What’s hot in Saucon Valley? What’s not? June 2022 Edition
What’s hot?
Weeding. June in Hellertown is a month when homeowners try to keep one step ahead of unwanted encroaching rapid growth of gardens and lawns. Usually, if you’ve noticed, it’s women, too, doing the hard work. Men love their string trimmers, but if you look closely, you’ll notice that more often than not, it’s women pulling up hanks of turf grass and slippery elm shoots. Here’s to the weed-pluckers!
Summer Salads. If you’ve been lucky enough to hit a few local summer parties in Saucon Valley, this is the high season for summer salads. My favorite this month was quinoa, feta, cucumbers and tomatoes. Here are some other great ideas.
Being dorkily nice. Say hello to stranger neighbors you don’t know yet. If you’re an adult, that is, since “stranger danger” still applies for minors. But it’s cool to be friendly. Give that salutary wave to that neighbor you don’t know too well or who may be feeling lonely. Risk being dorky. Our town needs more dorks and fewer glowerers.
Lantern fly guts. Keep squishing, folks. It’s the season of doom if you’re a spotted lantern fly.
The Freemansburg Hill Climb. It’s Sunday, Sunday, SUNDAY! Many younger residents of Saucon Valley and transplants have absolutely no idea how historically important the hill climb is. As far back as 100 years ago, the hill climb attracted thousands of local residents.
What’s not?
“Helping” fawns. As Lower Saucon Police recently reminded folks on Facebook, it’s time to give fawns space. They’re probably not orphaned. They generally need to be left alone.
Elected officials who micromanage stuff. Elected officials: Please let your municipal managers, department heads, superintendents and hourly workers do their jobs, and if they can’t, get new ones. You’re probably way less qualified anyway. Your job is to represent the public, vote on the hiring and firing of personnel, oversee the budget, liaise with departments, consider and deliberate on proposals, and offer strategic ideas, never, never, never to manage day-to-day operations. The only exception is the borough mayor in cases of public safety emergencies.
Drivers who go apoplectic over bicyclists, especially when they’re kids. Quit acting like you were never a kid who did dumb things on a bike. In Allentown and Philly, the plague of kids riding ATVs and dirt-bikes up city streets is an actual serious problem. The plague of kids popping wheelies on mountain bikes is not. Yes, kids need to be careful. Yes, parents should be educating kids about safe bicycling. But when a car needs to stop to let a kid cross the road on a bicycle, the adult on the scene needs to behave like the adult on the scene.
Gasoline and fuel-oil prices in Saucon Valley. Oh, man. $1,000 oil deliveries and $100 truck fuelings are overwhelming wallets. At the very least, use GasBuddy.com to find the cheapest local gasoline.
Calling out cheuginess. That’s soooooooooo 2021, folks. Even in Hellertown, it’s perfectly OK this year to flaunt your lack of stylishness. Oh, wait, don’t we kind of do that anyway?