Wiki-what? Wiki-who?

Wikipedia is a fascinating way to waste a few hours.

What started as a quick reference stop to look up some info on filmmaker Roger Avary ended with enlightening research on where I grew up.

West Chester is the county seat of Chester County, the county in Pennsylvania where I grew up. (Wow. I just used the word county three times in one sentence) It is also where i went spent my first two years of college.

From the Wikipedia page on Avary, I discovered he is an Atari aficionado. I linked to a page on Atari, and then on to a page about the wonderful Commodore 64. From there it was just a click away to finding out more about West Chester, Pennsylvania.

Some facts about West Chester:

It was the birthplace of composer Samuel Barber (I knew that already), famous for his Adagio for Strings, and also Hasidic rap sensation Matisyahu. (I didn't know that)

I also discovered that humorist Dave Barry began his career as a writer for The Daily Local News, a newspaper I was "lucky" enough to have had my picture on the front page of back in 1995.

The per capita income for the borough is $19, 073, and almost 10% of the population lives below the poverty line. And yet every time I visit, there are more and more $400,000 homes being built.

The newly-constructed West Chester Transportation Center cost 1.25 million dollars to build, and though I've never been to it, I am looking forward to not waiting outside for the bus to Philly. I wonder if they have a food court. And juggling clowns who sell popcorn. That would be sweet.

I was also interested to find that there was an actual Wikipedia entry for the band Plow United, one of Creep Records' "biggest acts". Ah, West Chester Rock City. (That actually should be the title of the documentary my brother and I are planning to make about our friends and the whole WC music scene and the enigma that is Arik Victor.)

You can spend forever clicking around on this site. And there are so many random things that actually have listings and articles. Crazy.

I really should get out more.