Monday Musings.

With all the driving I do with my daily commute, I use a variety of methods to get the time to pass quickly.  Or, at least, interestingly.  Recently, I've been thinking about street signs - their names and how they got them.  I must pass two Sunset Streets - there's a Victor, a Bonnie, a Stuart, a Stewart, etc. 

There's a Bonacre.  Which, I assume, was at one time a "bon" acre.  Now it is a small, crowded plot filled with double-wides.  No longer "bon".  And how about Clearview Road?  Maybe once, but now there's no view.  And Westfall Road.  It is neither west nor is there a body of water nearby - let alone 'falls'.  Some take on an air of grandeur:  Wuthering Heights Blvd.  Oh, really?

I grew upon on Southwood Drive.  It was a perpendicular spoke off Irving Park Blvd.  Irving Park Blvd. was not grand.  There was no park.  It was pretentious.  At least Southwood was 'south' and there was a 'wood' at the end of the street.

How about some honesty in street names?  How about "Stinky Street" - that road that runs near the big dairy operation?  Or "Bottom Out Road"?  Or "Noview Avenue"?  Or Rottenview?  Or Smogline Lane?  I would love to come across a Lois Lane....

When I was a toddler (many moons ago), we lived in a rough-hewed little development in the South.  There were long, dirt roads with deep ditches on either side.  I, apparently, had the 'itch' to know what was on the other side of those ditches and caused my mother no end of anxiety.  One crisp, winter's day, I decided to toddle off, pick up a pal on the next street and head West.  I believe there was some idea that there was a store that had candy in that direction.  My mother had no idea what happened to me, and spent a frantic half-hour searching the neighborhood before she called my father in a panic.  Luckily for me and us, the store owner (I had actually made it there with little whatshizname) did not give me candy and sent me packing home.  A neighbor recognized my red snowsuit and plucked me off the rim of the ditch and brought me home.  I was never allowed out of my mother's sight after that - and she actually leashed me on occasion.

I believe this started me on a) my lifelong nomadic life and b) my affinity towards dogs.

So, is there a street, avenue, road, lane, or boulevard near you that should be more aptly named?