Columbia Closings   What's not in Columbia anymore

Happy New Year, Columbia!

This old-school appliance store, right next door to Spring Valley Liquor Store & Party Shop is now vacant.

You have got to admire that wringer equipped Maytag still (as of late December) holding down the fort, and waiting for cartoon hijinks:

(Hat tip to commenter thomas)

Well, this was my week for seeing old guys.

I have to say the drive up to Greenville was fairly awful. I forgot that leaving Columbia on I-20/I-26 at 4:45 was not a good strategy and then it was rainy and misty the whole way and when I hit the road work near I-85, it was like they forgot to put lane markers on that stretch, or put them in with slate grey paint. Then I-385 ran out and the Greenville traffic jam started.

Anyway, it was a good thing that my ticket said 7:30 but the show didn't actually start until 8:30, or I would have missed the first hour..

Seger was in excellent voice, with no signs of the medical issues that postponed this concert from the start of the year. He has one of the best catalogs in rock, and he had the audience rapt from the first song ("Old Time Rock & Roll") through the last brauva performanc of "Rock & Roll Never Forgets" (which I missed capturing due to battery issues). This is his last tour, and if you can catch a show somewhere, you definitely should!

After not being able to go last year due to scheduling issues, I was afraid that this year would be a bust as well, since it had rained all day Friday, and was just starting to drizzle again as we pulled into the Gardens. Fortunately, that quickly petered out, and the rest of the night was rain free (though the ground was saturated as I found to my squishy discomfort a few times I steppted off the paths).

The basics of the festival stay the same year after year: Lights in a garden full of beautiful trees and sculpture, but they change it up a bit for each new edition. In particular, this year the boat full of glass balls was new as was the Hogwarts train setting.

I learned something interesting about taking pictures of LED Christmas lights: Even though these are not "blinking" lights, if you push your shutter speed high enough, you may well catch the instant when they are off. This did not happen with the old incandescent bulbs. I'm not sure exactly what the mechanism is. I would have said they go on and off 60 times a second with the AC frequency, but clearly in some pictures one strand is off and another is not.

One thing the preceding days of rain did do was keep the temperature at a comfortable level. There have been years where I could barely work the camera because my fingers were numb, but not this year!

There are two days of the lights left: Saturday 22 December & Sunday 23 December. If you are in the area, you definitely should go. Tickets are at https://www.brookgreen.org/.

(If I get the time, I may go back and add some videos of the train setups).

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Longtime Fort Jackson Boulevard staple Julia's German Stammitisch has moved from the old motel behind Cross Hill Market and to Sparkleberry Crossing in the old Za's location.

The State has the details, which include the fact that the Fort Jackson Boulevard space will be occupied by Moctezumas Taqueria which is moving from 506 Beltline Boulevard.

Schnitzel on!

(Hat tip to commenter Jimmy)

I never ate at White Duck though I like tacos (or soft tacos & burritos: hard shell tacos crack and fall apart too easily for me). It's a bit out of the way, and I keep forgetting that it exists. Also, from the name, I thought maybe it was one of those places that is too hip to have regular taco ingredients (like Italian restaurants that are embarrassed to offer pizza so they don't have pepperoni..)

Of course there's also the song I chickened out of playing at my first and only piano recital..

Anyway, according to The State, you have a chance to make a difference here with a last minute surge of business.

(Hat tip to commenter Heath)

This building was originally a Bojangles and was next and an Asian barbecue restaurant.

In 2016, Nick's Gyros & Seafood set up shop, and lasted until this year. Or at least I noticed driving by recently that it was now Charlie's Wing's & Seafood and I think I would have noticed that fairly shortly after it happened as I drive that way frequently.

I was not really aware of Rue 21 in Lexington as I'm not in the target young women demo, and don't like shopping for clothes anyway. After commenter Jimmy mentioned that this store was closing, I did a little research and found that the store was in Chapter 11 bankruptcy from May to September of 2017 and closed 420 stores during that period. They also took on a new CEO as of 25 June 2018 who 'resigned' mid-November 2018 after less than a half year tenure. Apparently the teen apparel sector continues to flail, and Rue 21 continues to shed stores.

(Hat tip to commenter Jimmy)

UPDATE 7 June 2024: Updating tags.

In retrospect, perhaps it was a bad idea to name a restaurant something that makes it tempting to write "Goodbye" headlines.

I never had any problem with Ruby Tuesday, but in recent years, it was clearly a place looking for its own identity in a flailing market sector. I used to visit this store weekly, as I liked the salad bar, and it was about the right distance that I could get my old Corolla wagon out on the interstate for a few miles and keep it viable. During that period I think they revamped the salad bar about four times, changes that did not always make it better, at least in my opinion. They also started and stopped serving complementary biscuits during that time as well. (They were OK, some sort of cheese drop biscuit, not as good as a real breakfast biscuit, but acceptable).

I'm not surprised this location closed, as there is another just up Garners Ferry Road, and I suspected when the chain started being in the news that one location or the other would have to go. The State has the story, but not really any more details.

With the recent retail openings in the Cross Hill area and the Old Kmart this is something of an up and coming area now, so perhaps the building will not be vacant for too long.

(Hat tip to Mr. Hat)

UPDATE 3 October 2019 -- New construction is going up on the old Ruby Tuesday lot:

UPDATE 12 May 2020: Update tags.

UPDATE 11 September 2020 -- The new buldings are complete. Kairos is now open and Another Broken Egg Cafe is about to:

I'm not sure exactly what is going on at this BB&T next to Panera Bread on Garners Ferry Road, but it seems to be some sort of renovation.

What really needs renovation is the parking lot by the old Postal Depot, which has one of Columbia's more impressive potholes (which is saying something).

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so at the time, Dave Thomas must have been very flattered.

Shortly after Wendy's came to town, a number of copycat restaurants popped up. They all had young girl mascots after which they were named, had square hamburgers and interiors set up with what at that time was Wendy's signature: One serving line. Unlike Burger King which was famous for letting McDonald's spend a lot of money finding ideal locations and then setting up across the street, these copy-cats tended to set up in smaller towns where there was, at the time, no Wendy's, or at least that's how I remember it. I'm pretty sure I recall chains called Judy's and Penny's (which I think had a restaurant in Georgetown which became El Cerro Grande before they razed it and built their own building). And then there was Cindy's Ole Time Hamburgers, which honestly I don't recall at all. Locating in Hartsville at the time would definitely be the setting up in a smaller market strategy though.

I haven't been able to find out much about Cindy's except that it definitely was a a Wendy's copy-cat and that its trademark was filed in 1976 (about the right time) and is expired. However, the chain still seems to exist in the Phillipines.

This particular location is at the intersection of US-15 & SC-151, and would have been basically in the boonies back in the day. It's still not what you would call a dense area. I may have the street address a little bit wrong, but it's close enough for Google Streetview to show the restaurant.

As you can see from the pictures, nobody else has ever set up shop here. In fact, I believe the place is now what you call a micro-clime which is uniquely suited for various plant life, though not so much for beef.

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