Tag: ohatlanta

Oh, Atlanta #285

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

WSB-TV: Georgia Department of Transportation wants to hear from the pleebs about something that they’re probably 20% already initiated into the project, adding express (read: pay) lanes to the top half of I-285

Shade aside, if there’s one thing that I’ve learned about the way the world works, is that when a big entity, be it a company, agency or local or even national government tries to look democratic and get feedback from the people in regards to a proposed project, it’s all just a formality and done for optics, photo-ops and public appearance.  I’d say probably 80% of the time, the projects are already underway, and the public is being tapped to hopefully identify and shortcomings or oversights, but with the guise of pretending like they care about the opinions of the rest of the poors.

That being said, nobody’s going to convince me that GDOT hasn’t already gotten the ball rolling in regards to adding Peach Pass lanes to the top half of 285, and that they’re tapping into the public at this juncture just to get a feel for public sentiment, with the idea of pivoting or adjusting the direction of the new lanes based on public opinion.

I’m just curious to know where the fuck these magical extra lanes are going to be built, or if they’ll just cannibalize the far-left lanes of existing I-285 and make them Peach Pass only.  It doesn’t take a genius to identify that there’s basically zero space in between the two directions of I-285, so adding extra lanes on the left doesn’t really seem realistic, unless they add them onto the right, and shift everything down, but that would basically necessitate colossal road work to probably 34 miles worth of highway, feeding the narrative that GDOT is completely incapable of leaving well enough alone, and is always working on something at any given time to all but guarantee that Atlanta’s traffic is among the worst in the nation.

Either way, regardless of if the project is or isn’t actually already started, it’s definitely going to happen if it’s already gotten this far, to ask for public opinion, and I think it’s a dumb one all the same.  It’s like city planners or GDOT schmucks have never played an iteration of Sim City at any point in their careers, and never learned that adding moar lanes of roads is never the solution, and only investing in rail or alternative means of infrastructure do cities really grow, flourish and liberate themselves from the rat race of cars and roads.

Besides, even if and when moar Peach Pass lanes are added, it’s not like the city will actually do anything about the inevitable legions of violators that use them without tags.  Last time I heard about the problem with violators is that there were well over six figures worth of violations that were left unpaid, and that was many moons ago, so I would wager that there are probably well over a million dollars by now in Peach Pass violations that will go uncollected.  So that’s kind of like a double fail that will result if and when Peach Pass lanes are added to I-285, but hey, maybe one more lane is what the City of Atlanta really needs in order to unlock the gridlock that many of us suffer on a regular basis.

#TRYHARDSZN2024: Just 17??

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Sós: Westlake High senior accepted into 17 colleges, amassing over $1M in combined scholarship offers

I’m convinced the only thing students are taught at Westlake High is how to apply to colleges, and once they become proficient at it, it’s all they do every day at school.  Because this is the third time this #TRYHARDSZN that I’m dipping into a story about students at Westlake High who have been accepted into a large number of colleges; all of which have made sure to mention the aggregate dollar amount of scholarships they’ve been offered, which is typically the tell-tale sign that most of the schools they were accepted to aren’t really that prestigious.

But to review, we’ve had students that cleared 63 and 50 acceptances, and then one who cleared 50+, so a student “only” being accepted into 17 schools seems kind of booty in comparison, especially seeing as how in their insufferably terrible senior wall where all students humblebrag or be ashamed of how many or how little schools they’ve been accepted into, there were more than just a few that probably had 17+ acceptances posted on the wall.

However, doing the math, and clearing $1M in combined scholarships out of just 17 acceptances blows the fuck out of water compared to the other TRYHARDs of the SZN who needed 50+ schools to clear the $1M mark.  Which means that she’s gotten some substantially heavier ride offers from fewer schools than her peers at CollegeApp High.

One thing that is a little different about this #TRYHARD’s story is that she actually has a pick named, and isn’t just being mum about where she’s going to go because they’re still phishing out a free ride from somewhere; and it’s of all the schools in the country, she’s picking Notre Dame.

I respect the ambition and the absolute get-the-fuck-out-of-the-hood mentality she’s taking, but I have to imagine it’s going to be a tremendous amount of culture shock going up to South Bend.  Especially from southwest Atlanta, going to lily-white Indiana where the winters are going to be brutal and the number of black people is going to feel like she’s going to Norway.

But considering her successes with #TRYHARDing, she’ll probably be alright in the end.  Good on this one for actually stating intent to go somewhere remotely prestigious, and not just doing it for humblebragging attention.

Who needs Vegas when you can just go to Kroger?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I wish I had the imagination to make this shit up: South Fulton Kroger under scrutiny for basically opening a slot machine area inside of the store

I don’t even know where to begin with this.  It’s like a hungry lion jumping into a herd of gazelle but there are so many intriguing options that it’s hard to focus on just one, and they all get away and they go hungry, but in this case I don’t know what angle to start blabbing on about and this post is going to (already) turn into shit.

It’s funny though; I like Kroger as a company.  They used to be 24 hr. mostly until the pandemic so it was convenient to go whenever, and the bottom line was always that my dollars always stretched a little further at Kroger than say, Publix.  But ask anyone I know around here, and the general consensus is that Publix is a preferable grocer, because it feels cleaner and safer and more upscale in general, none of which I necessarily disagree with, but when I’m trying to stretch dollars, Kroger is still superior in that regard.

Granted, I still do the majority of my shopping at Publix, because there are literally two of them equidistant from my home and closer than the nearest Kroger and for daily needs and quick gets, time is money and distance wins out, but sometimes when I know I need to make a big trip, I’ll go out of my way and hit up Kroger, because at least where I am, they’re not as scuzzy as say, the ones in South Fulton are, which I am all too familiar with, seeing as how I lived there for 13 years.

But over the last few years, Kroger hasn’t done themselves any favors in the public eye, especially that of the one that resides over the Metro Atlanta area.  I mean, prior to getting hit with the Gentrification Bomb, we had Murder Kroger in the middle of the city, where at least three murders had occurred.  Then we had the Kroger in College Park that was accused of being racist for implementing a series of security vestibules that basically enclosed shoppers inside aisles to help deter theft.

And now we have a Kroger in South Fulton County that for some reason, has decided to put a miniature slot casino inside their store.  Prizes are not monetary, but they’re still slot machines all the same.  Like, my knee-jerk reaction is just to laugh at the sheer absurdity of such a wild idea, and just how flagrantly targeted it is at feeding into racial stereotypes and not even trying to hide it.

Like really, what the fuck business do slot machines have inside of a grocery store?  Even Las Vegas has steered away from the days of having rando slot machines in every gas station, CVS and restaurant, and you can go into a Smith’s or an Albertsons to get just your groceries and not be tempted to dump the remainder of your paycheck in some crappy Wild Cherry or Double Diamond machine.

But not this Kroger, who set up a loosely partitioned-off area with a few slot machines and some sad stools for people to really post up and get comfortable for a wallet-draining slot session.  And it’s at the front of the store, where it’s easy for people to come inside with the sole express of gambling away their money, instead of like Costco where they make you march all the way to the back of the store in order to get a $5 rotisserie chicken. 

Kroger Casino’s spot is where you’d see some other Kroger or Kroger-affiliated stores set up like a Subway, a Starbucks, or like eye glass repair or a tax prep kiosk; random conveniences meant to make you want to spend a little more time in the store to sway you to shop more on actual profit-making products.  But instead, it’s just a literal hole in the wall guarded solely by some portable plexiglass partitions with a sign on it that states one must be 18+ in order to play.

I’ve been to Krogers in the hood; maybe not this specific one, but I’ve been to some rough Krogers in South Fulton.  Usually against my better judgment, but the desire to save a buck or two, or sometimes they’re just conveniently on my route.  I don’t think for a minute that by the time I post this, there probably have already been at least 100 minors who have meandered into this section of the store without repercussion and drained at least $2,000 by now.  The store is definitely not going to spring extra for some fat slob with a fake badge and can of pepper spray to run security for this section, and it’s clear that the intent of Kroger is knowing that they will help create young gambling addicts, and by being in existence, help pad their own bottom lines at the expense of the poor and vulnerable.

As sad as this all is, and the painfully obvious message that it’s sending, all I can do is laugh about it.  It’s fucked up, but I still find it absolutely hilarious.  Kroger is in the making money businesses, and there clearly no moral or ethical boundaries in place if they have an idea that can make them some, and they’re absolutely not at all concerned over the optics of choosing stores in the hood of hoods to pilot such an idea out.

Next thing we know, there will be some form of legalized prostitution brought to you by Kroger, where customers can walk up to a different loosely partitioned section of the store, scan your Kroger Plus Card, and then chat with some store employee in a blue Kroger polo shirt about wanting to get 30 minutes with Kayla, before going into a makeshift brothel like in Taken to get your jollies off.

And of course, this would pilot in Forest Park, or Covington, Georgia, because the seedier the idea, the deeper into the hood they need to be piloted in.  Fresh for everyone!™

#TRYHARDSZN2024: Dook sounds about appropriate

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Souse: South Fulton teenager accepted into allegedly over 50 schools; claims to have already selected Duke University

Dear god, of all the #TRYHARDs on the planet, here we have actually managed to circle back and find ourselves at the same school as one of the already chronicled tryhards.  Coming out of the same school that earlier this SZN boasted two fellas who humblebragged about gaining 63 and 50 college acceptances, we have yet another TRYHARD who has allegedly been accepted into over 50 colleges herself.

And because the lion’s share of the colleges aren’t worth writing home about, it’s pointed out that the cumulative amount of scholarship dollars that she’s amassed has exceeded $1.3M dollars despite it not working the way people might think it does.

But imagine being the students on the senior wall next to this girl’s, or the two other TRYHARDs who have 63 and 50 schools under their heads, and they’ve only got their three acceptances, and not to any particularly noteworthy schools either.  I can’t imagine it’s a particularly great system they’re running at the school, where such obvious visual measuring sticks are literally pasted onto the walls among their peers.  This is about as close to Japanese score-posting as we’re going to get in ‘Murica.

One thing that is interesting about this particular TRYHARD’s journey is that she claims to have spent a tremendous amount of time; three hours a night over several months, applying to all these schools.  Considering the circumstances, and the desire for lots of schools to be able to check off their Affirmative Action participation, I was under the impression that if one was a poor minority from a title-1 school, all they really had to do was fill out forms as basic as signing one’s life away to an online credit card application to apply for schools, which is how so many of these kids manage to churn out 50+ applications.

However, among those 50+ college acceptances, our TRYHARD in question does appear to be shooting for the moon a little bit, and isn’t just settling for an HBCU offering up a free and clear ride; she has proclaimed her intention to go to Duke, which as much of a school I loathe for their athletics, is still an academically reputable institution, and if for anything at all, getting that piece of paper and gaining access to the alumni network is worth its weight in gold in the long run.

But Duke seems pretty appropriate for this TRYHARD, because like a lot of the tryhards before her, she’s got that air of insufferable humblebraggart already down, and that’s precisely the type of people whom Duke would be a great fit for.

The jury’s still out on whether or not she’s getting a free ride or not, I have to guess that it’s probably not entirely free, but it’s also probably not just an acceptance and go fuck yourself, get your own student loans and fall into our trap kind of situation; after all her goal was to not pay for college, but it’s hard to imagine a money printer like Duke actually be willing to give anyone not in athletics a free ride.

Regardless, I hope this girl knows what she’s in for, going to Duke.  As intelligent as she might think she is, Duke is still a notoriously racist and classist environment, and if word gets out that she’s the black girl from the sketchy part of Atlanta, lord only knows what the fuck is going to become of her student life among the snobs and privileged among the Dook Elite.

Well you know what they say, which is something that literally only one friend of mine likes to say, if you TRY HARD, you die hard.

#TRYHARDSZN2024: I wonder what question he got wrong on his SATs?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Four countries: Vietnamese student has been admitted to numerous schools spanning four different countries, including “several in the U.S.”

Instead of flexing a large number of acceptances like American #TRYHARDs do, this Vietnamese #TRYHARD has gotten into the habit of flexing the number of countries in which he’s gotten acceptances from; I have to say that that’s kind of the level of overachieving that can only be done by an Asian person.

The article cites that he’s gotten acceptances from schools in the U.S., Canada, England, as well as his residence in Singapore; off the top of my head, I’m inclined to think that this cream of his crop is probably the acceptance into Cambridge, because the article doesn’t mention that he got into any of the Ivy Leagues, which is typically the dream goal of any Asian #TRYHARD.

In fact, the only American school that was mentioned in this particular article was none other than Georgia Tech, to which I know I clown on because of ACC sport rivalry, is still a great school in general, but especially for computer science, which this particular #TRYHARD seems to have an endless hard-on for.

But the thing is, if Georgia Tech is the only American school that was mentioned here, I’m inclined to believe that the rest of the “several” U.S. schools in which he gained admittance into probably aren’t going to be any higher tier than GT.

I get that computer science appears to be his jam, passion and at the core of whatever he does with his career, but when it comes to college, perception is still reality, and when he finishes school and gets out into the real world, I feel like recruiters and employers are going to be more likely to stop and hesitate to take a glance at a candidate with Cambridge on his resume over a fairly niche school like Georgia Tech.

Either way, I have to say that I was quite tickled at the fact that this one kid got a 1590/1600 on his SATs; which means he missed one question on the entire exam, that prevented him from getting that perfect score that would definitely have gotten him noticed by pretty much every school he applied to.  His dad probably is full of disappointment, and at this point, he probably feels like it’s worse to get 1590 and fall just short of perfection, than to have gotten like a 1310 like I did, and just be slightly above average in terms of scoring.

To think, it’s probably that one question that separated his one kid from the Ivy Leagues and Georgia Tech.

The city’s most baller taco parties for the less fortunate

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

That’s what I’d want to do if I had the manpower, time, cooking acumen, multitasking ability and most importantly, didn’t have to sweat the whole needing to work for a living thing.

I volunteered for a charity event at work, because sometimes I just want to get the fuck out of the office, and honestly I do like doing charity work, so it’s a win-win getting to do something that makes my soul feel a little less droll, but at the same time doing it under the banner of work, so I get out of the office and it makes me look good all the same.

It was for the Atlanta Community Food Bank’s pantry center out in Bumfuck Stone Mountain, South Carolina; admittedly, I didn’t really look much at the details of the event, so firstly I failed to see that it was in Stone Mountain instead of their main offices in West Midtown next to the Fulton County jail, but also since I’d done volunteer work for ACFB before in the past, I also assumed it would’ve been more manual labor of packing boxes or unloading pallets or something of a similar nature.

No, the pantry center is kind of cool, in the sense that it’s set up to look like a tiny grocery store, where needy families can make appointments to come and “shop” for donated food, in the name of preserving their dignity and giving them the opportunity to feel like they’re shopping instead of being handed handouts.  My task during my shift was to keep watch over the freezer area, to make sure people weren’t taking more than they were allowed to, as well as making sure the shelves were well stocked.

Obviously, I wasn’t going to be a hardass on people who needed this kind of service, so if there was the occasional person who grabbed a second package of frozen meat or pouch of lunch meat, I wasn’t going to say anything, and at the end of the shift, we had serve 75 families and donated about 6,000 lbs. of food, so as far as I’m concerned, I like the idea that we’re helping impoverished people as well as preventing a tremendous amount of food waste.

However, while on my shift, I couldn’t help but notice that the majority of the food stuffs we had on the shelves on this particular day, man, could we have thrown such a banging taco party if we were to just cook up all of the available food and distribute it to the homeless or give it out to low-income areas where people might be hungry.

Tons of chicken and beef products were in the freezers; at or past their marked expiration dates, but if they were thawed and cooked that day, it wouldn’t be a problem.  There were pallets of taco kits, so all the meat could be seasoned and doled out in crispy corn shells.  Cans of beans, pinto and refried were in massive quantities, and some Whole Foods somewhere donated an endless amount of bags of blue corn tortilla chips.

Needless to say, plenty of ingredients for a baller taco party were on hand, and I was thinking during my shift that if I were like a more ambitious type or something, what I’d want to do is just take all of the meat and taco kids and tortilla chips in the pantry that day, cook up a ridiculous amount of tacos, and be that guy that goes around the city giving away taco meals to homeless people, or title-1 school kids or anyone in the city that is hungry, needs a little food assistance or just wants to get together to share tacos for a greater cause.

It’s definitely one of those ideas that only those with time, manpower and not needing to sweat the need to work for wages could accomplish, but hey, there are worse ideas to ponder about when you’re trying to do something good in the world.

#TRYHARDSZN2024

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Feels like it’s starting earlier than usual: two South Fulton teenagers accepted into 63 and 50 colleges respectively, trying really hard to not humble brag about it

It’s apparently already started, that time of year, in which throughout the country there are overachieving high school seniors who begin announcing, as loudly as they can on social media, just how many colleges they have been accepted to.  Some aim for the stars and only go for the cream of the crop like just the Ivy Leagues, and usually upper echelon schools like MIT, Johns Hopkins and Stanford, and then there are others who just apply for every school under the sun, as if there were no such thing as application fees.

And once the acceptances start rolling in, if the number is impressive enough, then onto the internets they go, boasting-not-boasting and humble bragging about how many schools they’ve been accepted into, with the hopes that some media outlet catches wind of it and puts any sort of spotlight onto them at all.

Of course, it can’t be ignored the dollar amounts of all these scholarships love to be extrapolated and added together, so that there can be somewhat of a tangible number to implement a degree of success and value of their accomplishments as a whole, and regardless of if and when they inevitably choose to go to whichever school is giving a full ride, no matter how lesser-heralded it may be, doesn’t change the fact that they put themselves into a position where they could brag about how many schools, simply said yes, you may attend our prestigious institution of higher education if you are willing to pay our egregious costs for credit hours, books, boarding and other bullshit expenditures.

But let’s get #TRYHARDSZN2024 off with a bang, with these two teens in my old stomping grounds of South Fulton county, which is the area’s PC way of lumping together the hood sections of the Southwestern region of the Metro Atlanta area.  But despite the fact that when watching the video in the article, there appears to be a whole legion of tryhards that have been accepted into 10-15+ colleges, these two particular teens who have hit 63 and 50 acceptances get the spotlight as being the biggest tryhards of the tryhards.

Sure, most of the schools that I was able to catch in the article are mostly smaller school, HBCUs, and schools nobody has really ever heard of, there were some notable Power-5 schools that have shown interest in them like Michigan State, Iowa, Kansas, Oregon and Mississippi State to name a few. 

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