New Year's Eve!

Forgive me for using the same New Year's Eve photograph each year, but it is one of the few I know was taken on New Year's Eve, and also my favorite. It shows my mother Mary on the left and her cousin Marie on the right, celebrating the coming of the New Year in Marie and her husband Ed's two flat in the Southwest Chicago suburb of Evergreen Park, Illinois. My mother and Marie were very close, and in fact, it was Marie and her husband Ed who introduced my mother to my father Nelson. Sadly, Marie passed away from cancer while still fairly young, and afterwards - I assume in preparation for selling the place - Ed gave Marie's parents, Al and Irene, until the end of the month to vacate their apartment on the second floor of that two flat. Not surprisingly, Ed was not a very popular person with the family after that. A sad story for New Year's Eve, but perhaps a lesson that we should all enjoy our time together while we still can, as my mother and Marie are doing in the above photo.

Waiting For The 2021 CTA Historical Calendar

It will soon be time for the new CTA (Chicago Transit Authority) Historical Calendar to be released. This is one of my favorite things about the start of the new year. This calendar is free for everyone to download, and features historic photographs of CTA "L" trains, busses, and streetcars every month, with scenes of a long ago Chicago in the background. The photograph above is from a previous year's calendar, and features a street car going up 111th Street in the Beverly neighborhood, just a few miles from the South Side Brainerd neighborhood where I grew up. This photo was taken on June 10th, 1948, and shows what the South Side of Chicago looked like 5 years before I was born and when my sister Susan was a mere 6 years old. Talk about a different era. Be sure to visit the CTA website at https://www.transitchicago.com/historicalcalendar/ to check out the calendars from previous years and to download the 2021 calendar when it arrives. 

Winter At The Zoo Part II

As I mentioned in yesterday's blog, I went to the Denver Zoo Sunday afternoon to take a few photographs. It was sunny all day, which this time of year makes it pretty difficult to get good shots, since you often are shooting directly into the sun. I was,  however, able to get a good photo of the rhino on the left, who - happily - was looking right at me. And what a friendly looking beast, too. I saw on the local television news the other day that the zoo is having difficulty finding the money to feed it's animals, thanks to a three month shutdown due to the coronavirus. Perhaps if they offered rhino rides to zoo visitors, they could make up the shortfall. I myself would be first in line.

The giraffes are also difficult to photograph, due to the sun glare, but if you are lucky enough to take the photo at an angle, you can often get a decent portrait. And if you make arrangements in advance, you can pay for the privilege of feeding them. I was able to take some photos of people doing this when the program first started, but these days they only allow paying customers onto the feeding deck, which I feel is patently unfair, especially for us cheapskates.

I was also able to take a fairly decent portrait of one of the new camels. Camels are actually groomed to be ridden, and so I think camel rides around the zoo would be a natural. I rode a camel while visiting the pyramids and the sphinx when I was in Egypt, and it was perfectly safe. In fact, since City Park is right next door, I think a camel ride through the park would be a big hit. Lots of good photo opportunities. Let's face it - if Denver Zoo officials followed my advice, they would not be having these financial struggles right now. But do they listen? Of course not.

Winter At The Zoo

I went to the Denver Zoo yesterday afternoon to take a few photos. It was bright and sunny, but rather cool, with temperatures in the 40s. Which probably is why the zoo gave all the orangutans blankets, which they wore, off and on, the entire time I was there, including the one in the photograph on the left.

The mandrills, on the other hand, felt that they did not need no stinkin' blankets. Or perhaps they weren't given any. If so, why did the orangutans get blankets and not the mandrills? I think this should be a topic of discussion at the zoo's annual board meeting. Perhaps instead of blankets, they should be given sweaters, which zoo interns would be assigned to dress them in. I'd definitely like to get a photograph of that.

The wild African dogs did not seem to have gotten any blankets, either, not that it seemed to bother the one in the photograph on the left. In addition to putting sweaters on the animals, I think the interns should also be sent into the cages to gently tap these beasts with a long stick to wake them up when they doze off like this. After all, zoo guests should be entertained, right? And sleeping animals just don't cut it.

A Photographic Record Of The Spillard Family

Looking through my photo albums, I realized that my mother Mary's family, the Spillards, have photographs taken of them all together throughout their lives. How wonderful is that? I myself have been hard pressed to find hardly any photos of our family together. I have one of us all taken at Christmas, when I was a kid in the Brainerd neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, and one taken when I was even younger at a resort called Lumina, on the Lake of Bays in Ontario, but that is it. I have to wonder why? But in any case, the photo on the left shows the Spillard family when they were all quite young. In the back row of the photograph are my Grandmother Louise and Grandfather Will, and in the front, from left to right, are my mother Mary, my Uncle Jack, and Uncle Bill. And where was the photo taken? Sadly, I haven't a clue. It definitely wasn't in front of their apartment building at 57th and Prairie on Chicago's South Side.

The photograph on the right shows the family standing in front of their apartment building on the South Side of Chicago, possibly in the Brainerd neighborhood. From left to right are my mother Mary, Uncle Jack, Grandfather Will, Grandmother Louise, and Uncle Bill. I suspect this photo was taken back in the 1930s.

I myself was actually around when the photograph on the left was taken of the family on the occasion of my grandparent's 60th wedding anniversary, back on October 5th, 1968. This celebration took place at our house in the Southern Chicago suburb of Country Club Hills. As I have often bitterly remarked, there was neither a country club, hills, or for that matter trees in Country Club Hills. But on the plus side, the family was all still alive and together, and that was truly a wonderful thing indeed. And in case you have not yet become familiar with the usual suspects, my grandmother and grandfather are in the back, and on the couch from left to right are Uncle Jack, my mother Mary, and Uncle Bill (from over the hill, as my father Nelson aways liked to say). Good times indeed.

The Christmas Tree Is Up In Time For Boxing Day!

Today is Boxing Day, which is a big holiday in the UK, but not so much here in the US.  It is the day that the English give gifts and a day off to their servants, who spent the holidays, including Christmas Day, serving their masters. I myself had to lay off all my servants, due to Covid-19, which means I can avoid having to purchase all those damn gifts this year and instead go out and buy a few half price 2021 calendars. Also, on this Boxing Day, l can  enjoy looking at my Christmas tree, seen in the photo on the left, which I wasn't able to put up until late on Christmas Eve. This is kind of a family tradition, actually. My mother Mary told me that when she was a little girl, her parents didn't put up a tree until after she and her brothers went to bed on Christmas Eve. I am not sure if this was because of some family custom, or simply that my Grandfather Spillard just wanted to wait until the last minute in order to to get a bargain. One of my favorite stories was how my grandfather found one of these bargain trees after having had a few drinks one Christmas Eve, and brought it home to their apartment at 57th and Prairie, on Chicago's South Side, on the "L" train. Evidently, this was by no means a small tree, and made for a difficult commute during the evening rush hour. Sounds like a perfectly reasonable decision to me.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone! No doubt it will be a lot less festive for us all this year due to the coronavirus, but on the bright side, 2020 is almost over and next year we have been promised the coronavirus vaccine for all who want it. Perhaps 2021 might turn out to be an almost normal year, after the first few months. To celebrate this holiday, I am posting the cover photo on my Christmas card for this year, featuring, from left to right, my father Nelson, dog Irma, my brother-in-law George, sister Susan, and mother Mary, with me in the front looking as perplexed as usual. The photo of my mother and father are from the Christmas of 1963, and Susan and George's are from the 1990s (I think). My parents and George have passed away, and Susan says she will kill me if I take any more photographs of her (and since she once came after me with a knife when I tried to snap a photo of her, I suspect she means it). Therefore, I am the only one in the photo in "real time." And looking as youthful as ever, I might add. Have a great holiday!

Another Christmas Eve. Another Visit From The Spirits...

Today is Christmas Eve, and as usual, I am expecting another visit from Marley (seen with me in the above photograph) and the Spirits of Christmas Past, Present, and Future. They will once again spend the evening trying to cure me of my curmudgeonly ways. Of course, it never works, and so I am amazed that they keep trying. Once a curmudgeon, always a curmudgeon, I always say. Just bring beer this time, guys.

Walking Past The Brown

I took the above photograph the other day of the Brown Palace Hotel (seen on the right) while walking toward Denver's 16th Street Mall and the RTD light rail train home. The Brown Palace was built in 1892, and since that time has been the most prestigious hotel in the city. It has an 8 story atrium, where during non-Covid times, Afternoon Tea is served. This atrium is lavishly decorated for the holidays, with a huge tree rising up amongst the tea goers. However, I have not been there this year, feeling that it would just not be the same due to coronavirus restrictions. And next month, the annual invitation to the National Western Stock Show's Grand Champion Steer to have High Tea in the atrium has already been canceled, not to mention the National Western Stock Show itself.  It is of course sad that so many traditions have had to be skipped due to the pandemic. However, as Chicago Cubs fans always say, wait until next year!

The Red Lotus

I just finished reading The Red Lotus, a mystery novel by Chris Bohjalian. I had never heard of this author before, but read a very positive review of the book in the Denver Post when it came out earlier this year, and decided to put it on my reading list. I finally got around to ordering it from the library a few weeks ago and was surprised to find it was really good. It is about an emergency room doctor who goes with her boyfriend of 6 months on a bicycling tour of Vietnam. He decides to take a solo ride to visit the sites where his father was wounded and uncle killed during the Vietnam War, but never returns to the hotel. He is later found dead from an alleged hit-and-run. After his death, his girlfriend learns that he lied about why they had come to Vietnam, and decides to investigate both why he was killed and what he was really up to. I really enjoyed reading this book, and found it a very compelling story. I strongly recommend it, and am happy to report that it should be easy to obtain from your local library - I myself didn't even have to put my name on the waiting list to get it.

The Winter Solstice!

Today is December 21st, the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year. Traditionally, this is the day that modern day Druids gather at Stonehenge, in England, to perform their rituals and celebrate the coming of longer and warmer days. Of course, this year, thanks to the coronavirus, these ceremonies have been canceled. Even here in Denver, all of the Druid bars in Lower Downtown (LoDo) and the River North Neighborhood (RiNo) are closed due to coronavirus restrictions, and so one of the only ways to celebrate is to take a brisk walk, perhaps in Washington Park, where I took the above photograph of the historic boathouse after a light snowstorm. I have to wonder, however, if some of the local Druids might be performing their rituals in the park today, maybe even making a human sacrifice or two. Perhaps I should head over there and find out. After all, I am always on the lookout for good photo opportunities, as you are probably aware.

Christmas Day! Only Five Days Away!

Since Christmas is almost here, I decided to feature the above photograph from my long distant past. It was taken by my father Nelson of my mother Mary, dog Irma, and myself on Christmas morning in 1963, in the living room of our home in the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago. We are posing behind one of my favorite toys, a miniature pool table, which I received as a gift that year. Since I was not quite 11 at the time, one would have hoped that eventually I would have become a skilled pool player and able to make a living as a pool shark. Alas, no. I had a toy gas station, too, but I also never became a service station attendant, not that either career was a desired goal. As I recall, what I wanted was to be a real estate tycoon, but this was before I heard of Donald Trump, who makes a career as a pool shark look much more reputable in comparison.

Living The Dream: Eating Raw Fish Outside In 38 Degree Temperatures

I took the photograph on the left of the patio at Smokin Fins, a sushi restaurant located at Foothills, an inside-outside mix of shops and restaurants in Fort Collins, Colorado. It just amazes me that people are willing to sit outside in 38 degree temperatures and eat raw fish without a gun pointed at their head. This was not a dish that was featured or even available back on the South Side of Chicago, where I grew up. If you even suggested eating raw fish back then, you would be locked up for psychiatric evaluation. I myself would still recommend that drastic step today, but then again, nobody has asked for my opinion about it.

The only comparable situation I've seen involving eating raw fish in 38 degree temperatures was when the seal in the photograph on the right was given raw fish as a reward for saluting it's trainer during a performance at the Denver Zoo. Of course, this is the only food available to seals in the wild, and so they have no choice but to eat fish if they want to survive. This is obviously not the case with the diners at Smokin Fins. Plus, seals can survive in extremely cold temperatures, thanks to a thick layer of blubber. And as for those people sitting outside in the cold? Well, thick layers of blubber are not uncommon for Americans, too, these days. Right?

Santa Has Left The Building, And He Is Not Coming Back...

Christmas is exactly one week away, a sure sign that it is time to start your holiday shopping. This looming deadline inspired me to visit the retail wonderland known as the Cherry Creek Shopping Center a few days ago. I walked through the place end to end to see what was new, since it is Denver's most exclusive mall, which of course means that I am not a regular shopper there. In the center court, where I took the above self-portrait, I could not help but notice that Santa's Flight Academy - and I have no idea why it is named that - has been set up as usual. However, due to coronavirus restrictions, Santa is not allowed to make an appearance. Which makes sense, since I recently read that in Georgia, 50 children were exposed to the coronavirus after a photo session with Santa and Mrs. Claus, who later tested positive for the virus. No matter - I wasn't planning on visiting Santa, anyway. For some reason, people look at me funny when I get in line.

Strolling Around Old Town Fort Collins

I had a few hours to kill up in Fort Collins last week, and decided to take a brisk walk around Old Town Fort Collins. This Northern Colorado city was founded back in 1862 as a military camp to protect travelers and settlers along the Overland Trail. The camp, which was located near Old Town, was abandoned after just a few years, but Fort Collins soon became a major agricultural center. The building in the photograph on the left was built in 1882. There are shops on the first level, and the upper floors have been remodeled into condos. One of them, with three bedrooms and three baths, was recently sold for $1.6 million, so don't expect to find too many real estate bargains in this neighborhood.

The photograph on the right shows a typical street in Old Town, which has been restored and gentrified over the years. As I walked around, I was torn over whether I should visit the Hydrate IV Bar, and then head to the tattoo parlor, but since I believe that Colorado coronavirus restrictions have forced these establishments to close, I was spared that agonizing choice.

Instead, I headed to Old Town Square, which is a pedestrian only block preserving the 1880s era commercial buildings lining it, and is the center of Fort Collins's restaurant district. The building in the photograph on the left is a street side view of CooperSmith's Pub and Brewery, one of the most popular establishments on Old Town Square. It is a great place to just hang out and watch the laid back Fort Collin's citizens enjoy summer evenings. Hopefully, it will return to normal next summer, after the Covid crisis is over. Hope, after all, springs eternal.

The December Mutt Of The Month

I took the above photograph of the December Mutt of the Month when I was up in Boulder, Colorado last week. The poor dog was patiently waiting for it's owner and her friend to get done texting and continue with it's walk. They were sitting at a picnic table in front of a restaurant, but did not seem to be eating or drinking anything. Were they there just for emergency texting, or is the service especially slow at that particular restaurant? Boulder is a pretty laid back place, after all.  Perhaps they were texting the hostess in the hope of getting some service. Of course, I suppose I could have walked over and asked them about it, and I am sure they wouldn't have taken any offense. After all, people in Boulder are known for being very friendly, as well as being laid back.

Herbie The Love Bug

I have been living in my condo, across the street from the University of Denver, for over 20 years now.  For about 4 years, there was a Volkswagen Bug parked in the lot outside my bedroom window with a number 53 on each side. When I would take the bus to work, and pass by that lot, passengers would occasionally point it out and smile. I knew it was supposed to be the car from the movie Herbie the Love Bug, but never found out who owned it. Eventually, it disappeared except for an occasional visit, and I suspect a student owned it and finally graduated, only coming back to visit pals. And then, the other day, I saw the Volkswagen in the above photograph near Washington Park. At first I thought it was the same one, but on further inspection, this car was newer, and had racing stripes along the bottom, which the other car did not. And I began to wonder if Volkswagen dealers offer this as an option. And if this is so, does this mean that if I bought an Aston Martin, I could get it equipped with all the gizmos James Bond has in his, including the ejection seat? That would certainly be a big surprise to any backseat drivers sitting next to me.

The December Issue Of Chicago Magazine

This month's issue of Chicago Magazine is it's 50th anniversary issue, and to celebrate this, the feature article lists the 50 moments that shaped Chicago from 1970 through 2020. A lot of these events happened after I left Chicago back in 1981, but a lot of them happened while I was still living there. These momentous events included the death of longtime mayor Richard J. Daley in 1976, and the January 1979 blizzard that shut down Chicago and doomed the reelection of Mayor Michael Blandic, after the city failed to plow the streets for a week and decided to run "L" trains from the suburbs non-stop into the Loop, bypassing all the inner city neighborhoods. The people in those inner city neighborhoods were Chicago residents and voters, unlike the passengers on those trains. Pope John Paul II's visit to Chicago (and whose mass my sister Susan and I attended in Grant Park) was also included. Curiously, Disco Demolition Night, where a local radio station hosted the burning of disco records in the middle of center field at Comiskey Park between games of a doubleheader - and resulted in thousands of fans storming the field and causing the White Sox to forfeit the second game - also made the list of moments that shaped Chicago. Really? It shaped Chicago? I am a diehard White Sox fan, and even I don't understand that one.

Remembering Country Club Hills

Back in 1966 my parents Nelson and Mary, sister Susan, and I moved from the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago to the southern suburb of Country Club Hills, Illinois. I myself never warmed to the place, and neither did Susan. She soon rented a 40th floor studio apartment at 1130 South Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago, which made me very envious indeed. Ironically, I now have much of the furnishings of that studio in my condo here in Denver, not to mention furniture from that house in Brainerd. Susan tells me it is like visiting a museum of our past whenever she visits. The photograph on the left is of my mother and our dog Irma in front of our house at 18840 Loretto Lane.

Country Club Hills did not have a country club, nor hills, or for that matter any trees, either. It was a suburb with identical homes, built for young families with children, and I think that is where my intense dislike of suburbs began. Years later, my mother told me she didn't like it there much, either. My father, seen in the photograph on the right, never said anything about the place one way or the other. After 10 years, when I completed high school and college, my parents moved to Stuart, Florida, where my Uncle Bill (my mother's brother) and Aunt Elsie moved several years earlier. My parents both loved it there. My father and Uncle Bill played golf every day (the complex had a par 3 nine hole golf course), and my mother took up golf, too, making more friends there than anywhere else she had lived. I myself at the time was working for Walden Books in North Riverside, Illinois, and moved to my first apartment, a studio in Forest Park, right across the street from the Daisy Hill Meatpacking Plant and the "L" train barn. It actually was my favorite apartment, just a short "L" ride from downtown Chicago.

The one advantage Country Club Hills had was that all my mother's relatives lived close by, just like they had done for all their lives. My Grandmother and Grandfather Spillard and my grandmother's sister Babe and husband Byron all lived in nearby Park Forest. My Uncle Jack (my mother's other brother) and Aunt Helen, my grandmother's sister Irene and her husband Al, and their daughter Marie and son-in-law Ed all lived in Evergreen Park. My mother's three cousins, their spouses, and children all lived in either Country Club Hills or nearby Midlothian. They were a bit of an eccentric bunch, but lots of fun, and I am sad to say that I did not appreciate at the time how wonderful it was to have all your family nearby. The ignorance of youth, I guess. And by the way, the photograph on the left shows Jack London, the husband of our cousin Shirley, and one of our other cousins, Betty, who loved entertaining and had large and fun parties quite often. A shame I didn't drink beer back then.

The Tattered Cover Bookstore Has New Owners!

Denver's Tattered Cover Bookstore, where I worked as the bookkeeper for 4 1/2 years, has been purchased this week by a local investment group, which promises to invest money into the operation to keep the four store - soon to be five - bookstore chain around for a long time. This is a very good thing, since the operation has been significantly underfunded since the chain was purchased five years ago from original owner Joyce Meskis by married couple Len Vlahos and Kristin Gilligan. Independent bookstores are struggling these days against major competition from the internet, and must have the resources to survive downturns in business, such as the one the current coronavirus has caused. It is good to see that the stores will be turned over to owners with deep pockets, even if they are much more corporate than the traditionally laid back Tattered Cover has been used to up until now. After all, the first day I started working there, I wore a tie, and was told that it was not only not necessary, but was making the rest of the staff very nervous. The above photograph, by the way, was taken at the sales desk of the Tattered Cover's Lower Downtown (LoDo) store, which will close this March and be replaced by a new store at McGregor Square, across from Denver's Coor's Field. Good luck guys!

Boulder During The Holidays

I spent an afternoon and evening up in Boulder this week, and was very impressed with all the holiday decorations along the Pearl Street Mall and West Pearl Street (where the hippest of the hipsters seem to hang out). I was also impressed with the large number of people having dinner and/or drinks outside, even after sunset and the steep drop in temperature. Since indoor dining has been banned for the foreseeable future in Colorado due to the coronavirus, outdoor dining is one of the main ways restaurants can survive during these difficult times.

In addition to outdoor dining, I also noticed a brisk business in takeout orders, too. Of course, the main reason I noticed this is because of all the cars pulling in and out of the parking spaces in front of the restaurants and shops, which played hell with getting a perfect, highly artistic photo. A small price to pay if its helps local businesses to survive. Of course, I gave up on the idea of taking "perfect, highly artistic" photographs many years ago, so it all worked out.

The city has really outdone itself this year with the Christmas lights. I suspect this was done to help cheer everyone up during this year of coronavirus, social unrest, and political upheaval. I find myself especially drawn to the blue lights, which I think are particularly colorful. As the old Elvis Presley song goes, it will be a "blue, blue blue blue blue Christmas." A perfect song for a time of pandemic.

Boulder is a beautiful city, located right up against the Flatirons, which can be seen in the background of the photograph on the right. Thanks to being the home of the University of Colorado, it has a fun, youthful vibe. It is surrounded by a greenbelt that separates it from the rest of the Denver metro area, which has resulted in some of the most expensive home prices in the state. But you can always drive up there in a little over half an hour from Denver, and pretend to be a local for the day, which is both enjoyable and much cheaper than trying to live there.

Ratio Is Ready!

Yesterday the temperature reached 68 degrees here in Denver, and since the weather was predicted to get cold and snowy in the coming days, I decided to take a late afternoon bike ride while I still could. I headed first to Lower Downtown Denver (LoDo) and from there to the River North (RiNo) district (and don't you just love all the acronyms they give neighborhoods these days). Along the way, I took the above self-portrait of myself in front of Ratio, a popular RiNo brewpub. Indoor dining has been banned for the foreseeable future due to the surge in coronavirus cases, but Ratio has all kinds of tables set up for those hearty souls who don't mind sitting outside in the cold. Up until now, the weather has been fairly nice, but I have to wonder how many people will want to sit outside drinking beer when the snow starts falling around them. Even I would have to draw the line at that. Beer is beer, but cold is cold.

December At Rocky Mountain National Park

Saturday afternoon I decided to drive up to Rocky Mountain National Park for the first time in quite a while. It is only one and a half hours away from Denver, and I have a senior lifetime pass, which means I have no excuse for not going more often. However, just like when you live near the ocean, after time you become complacent, knowing it will always be there, and so wind up never going. In any case, I am always impressed with the scenery along the way, which is non-stop gorgeous from just north of Boulder all the way through the park.

Since I started out in the late afternoon, I decided to skip doing a hike and simply drove up Trail Ridge Road, enjoying the rugged mountain scenery, until I reached the gate beyond which the road is closed for the winter. During the summer, Trail Ridge Road goes above treeline, across the Continental Divide, and then down the other side of the park to Grand Lake, Colorado. Of course, during the summer, there are millions of people, and their cars, all over the place, taking away a bit of the wilderness experience. It is much more mellow in December, let me tell you.

There is a parking lot where the road ends for the winter, and I decided to park there and walk back to the viewing platform, where I took all three of the photographs posted here. I am always tempted to take photographs of the scenery while I am driving, but considering all the switchbacks and impatient drivers behind me, it is a pretty difficult - not to mention dangerous - undertaking. And by the way, during the Trump Administration, the cost of entering the national parks has gone up quite a bit. It now costs $25 per car to enter the park, and yearly passes are $70. The senior lifetime pass currently costs $80, but thanks to a local newscast announcing the proposed price hike, I was able to get that pass a few years ago for half that amount. Just another of the many benefits of being a cheapskate.

Scary Times Indeed...

As I was driving through Boulder the other afternoon, I couldn't help but notice the two women in the photograph above carrying Election Fraud signs, which made me ponder the fact that President Donald Trump's claims of a fraudulent election are wholeheartedly accepted as fact by his base, despite not a shred of evidence. So much so that I suspect his supporters would not object to the election results being overturned by Republican state legislators, the Supreme Court, or for that matter, by armed insurrection, which of course would result in the end of democracy in America. Over 72 million people voted for Trump, and it is almost certain that when Trump leaves office, he will partner with a right wing cable channel and continue to stir up anger and outrage among his supporters on a daily basis. God knows how that will turn out. Not well, I am sure.

Washington Goes To War

And no - this is NOT a news flash. Washington Goes to War is a book by David Brinkley about Washington D.C. in the time just before and during the Second World War, and I thought that Pearl Harbor Day would be the perfect time to review it. I very seldom read non-fiction books these days, but I saw the book in a Little Free Library on one of my walks, and decided to pick it up. It was published back in 1988, and tells the story of a place that before the war was more or less a small southern town, and how it quickly grew into the city that led the fight against Germany and Japan. This is a really fascinating story, well written and very enjoyable to read. One of the most surprising facts I learned was how politics back in Roosevelt's day were so similar to today's dysfunctional, polarized, name-calling quagmire. You think the times you live in are so unique, while in actuality, the country has seen it all before. And survived! And by the way, that is indeed the Eugene Field House seen in the background of the above photo, located in Denver's Washington Park. Eugene Field, author of Wynken, Blynken, and Nod, lived in Denver for several years back in the 1880s while he was the managing editor of the Denver Tribune. Another fascinating fact provided free of charge by this blog.

The 9th Hole At Monterey

I took the above photograph of my mother Mary many years ago, as we were leaving the final hole of the par 3, nine hole golf course that winds through the Monterey Yacht and Country Club, where my mother lived for almost 30 years. Her condo was across the street, on the river side, where the yacht club was located. Of course, since the City of Stuart, Florida did not allow the complex to dredge the St. Lucie River, there never were any boats docked there. However, if you have a yacht club and a view of the river, who needs boats, anyway? My parents moved to Monterey in 1976, and my mother soon learned to play golf, making more friends down there than at any other time in her life. Whenever I would visit - usually in August - we would play a round of golf each day around 4:00, when the breezes came through from the ocean. My sister Susan and I still own that condo, but are renting it out to help pay expenses. However, once the coronavirus is over, we will head down there for a visit, and maybe even play some golf, even if our tenants won't let us "crash" at the condo.  

The Parade Of Lights, Minus The Parade

This is the weekend when the Parade of Lights traditionally takes place here in Denver. However, due to the coronavirus,  the event has been changed to promote social distancing. Instead of a parade, which usually takes place on Friday and Saturday evenings, the floats that usually appear in the parade will be scattered around downtown Denver, such as the 5280 Magazine float seen in the photo on the left. The usual live TV broadcast of the event will be replaced by a compilation of scenes from previous parades.

Each year I have dutifully gone down to the 16th Street Mall to take photographs of the parade, which to be honest, I have never found to be especially fun. No matter how warm it gets during the daytime around here, once the sun sets, it gets cold as hell, and there is a lot of standing around until the parade materializes at the spot where you are waiting. Plus, there is always a huge crowd, and because of this, it is tough to get a good photograph of the floats as they go by, unless you show up hours early, and get a front row seat. On the other hand, having the floats placed in a fixed spot makes them easier to photograph, and you can even visit in the daytime. However, I must admit that not having people on these floats waving and throwing candy at the crowd takes a lot of the fun out of the experience. Maybe the city could hire people to stand on them, and wave at visitors in the evenings, to make the experience more authentic. Perhaps they could even hire some of the many homeless people around the area these days to do this. Just a thought, of course.

Wild Dogs And Vultures - Perfect For A Time Of Pandemic

As I mentioned in yesterday's blog, I spent a rather cold Wednesday afternoon at the Denver Zoo, happily finding that most of the animals were nevertheless out and about. The first animal I saw after I went through the gate was a wild African dog, seen in the photograph on the left giving me a cheery look.  I must say, when you think of pandemics, the idea of wild dogs running around loose seems quite natural, although this particular wild dog was still in it's compound. At least for now.

Vultures are another breed of animal you tend to think of when you think of pandemics. Of course, that is based on commonly held stereotypes, which I am sure have been exaggerated.  I imagine the pair in the photograph on the right are actually just smiling at me.  Vultures have always had a bad rep, just because they circle around dead carcasses, waiting to swoop down and feast. As they famously sing in that James Bond film, live and let die.

On my first pass around the zoo, I didn't see any zebras at all. My second time around, they were all out and about, frocking around their compound. I was pretty surprised to see this, since they usually tend to just mosey around, usually to their feed bins for a two or three hour snack. I took the photo on the left of one posing for me just before it went inside for dinner and to watch Animal Planet on the tube.

All four of the bachelor lions were in the smaller lion compound Wednesday afternoon, while the wild African dogs had the run of the much larger compound called Predator Ridge. The Denver Zoo has two sets of lions - the four bachelors, who came to the zoo as cubs and two of whom can be seen in the photo on the right, and a family of lions (a pride?) that includes 3 cubs. Evidently, if both groups of lions were put together, they would wind up killing each other, which might upset zoo guests, especially the younger ones. I am not sure where they keep that lion family when the bachelors are out and about. They probably stay at some zoo employee's house. Hopefully they get reimbursed for cleaning costs.

The Zoo In December

I went to the Denver Zoo yesterday afternoon, despite the fact that the high temperature was forecast to be 30 degrees, with a wind chill predicted to be much lower. I was not surprised to find that there were very few other zoo guests around, and was expecting that most of the animals would be inside their heated compounds, watching The Ellen DeGeneres Show on TV, or whatever they watch during the daytime.

I was also not surprised to find that the penguins were out and about, enjoying what to them must be perfect weather. I took the photograph on the right of them marching toward who knows what, although I suspect it probably had something to do with food. Life for most of the animals at the Denver Zoo seems to revolve around food and sleep, after all. Not to mention pooping, of course.

I must say I have never taken many photographs of penguins. They always seemed less interesting to me than other animals, such as the lions, tigers, apes, and orangutans. When you look into the eyes of those creatures, you can see true emotion. However, Wednesday I took a closeup of one of the penguins, as seen in the photograph on the left, which shows a jolly looking animal that perhaps is not as much of a "birdbrain" as I thought. Is it actually smiling at me?

Happily, and much to my surprise, most of the animals at the zoo were actually out and about on this cold afternoon. The tiger in the photograph on the right was more than happy to have it's portrait taken. During the hot summer months, these animals are usually in a shady corner of their compound, trying to stay cool. However, these days, they seem to seek out the sun to help stay warm. Perhaps winter is the best time to take animal portraits after all. Lesson learned.