The Coca-Cola Co. plans to partner with United Resource Recovery Corp. (URRC) and spend $50 million to build the largest plastic-bottle-to-bottle recycling plant in the world.

The Atlanta-based beverage giant (NYSE: KO) said it has a goal of recycling or reusing 100 percent of its polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic bottles in the United States. The 30-acre facility will be built in Spartanburg, S.C., and will be fully operational in 2009 to produce some 100 million pounds of food-grade recycled PET annually, which is equal to 2 billion 20-ounce Coca-Cola bottles. Over the next decade, the plant will cut the production of 1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions.

This via the Atlanta Business Chronicle

At the same time, more folks will be surging into the market place (though not quite as drastically as with the “bloodbath” at Earthlink last week), as Coke announces pending pink slips for 125 employess. More info on AJC, which tells us most of the 125 will be made up of Atlanta based employees.

I think we might need to put Coke on some meds to handle the manic swings.

I’ve walked by it a dozen times.

Sometimes I thought “what cute stuff…I totally can’t afford that store”. Sometimes I thought of Hillary Clinton. Sometimes I was still preoccupied by my visit to Knitch, the yarn store behind it. Sometimes I was daydreaming about getting more flowers from Foxgloves & Ivy next to it.

I didn’t walk in until last Saturday.
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Last week I asked if you’d be at the parade, and by the looks of it, you were.

Gravy! I didn’t expect (especially given the lack of snarled traffic) to find people lined up 5 and 10 deep along Peachtree in every imaginable outfit from civilian to Tiny Spidy to fairies. That’s what I get for not having expectations.

The parade begin with the obligatory banner and a few costumes, but got my attention when none other than Ponch rolled by on two wheels in all his denim glory, my reaction to which was a source of great amusement to my parade companion. It got better from there. If you still have eardrums that work, it’s because you weren’t next to me when Uhura (who I have dubbed the Grandmother of Bluetooth) or the Cardboard Storm Troopers went by.

What I found so surprisingly romantic about this event was the willingness of not only the participants but the spectators to let themselves go a little. To relax, and to laugh, and to let it all hang out and to embrace their inner children and to cheer wildly for those doing the same. To not give a shit for an hour or for a weekend what anyone thought of them, or their outfits, or what they do in their free time. There was an energy that hung around in the air after the parade that I can’t explain other than to say it smelled/tasted/felt a lot like childhood…and I wish I could have bottled a bit of it for sale/retirement.

You won’t get that vibe at a 4th of July parade, where everyone is overly concerned about having the best seat for the fireworks and stressing out about parking and weather and blah blah blah. This crowd just was and for the duration of the event, I just was, too.

My full collection of weak point and shoot captures from the parade can be found here.

one of my favorite atlanta chefs, kevin rathbun, has been selected along with his dallas-based chef brother kent, to appear on food network’s iron chef america against two other chefs (access atlanta here).

all i can really say about that is if blue cheese, steak or onions are the secret ingredient my money is heavily on rathbun.

h/t to the blissful glutton.