a walk about Tremont (Cleveland)

 inside a broken glass block, a hive

 peeling letters appear to be a fancy font

stonehenge on tree lawn

early bird

Saw, and didn't foto, a red-wing blackbird in Brecksville Cuyahoga Valley Park. To-day i capture one in a foto. Some people count them as a harbinger of spring about here.

the crazy returns

Well, last time she (Nancy Sysack) put up a series of Johnny Manziel portraits. The final one obscene. I have photographed several of her, and her deceased brother's signs. This paranoid in political thought has a public outlet. These conspiracy enthusiasts are often incoherent, and inconsistent. But they have a national audience. Some of the millions are Ron Paul, Donald Trump, Lyndon Larouche fanatics, and of course there are the many beyond coo-coo radio mouthfoamers.

Earlier, Obama was a pawn of the British monarch [click]. Now he is a puppet of George Soros, and for added measure   Saul Alinsky, two bogeymen of the Republican/conservatives/American fascists. The negro issue is a constant thorn. Consistency, again is not there. There are traces in this condensed screed of anti-semitism, but it is a fascism that denounces Hitler, while finding treasonous scapegoats which Hitler employed to gain power. But Obama is the Hitler figure, and he will complete his scheme in less than eleven months? Civil disobedience is rioting to have local police replaced with Obama's police? All the money funding Republicans is not a problem to be mentioned. Police brutality does not exist, and would not be a reason to protest.

For asinine a sign writer, one would think some proofreading would be considered: American Civil Lifeties Union, infact, England broke, tenticles, Nazi's (plural), idiology

 

 

2016 Miscellany #1 -- February in Cleveland

Tadeusz Kościuszko by the art museum

 

 bridge over Interstate 77 (Willow Freeway) near Fleet

 

 Ninja snowdude

 orchid Rockefeller Greenhouse

Saint Theodosius

then there were still too many republicans

Iowa's unrepresentative Republican caucus had Paul, and former winners Huckabee and Santorum throw in the towel. All three had more votes in New Hampshire than Gilmore. It is easy to get on the New Hampshire ballot, thirty Republicans were on it. Gilmore finished 13th [click]. At this point, whether he quits or not, it does not matter. Fiorina did very badly, she refuses to go away. Carson is sleepwalking.

Rubio, the establishment's last hope, is dropping fast. Christie knocked him out by focusing attention to Rubio's repetitive sentences (something everyone does). "This notion that Barack Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing is just not true. He knows exactly what he’s doing." Rubio said this four times that evening, and many times before. He wants it to sound ominous, it sounds like nonsense. Christie did not criticise him for that, but Rubio looked like a programmed idiot anyways. Christie is pondering dropping out.

But the slimiest was Cruz. He gave a combative 'victory' speech for his third place finish in New Hampshire where he was barely ahead of fifth place. He came in first in Iowa in a close three way finish, where the Republican electorate is heavily socially conservative Protestant, as recent 'winners' Huckabee and Santorum proved. Trump had more than twice the votes of runner up Kasich in New Hampshire. Cruz's third place was nothing to boast upon, and Cruz had rubbed it to Trump when Trump finished second in Iowa.

☐ John (Jeb) Bush
☐ Ben Carson
☒ Chris Christie February 10, 2016
☐ Rafael (Ted) Cruz
☒ Carly Fiorina (née Cara Carleton Sneed) February 10, 2016

☐ Jim Gilmore
☒ Lindsey Graham December 21, 2015
☒ Mike Huckabee February 1, 2016
☒ Piyush (Bobby) Jindal November 17, 2015
☐ John Kasich

☒ George Pataki December 29, 2015
☒ Rand(al) Paul February 3, 2016 
☒ Rick Perry  September 11, 2015 oops
☐ Marco Rubio
☒ Rick Santorum February 3, 2016

☐ Donald Trump
☒Scott Walker  September 21, 2015
========================

☒ Lincoln Chafee  October 23, 2015
☐ Hillary Clinton
☒ Lawrence Lessig  November 2, 2015
☒ Martin O'Malley February 1, 2016
☐ Bernie Sanders
☒ Jim Webb  October 20, 2015
-------------------------------------------------
postscriptum edit 3.23 p.m. 10 February: Fiorina left the race a few minutes ago
postscriptum 12 February: Gilmore is out, Carson should be next in irrelevancy. Perhaps Bush, Kasich, and Rubio will have a little battle royale.
Trump remains the kahuna. Cruz is impervious, as are his supporters; he will not overtake the Donald, but his voters are impervious to reason, and ultimately   decency.

grinning blue goose

The snow goose breeds in the most northern part of Canada, the high Arctic. They can assemble in the many thousands, but they are a rare migrant through Cleveland. And this one accompanied a small flock of Canadian geese, which occasionally harassed him. The Canadian gray is larger than the snow.

The snow goose has two color variations (morphs):  mostly white (with partly black wings), and a darker coloration called 'blue'. The biting surfaces (tomia) of the snow's bill/beak is slightly darker, and is called a 'grin(ning) patch'.

Sunday, before Mass, i snapped fotos on the lakefront along the old Liberty Blvd (now MLK Jr.). You see this fellow with an extended lower leg. That is 'goose stepping', some soldiers march this way in parades.

Further along the boulevard, in front of the Cleveland Art Museum a Ross's goose was amongst other Canadian geese. He was continually chased and picked on. From a distance he looks like a snow goose, but he is smaller and has a shorter bill on a rounder head.

Kurents on Saint Clair

 Piast, a Polish dance troupe, marching before Kurenti

 Two Kurenti in the ballroom of the Slovenian Home, St. Clair Avenue Cleveland Ohio

Polka is fun, Chardon Polka Band on stage, hideous mirror ball suspended from ceiling

Cleveland had their fourth Kurentovanje on the last Saturday before Lent. The day began with a new route for the parade. The units were fewer in number and tightly jammed together. There was a goal to have only a short interruption of traffic on the avenue. The neighborhood is not booming, there is a movement to arrest the decline and add some cachet. This new festival is part of that. 

The Kurentovanje is a Slovene pre-Lenten folk carnival. Kurenti (plural), Kurent (singular) dress in sheepskins and a headdress of ribbons. They are there to chase away the winter.

I sometimes see annual events again, here is the parade two years ago [click].

year of the monkey

garden stone work

in the Hungarian Cultural Garden, Cleveland O.

Concord Casimir Forecasts a Sloppy Winter

Yesterday, i saw a couple of television weathermen upset with attention given to woodchucks. You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.  The groundhog is not the only pretender attempting to foretell the weather.

 Concord Casimir Forecasts a Sloppy Winter Still Ahead-by John Niedzialek

   Under mild conditions, Concord Casimir made his official weather prognostication Monday 12 Noon at Ellison Creek Knob in Concord, Ohio. Casimir says don’t put your galoshes away yet, looks a sloppy remainder of the winter, states John Niedzialek, Master of Ceremonies.  Casimir did not see his shadow and his pre-forecast meal tells us all we need to know.  Casimir, the Polish Prince of felines always feasts on sour cream topping over pierogis before his forecast each year and sloppy is the word as he devoured his meal this year is notably sloppy fashion. It’s kind of a tradition for him states Niedzialek, just like a pre-game meal before the Super Bowl. That can only mean one thing and that is we will be having a mixed bag of rain and snow with extreme sloppy conditions for the remaining part of winter, states Niedzialek. “Contrary to popular myth spread by a burrowing animal in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, the sun’s shadow on such a beast is not a very accurate predictor of weather.  They have had it all backwards over there in Pennsylvania,” says Niedzialek and their record shows it. There’s more to weather forecasting than just checking on your shadow. “Casimir was right on the money last year with his forecast of a tough winter and you can take this year’s forecast to the bank,” states Niedzialek

   Casimir was found abandoned as a kitten on the footsteps of St. Casimir Polish Church on Cleveland’s East side at what many are now calling “Cleveland’s Miraculous Polish Church.”  Against all odds, St. Casimir’s church reopened on July 15, 2012. By more than strange coincidence, Casimir was born exactly one year later on July 15, says Niedzialek. There are always a few hecklers out there but his track record is flawless.

beaver hound