View allAll Photos Tagged close
This RadioShack store was just four storefronts down from where Kmart was. It happened to be on its last day when I was visiting Xenia Towne Square to eat at a restaurant.
I took a quick look around inside on my first, last, and only visit to this store. I didn't find anything I was interested in, although there were a small assortment of items left, including cell phone cases, in-car chargers, and other accessories. As expected on the last day of a business, everything was at least 90% off.
It's sad to see yet another business leave Xenia Towne Square (there was a Hallmark store that had closed just a month before, on January 25), but with the entertainment center/movie theater plan going forward for the former Kmart and Fulmers, that will likely change!
RadioShack - W Main St - Xenia, Ohio
Last Day February 25, 2015 (my birthday!)
The beginning of the daily mass exodus from one of the Yorkdale Shopping Centre's parking lots at closing time
hard to get a good close shot of drawings with this pen. the black gives a nasty glare when i use my camera and my scanner was 'free with purchase' (i guess i got what i paid for)
Due to actuality I repost this picture made in my hometown in 2009 with a Carena SX-300 (Minolta X-300/370 clone/license built) camera.
This donkey was at the Prom dance!!!
Laugh!!!
He is the resident donkey at Club Mykonos, to entertain kids!! They ride on him, etc.
He came storming round a corner and was howling.... and came straight for me. At first i was not scared and took a picture as he pushed his face into my camera!!
He would not go away, untill his Master fetched him, and explained that he was scared of all the commotion (The cars pulling up for the dance!!)
i finally got to make what would hopefully be considered a real quilt! it was sweet lil' annalie's second birthday yesterday and we wanted to give her something special that she could hopefully enjoy for a very long time. she'll be moving back to the states in about a year and i thought it would be nice for her to have something to remember us by long after our ways have parted.
about the quilt... it measures about 85 by 115cm. most of the fabrics are alexander henry prints. i tried to use fabrics which her mom has used to make clothes for her but only had a few of the wonderful prints she chooses. i did lots of machine applique which worked better and faster than i had feared it would. the batting is one half of a light polyester ikea blanket (yup, we're cheap like that). the backing is an ikea cotton print. it's all machine pieced and free-motion quilted. i machined topstitched the (not at all bias) bias instead of handsewing it and will continue to use this unorthodox method until my kid's are grown and i can afford to spend all that extra time on projects. about the actual quilting... i was very close to spending a good bit of cash on getting a quilting foot for my not-so-fancy modern machine but figured i should at least try and see if for some random reason all the cool little extra feet that came with my butt-kickin' vintage pfaff would fit on the newer machine. gasp! totally works! i'm of course stoked. anyways, i took a 4" practice sandwich and as soon as i had free-motion sewn my first halfway decent looking line decided to just brave it. i had NOT read a tutorial or anything on this technique and instead decided i'd figure it out as i went. so the quilting is very much less than perfect but i'm still quite happy with the way it turned out. at some point about halfway through i started breaking needles like crazy. i broke every single needle i had in the three sizes i thought would be acceptable for this task (a total of seven or more needles!!) so my sweet husband made a quick trip to the department store to get some more notions for me. i'm still unsure what caused the problem but think it may have had something to do with the applique. which is why at that point i decided to leave quilting the applique bits til the end. i managed to quilt over them all without breaking any more needles but because i quilted around them first, those spots (especially the letters) ended up looking a little funky. oh well. ;)
so yes, here it is, my first quilt. i'm very proud of it and hoping the next one will take only half as long to make. this one probably took an estimated 15-20 hours from choosing the fabrics and designing the layout to finish.
My story here.
HADLEY (Daily Hampshire Gazette) - For over 22 years, only hand-cut mushrooms have topped Aqua Vitae pizzas.
Yeong-Ja Jung, co-owner of the 56-year-old Hadley institution, has proudly featured fresh ingredients - from dough made in-house to basil from his garden - in the classic Italian dishes that earned the restaurant its local renown.
But the kitchen will only serve up a few more of its famous pies.
After nearly a decade of tough times, the family-owned restaurant will shut its doors March 2. Soon after, the Jungs will close a deal to sell the sizable property at the junction of Route 9 and Bay Road, not far from the Coolidge Bridge.
An agreement prevents them from revealing the buyer's identity until the closing.
The boom of fast-food chains as well as the Route 9-widening project have taken their toll on Aqua Vitae, which once reigned as pizza king in the Valley.
Yeong-Ja and her husband, Jung-Si Jung, 'feel so bad after all these years that they can't do it anymore,' their daughter, Ellen Jung, said.
The couple, who bought the already well-established restaurant in 1986, had hoped to return to Aqua Vitae as customers after they had given up ownership of the business.
But it's hard for an independent establishment to survive in a chain world, Ellen Jung explained. 'We're competing against mass-market food.' A small family-run restaurant just doesn't have the buying power of a chain.
Even the gas station down the road has started selling pizza, Jung-Si Jung said.
Insurance and license costs are increasing, and maintaining the building would require costly projects like installing a sprinkler system and raising the ceiling.
Jung-Si Jung estimates that he is losing between $20,000 and $30,000 a year and said he pays around $7,000 a month for fixed costs like the mortgage - money that he can no longer recoup in sales. Keeping the restaurant afloat has required him to spend most of his time also working as a carpenter.
But through the hard times, according to Ellen Jung, the owners have prided themselves on both quality food and service.
Though they can't offer the two-for-ten deals that Domino's advertises, she said, 'We compete with quality' - perks like fresh summer tomatoes from a garden outside the restaurant.
The Jungs have also served up personal customer care.
Regulars at Aqua Vitae know that Yeong-Ja Jung, often called Sue, prepares the restaurant's specialties seven days a week.
After over two decades of spending 363 days a year at the restaurant, she has gotten to know customers and their orders - and well. Having worked at Aqua Vitae during high school and college, Ellen Jung remembers her mother starting dishes early in the morning for customers she knew would be coming in that day.
Regulars often popped in and out of the kitchen to chat with the well-liked cook, Ellen Jung said. 'She would go the extra mile to really take care of her customers,' giving them free food during celebrations and remembering whether they liked their salad in a plate or bowl.
Because of that 'continuity with the customers,' Aqua Vitae has seen its share of regulars, according to Ellen Jung. 'But you need more than just the regulars' to keep a restaurant going, she conceded.
Business boomed in the late '80s and early '90s, she said, before Route 9 traffic began to increase and a slew of new Italian restaurants cropped up in the area. Once traffic became 'bumper-to-bumper' during rush hour, fewer and fewer people wanted to get off the road to stop for pizza, Ellen Jung explained.
The road-widening project this decade only exacerbated slow business. Early-morning construction forced the Jungs to cut back hours and not open the restaurant until late afternoon.
Route 9 now runs only a few yards from the front of the restaurant. 'You could do takeout from our window,' Ellen Jung said.
As a result, the Aqua Vitae dining experience has become noisy and a little bit frightening, she said only half-jokingly, as 18-wheelers barrel past the small, wooden-framed restaurant. 'You can't have a quiet meal.'
Ultimately, though, it wasn't the road, but 'the chains are what killed us,' Ellen Jung said. 'You work hard and you can only do so much. People don't make it a priority to spend money on good food. Everyone's so busy.'
Jung-Si Jung ventured that paying for a meal out is becoming a bigger burden for many Valley residents.
Despite her parents' best efforts, 'it's hard for independent business owners to really succeed and make a difference,' Ellen Jung said.
Adhering to tradition
When the Jungs purchased Aqua Vitae from Charles Sienkiewicz Jr. in 1986, they hardly altered the Hadley institution.
The restaurant serves up the same pizzas that Charles Sienkiewicz Sr., who learned his craft in Northampton, began making when he bought the space in 1951. Charles Sienkiewicz's son became head chef at the restaurant before eventually taking over as owner.
At first, customers were skeptical of a Korean family running an Italian restaurant, Ellen Jung said.
Still, the Jungs, who wanted a family business to schedule their own hours and be able to spend time with their children, adopted a can-do attitude. 'If a Polish family could do Italian, a Korean family could do Italian,' Ellen Jung said of her parents' decision.
The Jungs tweaked a few recipes and substituted fresh ingredients for canned ones, but made sure everything still tasted the same, she said.
They also purchased the lot's 10-room motel and a nearby house, where they still live. But chains made it difficult for the motel to compete, and the Jungs closed the operation entirely several years ago.
With such a large property right on Route 9, the parcel offers amazing development opportunities, Ellen Jung said, and her parents have received unsolicited offers to buy the land over the years. But none of those included saving the restaurant. 'The people who did make an offer were not in the restaurant business,' she said.
The Jungs are still working to sell the Aqua Vitae business, even if it will no longer inhabit the same space, but the process is rough going.
Few people want to invest in an independent restaurant, Ellen Jung said. The couple's three children lack both the resources and expertise to take over the operation.
The couple plans to stay in the Valley, which Jung-Si Jung said he considers his second hometown, but aren't sure whether they are going to begin another business venture. Their first plans: a vacation, something they haven't taken in over two decades.
Jung-Si Jung said he's looking forward to dancing at his sons' weddings, which responsibilities at the restaurant prevented him from doing on his daughter's big day.
Despite their story's early end, Ellen Jung said, her parents have lived a 'little American dream' - coming to the United States, opening their own business and raising a family.
'Sometimes,' she said, 'you just have to say enough is enough.'
P1000108