Whoa! Color me surprised. I picked up a book today and I can't tell you how weird it is to read the name of my po-dunk little city being used as the setting for a story about werewolves and vampires. It's strange, in a cool way. Especially seeing the police departments being referenced--as if they'd be able to handle vampire or any other supernatural problems. Ha ha hahahaha hahahaha haha!
Okay...anyway...
See, where I live, it's sort of the forgotten land. However, it's one of the largest areas (city wise) in Eastern Washington. But that's still super small potatoes when compared to the Seattle area and such. They've got all the people, but we make the food. *heh* Lots and lots of farms here. Not surprising since this area grows many of the nations crops, out producing even the midwest in wheat production with less acres (Zoso is an Ag. nerd).
When people think of Washington, they...probably think of Washington DC, but that's not what my point is. Their second thought is probably green trees, forests, and crap like that. Yeah, we're called the Evergreen State, though a lot of this state is hardly green. Try dusty, dry, and friggen hot like Arizona in the summer (not quite that hot, but 105 isn't uncommon around here, nor is 110 degrees in the dead of summer). Only the west side is lush and green, but come east of the mountains and you'll find sparse forest and eventually nothing but sagebrush and sand. It's amazing shit grows here as well as it does, but contrary to what wine snobs will tell you, France has nothing on our grapes (California does though :( ).
Anyway, it's just weird seeing this small city being used in a book. I've lived here my whole life and it kind of makes me laugh. Nothing exciting every goes on here. There's the occasional murder and sometimes a fat man riding a motor cycle with nothing on rides down the street, but that's about the jist of it.
Though I think it's cool, I have to wonder why the author picked such a no name, listless place such as this?
Posted by Zoso at March 6, 2006 09:46 PMWhat is the name of the book? Maybe the author is from the Tri-Cities?
The most famous thing I encounter from the Tri-Cities is "Kennewick Man", judging from the millions of entries about it I have to wade through when I use Google. Kennewick Man is pretty cool, though.
...
Living in SoCal, you see this sort of thing all the time - mostly related to film. A few:
- The (relatively small) building I used to work in was quite prominently used as a location in a Tony Danza movie in the late 1980's ("She's Out of Control"), as a radio station. It has a fair bit of screen time, and you can recognize some offices.
- The 210 freeway, which I live about a half mile from, was the freeway that pretty much all of C.H.I.Ps was filmed on.
- I used to live one town over from San Dimas, and Glenna and I used to eat there often. This was the town Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure was set in (and the water park referenced in the film? We went to it). Nice little town.
- I used to live on the former (famous) Route 66, and drove on it every day. Now I live about a mile from it.
- That same street was pretty much destroyed in a major scene in Terminator 3.
- A co-worker of mine was in a Sketcher's television ad, as a DJ (he's actually a DJ).
- The movie "Next Friday" was filmed in and took place (in part) in Rancho Cucamonga. There's also a TV movie named "Camp Cucamonga".
- "Cucamonga" has been used in Looney Toons Cartoons, Mad TV and by Johnny Carson as a funny name for a town. "Walla Walla" has gotten that a lot, too.
- Cucamonga also use to be the home of Frank Zappa's recording studio, and there's a Grateful Dead song called "Pride of Cucamonga" (named after a local wine, oddly enough).
- Sort of a funny one, for a Tri-Citian: When I lived in Kennewick I lived about a half mile from Highway 395. Now, I live about 10 miles from Highway 395. It goes all the way down here, and terminates somewhere near San Diego. We drove up it on the way to visit some time back. :>
Seriously, that is strange. I know the guy who wrote "Fight Club" was from B. Mrs. Caldwell was his english teacher and he sent her a bunch of film promotions when the movie came out.
I can't imagine however, that anyone even knows about B, WA unless they've lived there or around it, or known someone who does.
I'm actually quite bewildered by this. What is the book?
> Seriously, that is strange. I know the guy who
> wrote "Fight Club" was from Burbank.
Just to make it stranger still, we host his official web site.
Posted by: Jeff at March 7, 2006 09:30 AM*snorts* We don't get fat naked men riding motorcycles naked in England.
No, we get old women with dyed rock 'n' roll red hair on white HUGE motorcycles but who can barely support themselves on their shopping trolleys and shuffle around Marks and Spencer.
WTF.
Posted by: DR at March 7, 2006 09:36 AMLucky you! I'm sure if anyone ever used my city as a book setting, surely it'd be a tale of mystery, intrigue, and bag ladies.
Posted by: J00kst3r at March 8, 2006 03:16 PM