we Americans are addicted to fast food. Which of course, we are.

If I’d kept the local news on all day Tuesday, I would’ve seen the same on-the-spot reporter at Krispy Kreme, giving updates every two or three hours on the progress of the grand opening. Instead, I just pulled up the news channel website and watched her short videos, one after the other after the other. This reporter was at Krispy Kreme the entire day (that’s 5:30am-10:00pm for those who are counting). She managed to look as fresh and bubbly with the first interview as with the last. Probably hyped up on doughnut sugar.

At least she was getting paid. Those first customers chose to be there voluntarily, which leads me to this question: what does the rest of your day feel like when you’ve been up since 3:00am? One customer thought to pack pillows and blankets into her car for her three (pajama-clad) kids, so they could sleep while her husband waited in a line so long, the camera couldn’t find the end of it. Another customer looked and talked like he’d just received his U.S. citizenship from a very faraway land, espousing the merits of the Krispy Kreme over the lesser doughnuts of his homeland. A third customer, several dozen-doughnut boxes stacked carefully in her hands, boasted how popular she was going to be when she showed up at work (and between you and me, she looked like she’d had plenty of Krispy Kremes already).

Here’s my favorite part of this “news story”. This isn’t the first Krispy Kreme to open in Colorado Springs. Years ago, when KK doughnuts were a new rage, Colorado Springs got its first store. A few years later it closed. After that, you could only get pre-boxed Krispy Kremes at a few convenience stores around town. After that you couldn’t get them at all. Then several years pass. Now we’re doing it all over again, with the same amount of hype. To which I conclude: What does it say about your city when headline news that doesn’t deserve to be headline news becomes headline news all over again?

Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write.

Some content sourced from the Krispy Kreme website.

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Lego Grand Piano – Update #11

(Read about how this project got started in Let’s Make Music!)

Today’s build stepped away from the body of the piano (again). Bag #11 – of 21 bags of pieces – started out as a bit of a mystery. If I’d looked closer at Mr. Instruction Manual, I’d have known what was coming. At some point in the thirty-five-minute assembly it became obvious. Keys, Francis Scott. Piano keys.

I put the Bag #11 keys side-by-side with the piano in the second photo so you can get a sense of scale. They’re kind of a “module”, which should insert comfortably into the front of the piano later. My next several builds may be more of the same. Remarkably, the keys are weighted just like a real piano. Press one down and the red-tipped weight way at the other end brings it back up. Think see-saw. Lest this photo has you thinking “easy build”, Bag #11 contained well over 200 pieces.

Running Build Time: 8.7 hours. Musical accompaniment: Ravel’s Boléro (twice through). Leftover pieces: 2

Conductor’s Note: Boléro is one of my favorite classical pieces and Ravel’s most famous work. Listeners either love it or hate it. It’s a fifteen-minute variation on two themes, with the orchestra building slowly to its crash-bang finale. The repeating themes are so simple I could probably play them with just the few piano keys I built today. Ravel composed Boléro as a ballet (it does sound like a dance or a march) and predicted most orchestras would refuse to play it. He was wrong. Boléro also gained considerable notoriety as the theme music for the 1970s movie 10, starring Bo Derek and Dudley Moore.

Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

As the Wind Blows

Pagosa Springs, a small town in Colorado’s San Juan Mountains, lies 7,100′ above sea level. It is locally known for its therapeutic hot springs. Pagosa also boasts a 35-year business called Rocky Mountain Balloon Adventures, which takes you an additional 3,000′ above sea level for “360° views of the beautiful valley [of Pagosa] below”. Maybe you’ll climb aboard their basket and go for a float someday. If you do, my apologies for not joining you. I’d rather spend my time in the terra firma of Pagosa’s hot springs than the “terror for-sure-a” of a balloon ride above.

Logic says my fear of heights denies me the thrill of soaring up, up, and away. Not true. It’s more about the “gone with the wind” part (sorry for that, Scarlett). Once the balloon reaches cruising altitude, the pilot extinguishes the fire and Mother Nature silently takes over. Then your high-rise ride gets a little ~~dicey~~ unpredictable. It’s the whole not-knowing-where-you’re-gonna-end-up moment that gets me.

Possible outcomes as follows. You descend gracefully into a farmer’s field with the “chase vehicle” just minutes away. You zip hundreds of feet up and then hundreds more down, depending on which fickle air stream you encounter. Or, you float all the way to nearby New Mexico on the strong winds we have here in Colorado. All while literally hanging by threads.

Speaking of New Mexico, it wouldn’t be the worst destination for one of Pagosa’s rogue hot air balloons. After all, the International Balloon Fiesta – the largest gathering of balloonists in the country – takes place every October in Albuquerque. At least you’d have professionals on the ground eager to reel you in. Also in Pagosa’s favor: small town = few power lines. Hot air ballooning and power lines do not mix. See here for what happens when they do (coincidentally, just weeks ago in Albuquerque).

Despite the occasional crash landing, ballooning fatalities are rare. In fact, hot air ballooning has been designated “safest air sport in aviation” according to years of statistics, and a Swiss aeronautics organization whose name I can’t pronounce. So maybe it’s not so bad if you never have a neatly paved runway to greet your touchdown. Heck, Pagosa locals love it when a hot air balloon ends up in their backyard. They come running out of their houses to greet you with coffee and cinnamon rolls. Breakfast? Hmmm. Maybe I can do this ballooning thing after all.

I may not be a balloon flyboy but that doesn’t mean I’d rain on a parade of those big colorful inflatables. After all, hot air balloons first appeared to me in favorite childhood stories, like L. Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, William Pène du Bois’s The Twenty-One Balloons, or Albert Lamorisse’s priceless (and wordless) The Red Balloon. They show up as flying animals every Thanksgiving Day at the Macy’s parade in New York City. As well, right here in my hometown we have an impressive showing of hot-air balloons every Labor Day weekend, including a “balloon glow” in the evenings. Now that I think about it, there’s probably more ballooning going on in this part of the country than anywhere else.

Colorado Springs’ beautiful balloon glow

It’s not as if hot air ballooning is some new-fangled sport (hoverboarding, anyone?) The first untethered hot-air balloon flight took place back in the eighteenth century. Hundreds of commercial operators offer hot-air balloon rides in the United States, and hundreds more are private owners. Add a little perspective and 3000′ above Pagosa Springs is nothing. The world record for the flight height of a hot-air balloon is 64,980′ (like a Mt. Everest on top of a Mt. Everest).

Strict definitions aside, the altitude record for hot air ballooning is about to topple, in a big way. A company called Space Perspective is now taking reservations for its giant hot air balloon, launching in early 2024. You, seven other passengers, and your ~~pilot~~ astronaut will take a six-hour ride in a pressurized capsule under a giant balloon… to the edge of the Earth’s atmosphere. A seat on “Spaceship Neptune” costs $125,000. Operators are standing by to take your payment…. for 2025, that is. The 300 seats offered in 2024 are long gone.

Maybe 3000′ above Pagosa Springs doesn’t sound so bad after all.

Some content sourced from the CNN Travel article, “On sale: $125,000 balloon trips to the edge of space”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

It’s Raining DONUTS!

Pikes Peak, the majestic 14,000′ mountain nestled in the Colorado Rockies west of Colorado Springs, is getting a major makeover. Okay, maybe not the mountain itself. Her nine-mile Cog Railway reopens in 2021 with new train cars and tracks to carry visitors to the summit. Her Manitou Incline, the one-mile ladder-like hiking trail up her eastern flank, has been improved for safer climbing. Finally, her Summit House visitor center is being replaced – sixty years after the original – with a state-of-the-art glass jewel.

“America’s Mountain” in the Colorado Rockies

Local folks like me only have one concern with all this Pikes Peak activity: the donuts. What’re they gonna do about the donuts?

You can drive, hike, or take the Cog Railway to the top of Pikes Peak, but you’ll always stop in at the visitor center once you get there. It’s the only thing you’ll find on the tiny summit beside the stunning views of the world below. Maybe you’ll purchase a supremely tacky, overpriced souvenir while you’re there. Maybe you’ll need a bathroom break. Whatever you do, you will buy a donut. Pikes Peak’s “World Famous” treats are sort of a reward for making it to 14,000 feet. Okay, so they’re not Krispy Kreme but they’re not terrible either. Just eat them at altitude. Once you begin your trek down the mountain they collapse into a mushy mess and they’re awful.

When I first realized the Summit House was getting demolished instead of remodeled my thoughts went straight to the donut machine. What are they gonna do with the donut machine? The “Belshaw Mark VI Donut Robot” delivered its final batch last week before someone pulled its plug. The Mark VI is a mechanical marvel. It can produce 700 donuts an hour (the summertime demand for Pikes Peak). The Mark VI endlessly dispenses the raw dough, four rings in a row, and creates donuts through a conveyer system of automated frying, rotating, and dispensing. Leave it on for twenty-four hours and it’ll pile up 17,000 of the little buggers.

Meanwhile, the new visitor center is getting a new donut machine. Maybe it’s the latest model of Belshaw’s Donut Robot and makes 1,000 donuts an hour. Maybe the donuts taste more like Krispy Kreme. Whatever it can do, this machine is a beast. It’s so big they had to use a crane to lift it into the building before they even closed up the walls.

If I’m the old Mark VI Donut Robot I’m not happy about being replaced, not at all. I mean, c’mon! I faithfully produced thousands of donuts day in and day out for decades! I’m not yesterday’s news just yet! Why not let me keep my job instead of giving all the love to a newer model? No siree Bob, I’m not gonna take it. I need to make some sort of statement. Y’know, demonstrate the extent of my discontent.

OH MAN, can’t you just picture it? Standing down on the streets of Colorado Springs one morning you suddenly hear this massive BAH-BOOM from the direction of Pikes Peak. Sidewalks start shaking and people start pointing. You look up to the mountain and there’s a freaking volcano blowing its top. A huge column of fire rises to the heavens. The sky is instantly air-brushed with white smoke. There’s ash raining down in every direction. Except, wait, it’s not ash… it’s…. it’s…. it’s donuts.

The rain of donuts, of course, is the Mark VI Donut Robot run amok. In its desperate attempt not to be overlooked it starts making donuts like crazy. Four at a time, plop-plop-plop-plop, fry, rotate, dispense. Faster and faster and faster, until its conveyor builds up a big head of steam and starts to break apart. Then the whole thing just blows up. Boom.

Down and further down come the donuts. Rolling by the hundreds along the hiking trails. Bobbing down the rivers and creeks like mini inner tubes. Ricocheting off the pine trees as they come back to earth until they just go poof! in a cloud of powdered-sugar smithereens. Decorating the rocks and trees with a cream-filling look of snow. Piling up in the low spots like generous helpings of oversized Cheerios. Clogging up the cog railway so the only way the train gets to the summit is for the riders to get off the train and start eating.

The Mark VI may have imploded but man what a way to get noticed, right?

Truth be told, there’s an aftermarket for Belshaw’s Mark VI Donut Robot. Do the Google search if you don’t believe me. A used one runs $15,899 plus $600 for shipping, and don’t look now; they take credit cards and toss in a limited warranty! Just think what you could do with 700 donuts an hour. All you have to do is click the “Buy It Now” button on the website. But one more thing before you do. Ask the seller if their Mark VI has given them attitude lately. Like it used to be on a majestic mountaintop or something wacky like that.

Note: This post would not even be a whisper of a thought were it not for Robert McCloskey and his wonderful children’s book, Homer Price. In Homer’s short story “The Doughnuts”, a restaurant donut machine goes bonkers and starts dispensing hundreds upon hundreds. How the town resolves this donut deluge makes for a great story. Thanks, Robert.

Some content sourced from the KKTV 11 News story, “Final Batch of Pikes Peak Donuts…”, and the Thrillist.com article, “You Can Only Get These Incredible Donuts at the Top of a Mountain in Colorado”.

Golden Thrones

Every now and then the local news sneaks in a headline to showcase our local taxes and fees at work. A swanky new visitor center is about to open on the top of nearby Pikes Peak (14,115′) at a cost of $66M. A 250-ft. pedestrian bridge ($18.7M) spans gracefully over downtown railroad tracks, connecting a public park to our new U.S. Olympic museum complex. Increased traffic between Colorado Springs and Denver demands eighteen miles of a new interstate toll lane ($350M).

Colorado Springs must be “flush” with tax dollars

These efforts make sense and I’m happy to write the check, especially with the potential for revenue in return. But another project almost escaped my news feed and Mr. Mayor, I respectfully request a refund. We now have a fully-accessible fully-automated self-cleaning public toilet in a small park on the west side of town. Cost: $415,000. That’s a lot of loot for a little lavatory, no?

On the surface our golden throne sounds good enough to try out. It’s a touchless experience once you “ring the doorbell”. The restroom door opens/closes automatically with a sanitary-sounding hiss. Circulating air and classical music provide the white noise you need to mask unpleasant sounds. A bathroom “host” politely pipes in over the loudspeaker to let you know you have ten minutes to do your thing. After that – reason in itself to just go and watch from a distance – all doors open whether or not you’re buttoned up. Talk about getting caught with your pants down.

Our city’s posh powder room comes from Exeloo (great name), an Australian company expanding its footprint into North America. Besides the fancy features mentioned above Exeloo toilets are self-cleaning, which means they spray down and disinfect their surfaces from wall-mounted nozzles every thirty uses or so. Makes me think the kitchens of Chinese restaurants could use the same treatment.

Learning more about Exeloo didn’t make me feel better about my tax dollars. That’s because our city purchased the fanciest model on the website. Exeloo offers six different “loos”, with names like Jupiter, Saturn, and Orbit. (Why – because going to the bathroom should be an out-of-this-world experience?) Our city chose the model simply named “Fully Accessible”. It looks at least twice as big as any of the others.

Let me contrast our wet-n-wild washroom with a more modest facility. Just off the coast at Torrey Pines in North San Diego County you’ll find a nondescript public restroom sandwiched between the beach and the parking lot. It has no doors. It has no music. It’s made entirely of cinderblocks and concrete. A flush requires an “old-fashioned” pull of the handle, emitting just enough water to clear the bowl. The sinks offer just a trickle of water to rinse your hands. The mirrors aren’t mirrors at all, but big polished metal panels with just enough of a reflection. This restroom is bombproof.

Which brings me to my point. Why does my town need a bathroom good enough for a visit from Queen Elizabeth when cinderblock and concrete will do just as well? The Torrey Pines toilet probably cost $4,000, not $400,000. The next headline I’ll be reading is how a homeless person took up residence in our well-to-do water closet and now our tax dollars have to fund a full-time attendant as well.

The first time I experienced a first-class public flush was in Boston Common. Smack dab in the middle of the grass expanse and softball diamonds we found a restroom similar to an Exeloo, only more like a double-wide RV. It was a welcome sight after hours exploring the city on foot. An attendant sat quietly on a nearby park bench, keeping an eye on things. And the cherry on top of this sanitation sundae: the facility was sponsored by a non-profit called Friends of the Public Garden. Not a tax dollar to be spent.

Could’ve had this whole house for less than our Exeloo, Mr. Mayor

Since we can’t go out to dinner or see a concert or even go to church this Christmas, I think I’ll take the family to see our sparkling Exeloo public restroom instead. Maybe they’ve scented the circulating air to smell like Christmas cookies or pine trees. Maybe they’ve switched out the classical music for holiday favorites. Hopefully they’ve dressed up the attendant to look like Santa. It’s the least they can do for my tax dollars.

Some content sourced from the 11/6/2020 Springs Magazine article, “At Least We Have a $300K Bathroom”.