WTF Toledo!?!

Ahh, Toledo, Ohio. 

The picturesque scenery.

The friendly townsfolk.

The delicious food.

The. . .

The. . .

The. . .OMG!  Is that an adult MOVIE theater!!!

Yes,

yes it is.

Now we're normally a pretty balanced pair, Chicken and I.

Chicken: I always see my glass half full of ice

               and completely full of Diet Coke.

Bo: And I always see my wine glass half-full of

       Silk's chocolate lite soy milk.

Chicken:  I like to smile.

Bo: I like to laugh.

Chicken: I like to laugh at Bo's laugh.

But there were many times when we both just looked at each other.  It took us quite a while before we could verbalize what it was we were thinking, because we just couldn't find the right words.  But we think we finally have them now: 

WTF Toledo!?!?

Everybody thinks of their hometown as the perfect place to be; so it's to be expected when you travel you'll invariably see something that makes you go "uhh?!?"  It was this "uhhh?!?" moment that has led us to write this, the first in a series of blog entries of traveling discoveries.

We had plenty of WTF Toledo moments
and some of them were so crazy
 it's resulted in us having to use the large-size font.

Now we're going to share these moments with you,
please join us in saying:

WTF Toledo!?!?

First let us start out by saying that we had a lot of problems with the road conditions.  Every street seemed to have some kind of construction work going on.  We would have taken a picture of the crazy maze of road cones that were out, but that would have required the use of our hands to pick up the camera and we were to busy clinging to our seat belts for dear life while Lishes navigated us safely through. 

When we passed all the traffic cone chaos, we started to really take in our scenery.

Then we saw the street lights. . .

Yeah, that's right. 

There are four lights on it. 

Believe it or not, this traffic light actually looks normal compared to the ones we saw with 5 (FIVE) lights on them. 

We have theories about what other colors there could possibly be on the traffic lights and what they meant.

We came up with these possibilities:

Red- Stop

Yellow- Slow Down

Green- Go

Blue- Do the Time Warp

 

or

Red- Stop

Orange- There is no turning back now! 

                Gun-it-and-run-it!

Yellow- Go Faster!  The lights going to turn red soon!

Green- Go at a moderate pace,

             take all the time you need to take in the scenery.

Lighter Green- It's a race

                         between you and the neighboring suburban. 

                         Burn some rubber! 

                         Go, Man, Go!

It ends up that what we considered extra lights were actually turn lights.  Go Figure! 

Chicken: Maybe they save room by having

               all the lights together on one unit?

Bo: I think our theories are MUCH more plausible.

We also saw several traffic lights that were set so close together that only one car could actually fit in the spot. 

What is outlined in red is the gap between the two traffic lights.  The green section is where we were pulling up to stop. 

If you think that's crazy, take a look at this intersection in action.

There are a lot of homes for rent and for sale in the Toledo area, so we took some time to check-out them out; like this beautiful one.

Moderately priced, completely remodeled inside, fresh paint, new appliances, three full bed rooms, lovely kitchen, with a modern interior.

Plenty of friendly neighbors:

I-Phone App: Sex Offender Registry

Less than 2 minutes from area shopping centers.

Oh, and did we mention plethora of friendly neighbors?

I-Phone App: Sex Offender Registry

Afterwards, we took in some more downtown scenery. 

Like, the building a dinosaur took a bite out of. 

And here we thought people weren't alive when dinosaurs were. . .here's your proof paleontologists!



We were also glad (and very confused) to share in the pride of this business' 1 star rating.

I don't know about you,
but if I only got 1 out of 3 stars I would not be plastering it outside of my business for the world to see. 

Let's look at this mathematically, shall we?

1 out of 3

1/3

.3333

33.3%

If we used a typical grading scale
(or any grading scale for that matter),
a 33.3% is an F.

So we're a bit confused as to why they are advertising that their business has failed.  Congratulations?

They weren't the only business that had confusing advertising.  We found this smoke stack on the top of a manufacturing plant.

This manufacturing plant that does NOT make cigarettes or cigars.  You can see our confusion.

We were also stunned to learn that Judgement Day is in May. 

This was news to us.  And to make sure we knew we were informed of said judgment day; we counted six bill boards advertising it, including a few in Spanish.

There was a LOT of graffiti, and it was everywhere.  Chicken even spotted some on a tree!  Artistically, we didn't understand most of it or had no appreciation for it.  Some of the graffiti wasn't that bad though. 

Here's Bo's favorite:

All to soon our day in Toledo was at an end.
As we hit the road, we thought we were leaving the craziness behind us.

Alas, no; because it wasn't soon before we encountered the following:

                          a gas station with a walk-in beer cooler

a blank road sign

(copy & paste this photo into paintbrush and create your own road sign)

two more blank road signs

                                a squirrel eating a hamburger

We could go on, and on, and on. . . 
but as we said in the beginning we're eternal optimists. 

This is just a tiny bit of Toledo.  When we first entered we were stunned at all of the little nature parks, hiking trails, and beautiful scenery.

 The sun glittering on the water in the mid morning cloudless sky was the perfect backdrop for our travels through the city.

Toledo also has a wonderful art museum, plenty of places for children to play and learn (including Imagination Station), and lots of great food.

Every city has it's little peccadilloes and own home town is no exception. 

Look for more WTF Cities!?!? to come out soon.