July vigils

[Brian]

School's out, so Edmond and Jenny were back on the corner. Jeanne brought her sister Mary Liz and brother in law Chip, who are visiting from Connecticut, joined later by Jeanne's son Ben. And former Montrosian and founding vigil member Bill made one of his too infrequent homecomings -- has it been two years since he moved? Total attendance for Friday's Montrose Peace Vigil was 11.

The reactions by the people on the street is growing ever more positive, and I'm not just talking about the absence of thumbs down or other single digits. The man who reopened the liquor store down the block on Ocean View walked up with two armloads of cold water bottles and passed them out to us. A woman from Pasadena stopped to thank us for being there and offer sign suggestions, then stayed to talk about how we made it through the past decade -- and how the tide has finally seemed to turn against the war.

[anni]

Here's the picture perfect proof...including Nikki and Connie...

[Sigrid]

Dig those photos -- and thank you, thankyou, thankyou for persisting on The Corner!!! I'm particularily thinking of you all on Independence Day, as our independence is being devoured by the rich few of this country, and we seem to be an oligarchy, not a democracy despite some improvements in civil rights, tho we have new slaves -- thanks for letting me vent!? Tony and I "celebrated" The Fourth early at Ireland 32 with a cover band Broken Bravado ( gasp -- I'm not a huge cover band fan, but vocals, guitar, creativity with Bob Segar, Johnny Cash, Beatles, Dylan, Hendrix pretty good. I digress. Well, hope to see you again on The Corner, as I'm back from lots of travelin'. Miss my compatriots (true patriots--do you like my play on words?! Allow me to digress again -- jus' readin one of my father's favorite books -- War and Peace; my father was both a soldier and a pacifist like Tolstoy. If you wanna read it, maybe jump start with Anna Karenina... Sigrid

[Brian]

Thanks to a young family who joined us spontaneously for awhile, Montrose Peace Vigil had 16 participants this Friday, our highest turnout since February 4. They also lowered our median age considerably.

The weather was beautiful and so were the passersby. Anni's going to post some photos from the corner.

[anni]

In the spirit of "increasing the peace" mom and dad spontaneously picked up signs, too...hey, a good idea is a good idea.



And some of our regulars...I know, define "regular", HAH.

[Brian]

Traffic was lighter and the weather was milder than you'd expect for a summer evening on the corner, yet turnout this Friday for the Montrose Peace Vigil was fairly heavy and hotter than usual. Maybe most of the greater Los Angeles area is obsessed with Carmageddon, but we had plenty of other topics to discuss. For instance, Louisa is attending one of Move On's American Dream house parties this weekend, while many of us are making our presence at Glendale Cruise Night. First, the vigil attendance stats so far this month:

• July 1 - 11
  
• July 8 - 16
  
• July 15 - 11
  

If you're reading this before the late evening of Saturday, July 16, please join us at the game booth with a peace and justice theme that we're co-sponsoring with Glendale Peace Vigil and Glendale Education/Social Justice Advocates at Glendale Cruise Night. Details and links can be found on this page:

montrosepeacevigil.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=talk2&thread=192&page=2#3085

[Brian]

Another cool summer evening this Friday on the corner. Montrose Peace Vigil got lots of beeps from the peeps behind steering wheels and found talkers among the walkers on the sidewalk. So far this month, our attendance is averaging higher than June:

• July 1 - 11
  
• July 8 - 16
  
• July 15 - 11
  
• July 22 - 9
  

I finally thanked Roberta in person for the inspired work she did planning and running the War Budget Cafe last Saturday at Glendale Cruise Night -- and packaging the artful bundles of 188 messages to President Obama that people signed there. This page on our message board has the news along with photos:

montrosepeacevigil.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=talk2&thread=192&page=3#3085

[Brian]

Before this Friday's vigil, I read an article about Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman in the August issue of Esquire. He said, "If you can't define a winning exit strategy for the American people, where we somehow come out ahead, then we're wasting our money, and we're wasting our strategic resources. It's a tribal state, and it always will be. Whether we like it or not, whenever we withdraw from Afghanistan, whether it's now or years from now, we'll have an incendiary situation...Should we stay and play traffic cop? I don't think that serves our strategic interests." He said that in May, adding that a significant withdrawal should start immediately.

After five years and seven months of the Montrose Peace Vigil, I feel that Huntsman reflects the opinion that the vast majority of Americans have held for years already. Attendance has picked up lately despite the lack of spontaneous participants -- but not as much as the goodwill from people on the street. If only some of them joined us every week on the corner, the war might finally, quickly end.

• July 1 - 11
  
• July 8 - 16
  
• July 15 - 11
  
• July 22 - 9
  
• July 29 - 12
  

The weekly average this month was 12 -- compared to 9 in June and 12 in May -- the same as July 2010.