TODAY'S COUNT: 09 blog posts remaining in the T-shirt year!!
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T-shirt #356 - Kalamazoo

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Since yesterday's blog was about New York, I decided that today's blog would be about KALAMAZOO (Wiki link).

I have lived in Kalamazoo most of my life, even though technically I was living in Richland. Before that Richland, we lived in Schoolcraft and Traverse City. I was born in Midland and lived there until I was three years old.

I love Kalamazoo, and I am happy to report that so does my wife.

Technically, this is a shirt for KALAMAZOO COLLEGE, but I decided to take this opportunity to document my love for Kalamazoo with a photo gallery. Most of the shots are older ones that I was able to find online, though I included a few recent shots.

Yesterday, I wrote about NEW YORK CITY. I do love New York City, but after living there for a few months, I decided that I loved to visit, but I would not want to live there.

I have not been to that many cities compared to other people (list to follow) though I still hesitate to name New York as my favorite city of all. I am not sure if I can select a favorite city. I am defining "being in" a city in the following to ones where I spent more than a few hours. Cities in which I have a feel for the city. I am also restricting myself to cities I have visited as an adult because I don't feel that I have a feel for Atlanta and some other places I visited once as a child.

MAJOR CITIES I HAVE BEEN IN: Chicago, Detroit, Seattle, Portland, New York City, Columbia, Washington DC, Pittsburgh, London, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Paris, and Boston.

From this list, I do not feel that I can make an informed decision about any city enough so as to proclaim it as the "GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD." I am not sure I can even pick a personal favorite.

But I have come to like living in Kalamazoo. This feels like home. There are good things here, good people, good businesses. There's seasons and the great lakes. Traverse City is very close by. It's easy to get to Chicago and Detroit on any given day, and Kalamazoo feels like a good launch point to get most anywhere else.

I liked the malls, which gave this town its distinction of "mall city," which I wish it still had. The downtown mall. especially, was a progressive idea that no one around here seemed to have the patience to grow and nurture properly.

I have made a lot of good memories here. And so for today's blog, I want to pull out a lot of images of yesteryear to go with a few from now. I hope you like what you see.

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This is the shirt I am actually wearing today
Powell's Books: T-shirt #215

OFFICIAL BOILERPLATE TEXT OF THE LAST TWENTY POSTS COUNTDOWN: Hi. Thanks for reading. I am posting this "boilerplate" text everyday for the last TWENTY posts in the T-SHIRT blog year, which started on March 22, 2013. I will close out daily transmission on March 21st, day 365 of my T-shirt blog-tastic extravaganza spectacular. I will give myself a short hiatus of total non-transmission or publication for an as yet undetermined period of time, though I am estimating about two weeks. After my blog vacation hiatus, I will resume T-shirt posts on a regular basis, also as yet to be determined (weekly? Twice monthly?) to finish blogging about all the T-shirts that were not featured in the blog year. At some point, once I feel I am rolling along nicely, I will begin regular posting through my main blog: SENSE OF DOUBT. T-shirt posts will direct to the T-shirt blog from SENSE OF DOUBT. I will continue to post THE WEEKLY COMIC LIST, the features of occasional T-SHIRTS I AM WEARING THIS WEEK, book reviews, comic book reviews, and other popular culture nonsense as I have been for a year now but all will go up at SENSE OF DOUBT and some will direct back here to 365 T-SHIRTS. Ultimately, I will begin Internet publication of my fiction, primarily the comic book satire episodic story called POP! among other projects. So, in summary, 365 T-SHIRTS will continue though intermittently. SENSE OF DOUBT will host my main blog presence and fiction writing as well as links to any T-shirt posts shared here. I hope you will continue to follow me in my journey as a writer and a content provider. Thank you for your kind attention and time you have spent with me on this and/or any other day this year. I am humbled and blessed by your readership. - chris tower, blogger, originated 1403.02

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KALAMAZOO PICTURE GALLERY

Very old picture of North Burdick - year?

Kalamazoo Mall postcard - 1960s?

Collected four-way shot of Kalamazoo Mall

Kalamazoo Public Library - 1965

Michigan Avenue looking east - recent

The wonderful SCHENSUL'S Cafeteria circa 1970s

My family ate at Schensul's a lot. It was easy, given that it was cafeteria style dining, and when I was first at Kalamazoo College I took many of my friends there as it was a Kalamazoo institution. I was very disappointed when the place closed.