My dear Ballard:

You really must come to the city, sometime.

We really have more than a few museums - with a new Please Touch, Barnes and Calder museums on the boards. We have a new libary planned and a world class orchestral hall open and thriving. We have interesting stores where prices dwarf those in the burbs (not exactly funk).

You can look at an old penis (at the Mutter), walk through an indoor butterfly house (Natural Sciences), walk through a heart (Franklin Institute) or go to an Imax (Franklin).

You can see Gilbert Stuart's Washington Cross the Delaware (maybe it wasn't Stuart) at PAFA or Picasso and Dali at PMA. While walking in between the two, you can stop at the largest collection of Rodin sculptures outside of Paris. And as you walk about, you can see (on corner after corner) the fruits of the most successful public art program in the country. Or drive about and see the country's most successful mural program.

You can head south and go to two new stadia or a semi new arena.

Do you really think that putting "Starbucks" on them will make them better or more acceptable.

And BTW, while you're here, visit Old City to discover that there ain't no row houses in that neighborhood.

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“Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” - Jane Jacobs