You know the drill. This is YOUR issue. Well, of course, every issue is YOUR issue — meaning we put NUVO out for you! And, well, OK, because we believe in arts, entertainment and social justice. And, well, OK, also because we get a paycheck. Where were we? Oh yeah, YOUR issue: You get to vote for your bests — and in fact throughout this product you’ll find YOUR words. You wrote about your favorite places and people when you submitted your ballot votes. You wrote about your favorite Indy entities off-ballot, when we sent out our call for entries.

Best zen walk

Timing and chance: What happened for me might not happen for you. You might not look up in time to see the juvenile bald eagle perched 10 feet away, above your head on an overhanging limb. Or see the mink before it melts into the early morning mist. Or notice the coyote, stock-still and staring at you from dappled shadows. You might not hear the voices of the dead beneath the firm-packed path over which you tread. Then again you might. I have.

Walk, run, bike or amble — for 20 years I’ve traversed the same stretch of Water Company canal from where Ripple Road climbs the hill and joins the canal, down to the Armory and back. People ask if I get bored with it, but it’s always different. From fat carp lunging in the shallows come spring and pancake-stacked turtles in summer, to Monet-colored leaves and foot bridges in fall and the crisp coating of hoar-frost covering all on winter mornings — every season, every day, gets made differently.

The place takes me out of myself. It’s special. How? Aside from nature’s changes, I think the bewitching quality to this stretch is made so by three things: One: While it is deeply embedded in the city, it is much removed from it as well. Hidden in plain view.

Two: Its pleasures aren’t available to everyone who travels it (me included) every time they travel it. They only reveal when we stop pushing. (Like seeing at dusk, you must look at your intended object, but not too intently lest it blur and fade. You look “sideways” instead.)

And three: repetition and time. Consider: The voices (above) allude to workers who died while building the canal system in the 1840s. The poorest (mostly Irish immigrants) were at times thrown into the heaped mound that became the towpath so work might continue unabated. I learned this while researching and creating a story I was to perform in public (about the canal) — but I couldn’t find a “voice” for some of the characters. I took to walking the canal, reading the script aloud, day after day. One morning, very early, two things happened. I got a vivid sense that some energy not my own animated my words, thus providing the “voice” I needed, the sense of just what it took to “hear” that voice and the knowledge that this place (or any place) is sacred only in so much as we devote time, again and again, to get to know it. Repetition. Time and chance: Devote the time and the chance will come.

Incidentally: The second thing that happened on that day of my passionate soliloquy was a jogger — who’d been approaching —deemed me crazy, quickly halted, turned and ran back in the direction from which he’d come at a much greater rate of speed. —Bob Sander

Best chocolate iced cake donut

One horrific side effect of the corporate control of donut making in Indianapolis is that the chocolate iced cake donut has become an endangered species. Krispy Kreme, which is in bed with Marsh and a lot of the other grocery and convenience store chains, doesn’t care to make a chocolate iced cake donut.

What does a body have to do?

Drive, baby, drive. Up at Keystone and 54th, The Donut Shop bakes and sells chocolate iced cake donuts every day. For $3 and some change, you can get three along with two milks in the little school-lunch cartons. The Illinois Street Food Emporium also makes a killer donut of this variety. But, if you go very late in the morning, you run the risk of them being sold out.

Sadly, I must admit I know that Super Wal-Mart also sells the donut I love so much. And, of all three of the places mentioned here, it is quite possibly the best. While I believe Wal-Mart to be one of the world’s great evils, I will cross its threshold and say hi to the old guy in the blue vest with buttons all over it as I rush forward in search of one of life’s richest treasures. But I won’t buy anything else there — except for (found in the back of the store) my milk. And maybe a DVD. And some picture frames. Hey, that’s a good price on diapers. Damn Sam Walton, you got me again!

Best exercise for a stiff back

Lunch is never enough by itself. It used to be the perfect capper to a midday repast was one or two — or more — cigarettes. Those were the days when the shadow of a skull and crossbones snuggled with the noon hour like a cashmere scarf. Good times, gone for good. Now instead of nicotine, a variety of sweets are called upon to slake the sated palate. None surpasses that old favorite: Bazooka Bubblegum. I’ve been chewing the stuff since I was a toddler and my dad took me to the bank of the Des Plaines River to read the comics on Sunday mornings. The little pink blocks were a penny apiece. Each one wrapped with an inane cartoon featuring the incomprehensibly named Bazooka Joe and his pals. That sudden burst of flavor, a perfect correlative for the color of the gum, was as thrilling as it was short-lived — not unlike the pleasure afforded by a cigarette. Anyway, bubblegum for a penny has become another vestige of what we like to tell ourselves was a simpler time. It certainly was cheaper. Worse, though, is that our contemporary rage for packaging has made the single nugget of gum almost obsolete. Almost. At Hammaker’s Pharmacy (49th and Penn) there’s a plastic bucket on the floor filled with bite-size Bazooka bits. If you’re little, it’s just your size. If you’re big, it’s good exercise for a stiff back. You reach down and take a handful. I like to take five — they’re a nickel each these days; that costs me a quarter plus a penny. The red cent is the tax paid for this pleasure. It’s worth it. —David Hoppe

Best public transit system

OK, so maybe it’s Indy’s ONLY public transit system. And maybe “best” isn’t a word normally associated with IndyGo. But our much-maligned city bus system does more than deliver too few people to too few places too infrequently. It makes its riders more thoughtful citizens.

Americans increasingly segregate themselves by their information sources. When you’re cocooned in your car on your commute, you let Limbaugh or NPR talk to your comfort zone, and you think you know what’s happening in the world. On a public bus, however, you’re exposed to unpredictable conversations among a constantly changing cast of citizen-savants. People who don’t look, read or think like you discuss their personal philosophies, pet peeves, romantic crises, job-hunt humiliations, military experiences and more. It’s a script conference for the human comedy. You’ll learn there are some things NPR doesn’t consider, and mega-ditto for Limbaugh and company.

Automobiles are ostentatious weapons of class warfare: my SUV can whup your SUV. But IndyGo reminds us we’re all just passengers on the shared ride of Life. Although we board and debark at separate times and journey for different reasons, my seat’s no more important than yours. Public transit’s on the cutting edge of coolness nowadays. Indy’s oligarchy has decreed we need better bus service to be seen as a hip city. Homely IndyGo, long eclipsed by its automotive stepsister, suddenly finds itself playing Cinderella at the ball. But unless it acquires a deep-pocketed fairy godmother, its coach may turn back into a pumpkin. —Gary Weir

Best cooperative effort to get out of the rain … just in time

Easley Winery; Aug. 27. On a Saturday afternoon, a couple dozen of us sat outside at Easley Winery drinking wine and listening to the Troubadours of Divine Bliss, an accordion/guitar duo from Louisville. As the Troubadours sang one sweet song after another, the roar of the visiting U.S. Navy Blue Angels mingled with the sound of thunder. Temperature dropped and breezes stirred and the wise management at Easley decided it was time to move the show inside.

Everyone helped. I mean everyone. There was all the sound equipment to haul inside, but there was also the need to secure the umbrellas that span above the tables. The plastic receptacles for ice to keep the wine chilled and the metal containers that house various bits of menu information — both of which had been useful earlier as percussion devices — all had to be schlepped.

At one point I turned in the parking lot and saw six people carrying a giant white tent, three people per side grasping onto the tent pole infrastructure. They were like a site-specific theater performance, or a piece of public art worthy of Christo.

We finished and as the last person escaped the roiling outdoors, the final items in hand, the cloudburst began.

We gathered then to hear more music, a bunch of strangers no longer strange to each other. The Troubadours took it all in stride and unplugged; no need for electricity in this space. What performer wouldn’t pine for a circumstance to create this level of intimacy and shared experience? —Jim Poyser

Best unofficial city park

If you’ve never visited the grounds of the former Central State mental asylum just west of downtown at Washington and Warman streets, you’re missing a place of placidity like no other in the city. Indianapolis Police Department’s horses graze in the pasture. Birds chirp in the trees. Jets fly over on the way to the airport. Not much else happens.

Controlled by the Parks Department, visitors are allowed to stroll around. You probably shouldn’t go into the creepy old buildings searching for the ghosts rumored to haunt the place. But you are welcome to visit the super cool Indiana Medical History Museum where they have syphilitic brains in glass jars, an intact surgical theater and all kinds of other glimpses into past approaches to mental and physical illness.

On the large grassy field in front of the museum, you might catch some vintage baseball players taking their swings. The field is home to the Indianapolis Hoosiers — a team fashioned after a real National League squad that played here in the late 1800s. Other teams — from as far away as Huntington and Culver — dress in old uniforms and follow the historical rules and customs of past eras (stuff like not using gloves to catch the ball) and play the Hoosiers at Central State.

Earlier this year, the old laundry building came back to life as a performance space for Butler University’s site specific dance class and for the Beckmann Theatre’s production of Asylum — a play about Central State at the time it closed. Both were excellent uses of the space and memorable experiences for everybody who braved the darkness (the city cut off the power to the streetlights months ago) and found the place.

I only hope this underutilized treasure goes into good hands as the city works to figure out what to do with it. Wouldn’t it be nice for it to remain what it is now, a peaceful place in a city that needs more? —Jim Walker

Best corner for one-stop shopping

Exactly two-thirds of my lifetime has been spent as a loyal customer to a couple of common and eclectic shops at Illinois and 56th Street and Westfield Boulevard.

I discovered the stores one day when I was a 16-year-old traveling alone from Kokomo to Fountain Square. I hit the tip of the city with a fresh driver’s license, my gently used ’67 Buick Skylark and an almost empty tank of gas. Guessing I wouldn’t make it to the Southeastside before my tank went dry, and realizing stations were few and far between downtown, I ventured off my usual beaten path and veered onto Westfield Boulevard. I have been returning ever since.

In my late teens, I’d stop in the drugstore for lip-gloss and the grocery store for Twinkies and pop on my way to see my best friend. During my single days I bought a barely affordable bungalow off 52nd Street. I rode to the canal on my bike with its “Toto” basket filled with Safeway bread for feeding hungry ducks.

When I was a working girl, I’d sneak away from office stress to a weathered waterside bench for extended lunches and a good read.

My wedding reception included a trolley ride past the canal. My teen-age daughter and I shop at the ladies’ clothing store on the northeast corner, watch through windows as beauticians work their magic on the southeast corner. We treat our pooches with dog treats from the dog food shop. I meet friends for lunch at Oh Yumm! Bistro, then cross the street for take-out dessert at the Illinois Street Food Emporium while flirting with cute firemen out in front of Station 16.

I venture over there every chance I get, through its transformations and change, losses and gains, no matter how far away I may live. —Cheryl Soden Moreland

Best happening

Back in the middle ’90s, the Susurrus Space on Vermont Street was the place to go for the experimental when it came to the arts. I say this without apology: Full disclosure, as they say, my wife ran the joint. But you can ask anybody. Those Rent Parties were amazing. When the Space was forced to close for the sake of redevelopment, Indianapolis lost a place where the new, the outré, the edgy and off-the-wall could call home. Until now. Big Car Gallery in the Murphy Building is that place: an unsafety zone where DaDa, soul and a certain Beat aesthetic meet. Disturbingly wholesome, wholesomely disturbed. It’s a creative impulse that’s so old it’s new. It figures John Clark is there and so is Jim Walker (known also for his work with NUVO — this said without apology). One night my wife and I were there. Old books about sex and violence were thrust upon us and, along with several other innocent souls, we read from them as part of a fractured chorus. We never do this. We probably never will again. I’m glad we did. —David Hoppe

Best sign

A recent story in NUVO shows the Link-Savoy Building and a doorway photograph with the name Link instead of the original owner, Rink, by replacement of the letter “R” only. “The shadow of the R is still there,” says a critic. “It’s very disturbing. That tells you a lot about the person.”

The person was Dr. Goethe Link, 1879-1981, amateur astronomer, who gave his private observatory, its 12 acres of land and 36-inch reflecting telescope to Indiana University in 1948. His interests also included herpetology and ornithology, particularly humming birds. An amateur aeronaut, he won the 1909 National Balloon Race, which originated at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Dr. Link was in his late 80s and still in practice when I first met him in this building, in the late 1960s. He was a nationally renowned pioneer thyroid surgeon and the only surviving faculty member of the original Indiana University School of Medicine.

His faded “R”-Link doorway evokes numerous memories of a brilliant, generous and obliging Hoosier.

The name Rink also evokes early boyhood memories of the 1920s, of Rink’s Department store (29-37 N. Illinois St.). The store had a little indoor playground where mothers could, without worry, leave their children while shopping.

Rink-Link, “R”-Link, a unique architectural artifact. It does tell you a lot. —C. A. Bonsett, M.D.

Best lighting at a festival

I wouldn’t dare try and pick the best single festival. That’s up to you and the voting process. I mean, jeez, in the late summer/early fall alone, Indianapolis is replete with public gatherings, from small neighborhood shindigs to behemoth parties like Irish Fest and Fiesta. I’ve been to many of these celebrations and they all have their virtues and delights, but the annual Feast of Lanterns (www.indyfeast.org) at Spades Park has the best lighting.

Look, the festival is about lanterns, luminary art created by local artists. Electric lights strung above on a grid of wires are suspended throughout the park — from these wires dangle the marvelous, dreamscape lanterns.

A handful of giant lanterns are suspended high in the trees, lording over the festival like gods on Olympus. Lit from within by candles, these mothers are beautiful to behold; throughout the night revelers stopped to gawk, take photos, breathe in the magic. —Jim Poyser

Best place to pig out

For months we drove past it along U.S. 31 South on our way to Greenwood. And, each time, I made the same joke: “There’s the Blucky Buffet.” Our kids are very young, so they still think I’m funny. My wife, on the other hand ... Then, one day, I pulled our Honda into the 8 Lucky Buffet’s lot (see, the 8 looks like a B on the sign). And we soon found out it wasn’t blucky. Not at all. It was, and is, a gorger’s delight.

The best approach is to go all day without eating then waltz into 8 Lucky (it’s in an old Shoney’s) wearing a loose shirt and a pair of drawstring pants. I’ll start with some sushi (it’s not your usually crappy buffet sushi). Then I’ll move to coconut shrimp dipped in that sweet mayo sauce. Then a plate full of mussels, some pan-fried frogs legs, some oysters Rockefeller, some peel and eat shrimp, some oysters on the half shell, some grilled squid, some deep-fried scallops, some more coconut shrimp.

Round two takes some patience. I watch for a fresh tub of snow crab legs to get dropped into the steam table then swoop in. With a plastic bowl of drawn butter for dipping, I commence cracking and popping my way to the sweet meat inside the salt-water warmed exoskeleton.

In the meantime, my wife and I are up and down getting slices of pizza for the kids. They especially like the quartered oranges with the peels still on, clamping them in their little teeth like boxers’ mouth guards, grinning.

When, stuffed to the ears, we walk out of the 8 Lucky Buffet, I always break out my replacement joke. Even the kids don’t laugh at this one: “We sure ate lucky tonight, didn’t we?” —Jim Walker

Best example of either good manners or low self-esteem, I’m not sure which

When the Pixies played the Murat Theatre on June 7, after “Here Comes Your Man” and before “Hey,” someone in the audience yelled out, “Thank you for coming to Indy!” I can’t help but wonder: What does this say about us? That we’re unfailingly polite? Or does it say that we have so little confidence in our place in the universe that we must thank touring rock bands — who will go wherever the money is — for coming to our city and carrying home our dollars?Now, I was as happy as anyone to see the Pixies, a band I love and had never seen before. And in my estimation, they played a blazing show. In a way I can see “ol’ yeller’s” point: Be grateful, especially since cool bands do have a tendency to bypass our city. But then again, aren’t our money and applause enough thanks? I like to think they are. In any event, it all brings to mind Martin Mull’s great concert-closing line: “Thank you for coming. Or however you reacted.” —Marc D. Allan

Best place for a picnic

I nominate Crown Hill as the least appreciated “Best Place for a Lunch-Time Picnic.”

The cemetery has over 550 acres and several miles of paved roads. When the weather is nice you can drive through the cemetery to find a peaceful, isolated spot to relax under a tree or on a well-groomed lawn or knoll. The staff there is used to people driving around and they welcome the attention.

I enjoy reading the markers. It’s hard to explain the calming effect of being in a cemetery on a beautiful spring day. It sort of brings perspective to anything you’ve been doing.

You can find out more about it at www.crownhill.org. —Kim Brand

Best coming-of-age

Massachusetts Avenue on a Friday night is a revelation. It’s always been cool in a Bohemian way, but lately it seems grown up with a big city panache hardly hoped for a decade ago. Although Mass. Ave. has been host and backdrop to such forward happenings as the first Fringe Festival, it’s got plenty of buzz of its own. One summer night a line of cars crawled along in search of parking from Alabama to the west to College on the east. People in convertibles leaned back and gawked at the action in the stately brick storefronts and were chatted up by laughing tipplers enjoying the parade from the comfort of the Chatterbox’s curbside café. It was like a scene from La Dolce Vita: street light and starshine, smiles and gathering speed. There were crowds in every bar and restaurant. Someone waiting in line sneezed and a waitress, laden with drinks and a wet towel, paused to say, “Gesundheit.” —David Hoppe

Best peace of mind journey

Any day, any time when you just want to feel miles away from home and find a peace of mind not often found throughout your everyday journeys drive down Kessler Boulevard. It’s like closing your eyes and opening them suddenly to your destiny — and you are the captain and creator of what is to come.

My venture often begins at 56th and Michigan Road heading east; the beautiful green trees, manicured bushes, winding pavements and hidden grounds structure any fantasy in colorful form. This scenic cruise must be accompanied by your favorite sounds no matter the genre. You can roll down the windows or keep them tight and you will still experience the silence of nature. Kessler Boulevard is a great cruise control path where you can think. There is peace and tranquility and a place to strengthen your dreams and move you one step closer to meeting your goals. Buckle-up and go with the flow. —Terry K.Y. Sims

Best quiet place

The Indiana War Memorial is located downtown between Meridian and Pennsylvania on 50 E. Michigan St. That is as close to the center of hustle/bustle city life that one can get — yet no matter how boisterous the downtown gets, the War Memorial provides a tranquil, meditative space. What better place to mull the passage of time, the cost of freedom, the “crazy sorrow” as Bob Dylan put it.

War-related exhibits fill the building, but the journey to the upper room is the most moving. Climbing the steps, one is surrounded by the names of those who gave their lives in last century’s wars. Then when you reach the top, you are greeted by one of the great treasures of the city: an expansive room bathed in blue light, columns reaching high above. At the center, an ornate, carved coffin, complete with stirring quotes, honors the fallen.

It’s an impressive echo chamber, this room. If you bring the kids, they might want to test out the acoustics. But even the littlest kids get it: After a moment, they quiet down and absorb the sheer power of the memorial room. Go and see where time has stopped. —Jim Poyser

Best night of coincidences

July; Fountain Square, various locations. Whether it’s the Fountain Square Theater, Radio Radio, the Wheeler Building or the many treasures contained within the labyrinthine G. C. Murphy Building, Fountain Square is a destination to just visit and see what weirdness happens. On this particular night, we went to a couple of galleries, but the buzz was almost too good to be believed: There was a showing of Wizard of Oz in the Family Dollar parking lot, accompanied by Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon as soundtrack.

Sure enough, it was true. Well over a hundred people gathered, sitting in lawnchairs, watching a large white screen peopled by familiar, nay, archetypal, characters. With the Pink Floyd soundtrack, the story took on new, complex meanings — too complex to elucidate here.

After a time, we grew hungry and walked to Peppy’s Grill, another Fountain Square gem, and while we were eating, someone put Elton John’s “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” on the jukebox. Coincidence? Perhaps not. Perhaps someone else had left the Wizard of Oz event due to not having thought to bring lawnchairs and thus tired of sitting directly on the hard parking lot decided to grab a bite. Yellow brick roads were on my mind as well.

But as we headed home, choosing I-65 as a quick way to snake north through the city, I spied the Anthem building stationed along the interstate. The “e” was burned out, dormant, missing, an inverted wink to anyone passing by, a cipher to decode: Ant em.

I could hear Dorothy’s cry: “Ant Em! Ant Em!”

But wait, I couldn’t hear it; Dorothy’s dialogue had been replaced by Pink Floyd. From Elton John to a burned out “e,” the city had conspired to fill out the soundtrack.

Is every night like this? A fabric of coincidences one must only be alert to discover? The smaller the town, the more predictable its threads. A city this size requires a bit more attention to make manifest its secret meanings. —Jim Poyser

Best overlooked art

On the first floor lobby of the IU School of Dentistry, on the IUPUI campus, there is a large, colorful canvas that depicts dental history from the beginning of time to the era of the most current dean, Lawrence Goldblatt. On the painting’s left hand extreme, a Paleolithic-era man is depicted with tooth problems. While another man attempts extraction with chisel and hammer, a naked redhead with sumptuous breasts and curvy buttocks holds the patient down. As the timeline progresses, an Egyptian woman bares her teeth on the Nile’s banks, an Elizabethan-era Englishman holds his jaw open while imploring a barber’s assistance, and wood-toothed George Washington gazes into a mirror.

Until recently, dentistry was a nasty business consigned to the likes of snake oil salesmen. The artist demonstrates dentistry’s development from a crude art to a science; he depicts the advent of sterile clinics with attendant dental professionals. In the canvas’ upper right, the artist shows the dental school building while portraits of the most recent deans fill the foreground. But the artist also has concerns that seemingly don’t have much to do with dentistry. Consider the buxom nymphet tied to a stake. As she burns, a bare-chested dude approaches her with a large pair of pliers.

The style here seems to be a cross between Diego Rivera and Bob Guccione. The artist, however, lacks the former’s transcendent imagination and the latter’s raunch. He is perhaps too mindful of institutional obligations to give imagination free reign. And yet, while the IU School of Dentistry is depicted at the apotheosis of human history, there is a perceptible countercurrent. The buttoned-up dental assistants of the modern era are not depicted with nearly as much zest as the naked vixens of old.

Can cheesecake nostalgia and institutional edification coexist on the same canvas? Next time you go to IUPUI, check out this painting and decide for yourself. —Dan Grossman

Best commute

The best of Indy is my life as a commuter. I live in the south part of Broad Ripple and commute to the airport. I commute by bicycle, bus or car, which gives me different perspectives. I make my own hours so at different times I experience different things.

By car I start at 52nd and College. I usually go down College so I can keep up with how the neighborhood is getting better. I cut over to East Street so I can remember Market Square Arena. Then I go up onto the highway so I can look at Lilly and the RCA Dome. In 10 minutes I’m at the airport. On nice sunny days I take my bicycle down the Monon Trail. I cut through downtown, and then go through the latest new neighborhood on Washington Street. I love the Hispanic flavor. On rainy days I take the bus. I get to interact with people on a deeper level. I’m a people watcher.

Try my commute at any time and it will open your eyes and mind. —Robert L Stewart Jr.

Best blues bar

The Slippery Noodle is the only place in town and probably the state that has live blues seven nights a week. How many clubs do you know, in any musical genre, with live music every night? While the city tries to keep awake on Sundays and Mondays (and some Tuesdays), the Noodle has music happening. There’s a reason why I’ve done my show, The Blues House Party (Saturdays at 9 p.m. on WFYI 90.1 FM), live from the Noodle.

The music lineup is a good combination of local, regional and national talent. It’s worth the trip during the week to check out greats like Bobby Rush, Rod Piazza, Tab Benoit, Debbie Davies and others when they visit our city. It’s worth the haggard look at work the next morning. The club also highlights numerous artists of our fair city and state. The Wednesday night jam is one of the best of any music genre in this city.

The staff is knowledgeable about the music and the artists. You don’t have to know the difference between Sonny Boy Williamson I and II to be welcome at the Noodle. Depending on the night, the Noodle crowd can be a gumbo of blues freaks, downtownies, tourists and what I call The Nametag Brigade (convention folk).

The club received a Keeping The Blues Alive award at the 2003 W.C. Handy awards — the blues version of the Grammys. —Matthew Socey

Best homeless person

I saw a homeless man earlier this month that made me turn my head, and if you’ve ever walked by the Alcatraz Brewing Co. in the Circle Centre Mall, you’ve probably seen him too. An old man with a long, dirty beard and a goofy hole-filled grin on his face, he usually sits leaned up against a light pole outside. His face alone would have been enough to draw my attention, but it was his sign that really got me to notice him. It didn’t say “HUNGRY, NEED MONEY FOR FOOD” or “VIETNAM VET NEEDS YOUR HELP” or even “GO CUBS. GOD BLESS” like the sign of the wheel-chair bound man who sits outside of Wrigley Field. No, this man was taking a different approach: “WHY LIE? IT’S FOR BEER.” You have to laugh at something like that, and although I didn’t give him any money, I considered it for a brief moment, which is more than I can say for other non-Street Wise selling or food requesting homeless people. It’s always nice to see a homeless person with a sense of humor, as well as one who doesn’t make you feel guilty. After all, I’ll never be able to turn somebody’s entire life around with the money in my pocket, but a couple of cold ones? I’ve got that covered. I salute you, Mr. Funny Sign Homeless Guy. You are an inspiration to us all. —Jack M. Silverstein

Best proof that dinosaurs once roamed the earth

The building at the corner of 16th and College, which has obviously had a huge bite taken out of the corner. It was probably a Tyrannosaurus Rex, or some similarly large, predatory therapod, that caused this damage, sometime during the Late Cretaceous period. Scientists believe T-Rex was capable of speeds up to 30 mph — just about right for average weekday traffic on 16th Street, and the lizard’s 7-inch serrated teeth and powerful jaws would have made quick work of the structure’s brickwork and guttering, to say nothing of the interior plaster. The owners of the building, currently the Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana, consider themselves lucky that it remains structurally sound, and in fact list it for sale on their Web site as an “endangered” property. I’ll say. —Colin Dullaghan

Best place to feel like Norm on ‘Cheers

Everybody has to eat. So my favorite spot for people-watching and trading jokes is LoBills; one store in particular — and since it is my laughin’ place, I am keeping it to myself.

Whenever I walk in, I feel like “Norm” on Cheers. The clerks and stockers know me there and look up, smile, sometimes laugh.

I like to break in a new checker with my tired old jokes that may be worn but are new to him/her. She asks for my driver’s license. I get indignant and say, “Don’t you think I’m old enough to buy beer?” (that one got a howl the last time from the girl behind the counter, since I am obviously old enough).

Another new one asks for my phone number to put on my check. “Why? You never call me,” I reply.

Sometimes I race to the check-out and tip the clerk that they (other customers) are on their way up with grocery carts full to the top and screaming kids wanting the toy in the cereal box NOW — and I beat them to the check-out line, thank God. Or we gossip about the sights in the store — the little old lady in the mini skirt, complete with pony tail, the 300-pound woman who just had to wear her teen daughter’s crop top … eek, I’ll go blind!

I stop at LoBills just about every day and it is one of the high points in my day. It is the “little things” that make the journey of life more fun. —Tess Baker

Best place to meet a dapper phantasm

Tuckaway, a small bungalow at 3200 N. Pennsylvania St., is a veritable time capsule lodged firmly in the 1920s, when fashion designer George Philip Meier and his wife Nellie, a renowned practitioner of “scientific palmistry,” would regularly entertain such famed luminaries as James Whitcomb Riley, George Gershwin and Walt Disney. Folks came from all around the country and world, disembarking from their trains at Union Station and progressing north to have Nellie study their palms.

Tour the house, and it’s not at all difficult to imagine yourself at a swanky dinner party from the turn of the century. Much of the original decor remains, from the kitchen appliances to the antique piano in the front room, where Rachmaninoff once held a concert. The enormous trees in the front yard nearly obscure the property from the street, and do indeed tuck it away from everything, adding to the illusion of going back in time. Owner Kenneth E. Keene will tell you that secret service agents once loitered beneath those trees while Eleanor Roosevelt visited Nellie inside, and that’s only one of hundreds of historical anecdotes awaiting a visitor.

It’s said that Nellie’s ghost still haunts the premises, which bothers Ken not one bit. As far as he’s concerned, if there’s a spiritual presence in his home, it’s a benevolent one, and he and it — whatever it is — get along just fine. And he welcomes you to see how the house makes you feel as well, by arranging a visit. Call 926-0251. —Colin Dullaghan