Opinion- Daddy Warbucks
BIKES, BLUES AND BBQ COMING AND ALSO THE COMPLAINTS
Ah…Fayetteville has already had one football weekend (Troy) with two more home stands—Kentucky and North Texas looming as we finish out September—but the Bikes, Blues and Barbecue festival has folks already talk, talk, talking.
Seems like the Randal Tyson Track Center and the Washington County Fairgrounds will be the hives of activity for the motor revving bikers. The Tyson Center will be an activity center for commerce (i.e. commercial booths and vendors) while the fairgrounds and other areas will be home to tents, RV’s and camper trailers. No one, as of yet, but give the organizer a day or two, has announced a projected attendance. But give that number quite a bit of reality leeway. Every year the organizers are glad to spout off the number of bikers, bikes and attendees that they can in no way prove. Let’s hope cooler, calmer, more reasonable heads will give out conservative numbers of realistic proportions for the 2007 BBBQ crowds.
It is an event that does good for several nonprofits. Let’s all hope the amounts available to those groups increase, well, like the crowds we are expecting for BBBQ. And after the little late summer drama at Eureka Springs with the Hell’s Angels reunion, let’s hope crime and meanness is kept to a minimum.
FLIPPO’S BACK
Pat Flippo, once the nursing home king over in Mountain Home, and once the director of the state Veterans home here in Fayetteville, is opening a
Senior Activity Center in Johnson. Looks like it may be a senior day care center. More later.
NEW DOG DIGS
The opening of Chubby’s Coney’s at 3878 Crossover in Fayetteville, along with a catchy telephone number, 582-4DOG has been announced. Daddy W. will have his with all the fixin’, onions and plenty of brown mustard. They are all to howl for, Daddy W. has heard.
STRIKING A DEA
With all the bad blood between some banks and developers, it was good to see some positive press in a easing of the tensions. LandQuest
Bank will work with Liberty Bank on some foreclosures in Benton County. That’s a positive spin on what many predict as more really tough times ahead.
HOME GROWN
The NWA Naturals didn’t have to look too far away to nab a turf manager. The team hired away UA turf baseball manager Monty Sowell, a native of Fort Smith. Sowell has been all over the baseball map with AA and AAA clubs in Fresno, Calif., Colorado Springs, Colo. and Midland, Tex. Look for emerald green fields at the soon-to-be-completed ballpark in Chickendale.
REUSABLE BAGS
The old joke about Arkansas luggage (those plastic Wal-Mart bags) may soon be a thing of the past. The world’s largest retailer has announced it
will (of course) sell and market a reusable bag in the future. But it may take a Herculean effort to get rid of the once blue, then green, now white plastic bags that fill our homes and litter the roadsides.
IN CATALOG
Fayetteville artist George Dombek has one of his signature still life watercolor prints being marketed in Acacia magazine’s fall issue. The
catalog filled with items for the mind, spirit and body, is hawking Dombek’s print “Now Be Here,” a 40 x 20 framed for $129. It is something to see.
SKY BAR VIEW
One of the grandest eating and drinking venues in NWA is bound to be the not yet quite open SKY BAR at the new Shogun Restaurant near the NWA Mall’s backside (toward Johnson). The building, which does not look like the surrounding strip mall design at all is unique. And the view from the bluff, even looking south towards Fayetteville is worth a look see.
DILLARD’S DIP
Watch for the stock of the Arkansas based Dillard’s Department Stores to continue to sag as critics of the closely run family business are a drag on Wall Street investors. Will the company be sold? Doubt it. But Dillard’s folks could benefit with some fresh management blood. That would make the bottom line better for everyone.
WELCOME SAM’S CLUB
The long awaited new Sam’s Club will open today in Fayetteville at the intersection of i-540 and Ark. 112. Fayetteville’s gain in cash registers ringing that will bring in more tax dollars for the city is indeed Springdale’s loss of the same, since the Springdale Sam’s Club closed on Wednesday. Let’s just hope that all the stop lights out along 112 will help ease the traffic flow.
