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Fan of Leon The Man
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Date Posted: 20:49:13 08/26/09 Wed
In reply to:
Leon Harrison
's message, ""Always on the job!"" on 20:19:18 08/24/09 Mon
http://projects.daytondailynews.com/cache/galleries/News/Local/082409xeniafire/
>Leon Harrison
>West Carrollton, Ohio
>Monday, August 24, 2009
>
>To: The Editor, East Kentucky Magazine
>
>Subject: My bikeway ride leads to Xenia fire photos
>and story
>
>
> “Always on the job!”
>
>
> Paul D., just like me, you always seem to be on the
>job! Today [Monday, August 24, 2009] and earlier this
>morning, I drove to the Xenia, Ohio, bikeway depot
>with my bicycle attached to the back of my little HHR
>car with the intention of riding it fast and long and
>hard, as usual and again; since I still do not have a
>single or a suitable healthy, wealthy attractive young
>female friend, as yet, much to our mutual regrets.
> In the middle of Xenia, I paused to take some EKM
>photos at the Greene County Courthouse, whereat I also
>posed beside a big black iron Civil War cannon
>monument that had been erected by and dedicated to the
>Greene County Soldiers of The War of The Rebellion
>1861-1865 by The Sons of Veterans in 1908.
> Once again, I had a nice bicycle ride to and through
>the clean green Ohio countryside, between Xenia and
>Yellow Springs, to stop and return via the bikeway.
>After passing back by the courthouse, still looking
>for a suitable spouse, I started slowing peddling down
>those old Xenia streets and wooden houses, stopping to
>take pictures of the Galloway cabin with plaques, one
>of which reminds us of the disastrous deadly 1974
>tornado.
>While slowly peddling along on Cincinnati Avenue, I
>rode by the Corner Restaurant, at which I have
>occasionally dined fine during the past 32 years or
>so, like ya know, since I used to live in Xenia and
>share spouseless houses with roommates on both sides
>of Route 35, when I used to work at Frigidaire.
> After returning to the Xenia depot, I reloaded my
>bicycle and got back inside my little HHR car to drive
>back to the Corner Restaurant, wherein I sat and ate
>and read my Dayton Daily News and my USA TODAY,
>leaving them on the coffee counter for other people
>after I was finished with them.
> I looked out the front windows and saw people
>standing and chatting and looking at something across
>the street and way up high, hearing some commotion,
>some of them calling people on their cellular
>telephones and calling their homes: “The old rope
>factory is on fire again. There’s a lot of smoke. It’s
>really burning this time, probably kids again. I wish
>that the fire department would let it all burn down
>and be done with it.”
> Always on the job, and with my new little 10mp
>Olympus camera on my belt, I had to leave and start
>walking toward that distant fire across the street. It
>had just got started but the smoke was thick and high
>and black near an old factory stack. I walked into the
>fence and walked around in back of the fire and the
>hose-bucket truck, snapping away, until they finally
>ran me off with the other spectators. I walked back to
>my little HHR car and drove directly to downtown
>Dayton and Patterson Avenue, near the old NCR and
>University of Dayton campus, where the new offices of
>the Dayton Daily News have been relocated, after they
>left Ludlow Street and abandoned their big old
>building.
> Oh, no matter the chatter or what some people say, by
>the way, like everyone else and everybody knows, the
>Dayton Daily News is the best newspaper in the nation,
>as I have always said and stated, despite them not
>publishing any of my classic columns or many of my
>better letters that have been printed and published by
>better editors. The secret of getting your pictures
>published with credit and inaccurate captions [Jim,
>today is NOT August 25!], it to be the first or only
>person there to take them and then drive them directly
>to the newspaper or magazine, if you know what I mean,
>if you can’t, don’t or won’t email them via some kind
>of 21st century computerized electronic digital
>devise.
> I was directed to sit in the lobby and wait. Jim
>Witmer came downstairs, looked at my digital images on
>the back of my camera, and then took me upstairs to
>download them into a computer for captioning and
>editing. Yes, of course, I always look at the captions
>and the credits to remember who wrote the stories and
>did the pictures. Do not you? Despite our two minds
>collaborating, if not combined, we still captioned my
>Xenia fire photos with the wrong date! Today being
>August the 24th, of course, not the 25th! Jim Witmer
>and I sat and chatted, while he made my digital images
>look even more professional if not better. They have
>probably been posted on the Dayton Daily web site by
>now. I’ll have to get online and look. Well, as I told
>Jim, I’ll put this and these on a CD for Paul D., with
>some other stuff just to fill it up. Oh, the pressure
>of these two-month deadlines, about which I shall not
>bitch or whine. Despite my being such a shy guy, I
>also mentioned to Jim that I was a Civil War
>reenactor, and that I would be participating,
>performing and posing at Caesar’s Creek, during the
>upcoming September 19-20 weekend battle reenactment;
>and that he could take some real colorful exciting
>pictures of me, uh…people. I must admit and thus
>confess that I left three East Kentucky Magazine
>copies at the big lobby desk; it being rude not to
>express some mutual admiration and respect, if not
>gratitude.
> I also attach and enclose and send and save and share
>similar digital images of last Saturday’s [Aug. 22]
>final Cruise The Burg car show of the year, held in
>downtown Miamisburg, whereat I walked around town,
>took pictures, snacked and chatted with a few old
>pals, while looking and a few purty young gals.
>Fireman Fred wants to going shooting with me at one of
>our local target ranges, he having finished a short
>security-guard course, of course, my fellow
>coffee-counter consultant being even an older Cold
>Warrior than I! Luther’s Granada lost a loose tie rod,
>but this was the best place to do it, during the day
>and around so many friendly motor-heads; who had the
>tools and a big sturdy floor jack with which to work
>and attack the problem.
> Last Thursday night [Aug. 20], with nine more to go,
>I attended my first West Carrollton Citizens Police
>Academy class with a room full of my fellow and female
>citizens. It was and will be educational, entertaining
>and FREE! This Thursday night, I am going to go there
>hungry, because the snacks, coffee, water and soda pop
>are free too! Don Ferguson is doing a history of the
>WCPD and I will give him pictures with stories, as
>long as I get the credit for them from him. This is
>the same deal that I made with Jim Witmer at the
>Dayton Daily News, he captioning me as the Buckeye
>Bureau Chief, since they were not going to pay me, by
>the way. Well, Paul D., like me, you always carry a
>camera and are always on the job. I have to win a
>lottery!
>
>
>EKMBBC Leon Harrison, G.C.M.
>
>EKM Buckeye Bureau
>West Carrollton, Ohio
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Great pictures, Leon! Thanks a lot!