on and off high

Grant Wood's American Gothic is in Chicago. This is in Columbus, repainted by Bonie Bolen 2010; originally by Steve Galgas and Mike Altman 2002.

I think it was in 1984, an Ohio U. graduate, wrote to me about getting a tee shirt from a record shop in Columbus. He was living in Louisiana, and he wanted a Magnolia Thunderpussy shirt. All these years later, it is still there. High Street was a bit beat up then, a store front was boarded over, and someone wrote in big letters, "Nuke a gay whale for Christ".

This is very near the American Gothic is Brian Clemons' Mona 1990. It needs to be repainted too. It borders a narrow alley, and it seems there is always trash there.

Barbara Grygutis. Garden of Constants. 1994. 

The numerals 0 through 9 are by Dreese Laboratory OSU. Could be something about number theory. Some lay on the grass, and some are upright. Seasons past this included plants.

There is a big sportsball place surrounded by thick metal fencing, not too far away. It seems like "O" is similar to "0".

Adam Hernandez. 2020.

This Martin King quote is on the aforementioned parking garage.

King Rhino is smoking a cigar in a strip mall. He is not old, but he is rusty. Once he was very shiny.

Ohio A&M

Millions, maybe billions on the football team, still no new gnomon.

The last time i walked the Oval was in 1975. I remember very little. I wanted to-day, to see the dinosaur skeleton in Orton Hall which arrived much later, and to see whether the sundial was functioning.  I saw a foto of it on the sundial registry, it was missing the gnomon. My nephew was not interested, or could not see why anyone would be interested in sundials, because every one reads time from their portable telephones. He doesn't entertain toward my Luddite tendencies. Well, to-day it was very overcast when we found it. It could not cast a shadow, anyway.

 

Orton Hall

bell tower

24 Mesozoic and Cenozoic animal heads act as grotesques

ornament of a dog and dragon chimera

stained glass and dinosaur skull

Orton Hall is one of two buildings from 1893 on campus. The first president of the school, Edward Orton, was a professor of geology. The building houses geological collections, and offices. It is by far the most interesting visually.

Cryolophosaurus ellioti

Behind the entrance doors, in the foyer rises a Jurassic carnivore, a replica of the largest dino skeleton from Antarctica, excavated in 1991 by geologist David Elliot, who was there in 2018 when it was installed at his school.

 

Jeff, Megalonyx jeffersoni

The previous star of the museum, was Jeff the Giant Ground Sloth from Holmes County. He's been there since 1896. Jeff is named for Thomas Jefferson, who thought Lewis & Clark might bump into living mega fauna. About 30% is actual bone, the rest fabricated from wood and plaster.

gift from the class of 1905 

Ohio was in Central Standard time zone then. Standard time was promoted by the railroads, it was not good to have two trains on the same track, unless you are Gomez Addams.

 

The Five Orders of Architecture (from right to left) Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, Composite.

I also wanted to see the classical columns surrounded by Knowlton Hall. In 2002 Ives Hall was razed, amongst other things that were taught there was architecture. Austin Knowlton *1909, 2003†, replaced it in 2004, he did. He was a graduate, and built several buildings on this, and many other campuses. This hall was built as a gift. At the west entrance he had five 23' Georgia limestone columns made. They represent the classical orders:  Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite. The building has won several awards. I was intrigued by this huge classroom demonstration, beats a sketch seen from an overhead projector.

Ohio Stadium rotunda renovation borrowed from Paris' Pantheon dome.

idiots  

A continuing example of petty stupidity is the crossing out of the letter 'm'. I had read about this a long time ago, thought it was an occasional, or long past thing. It is not. It is found many times on campus.

disgorgement

disgorgement (noun)

•     The act of disgorging; a vomiting; that which is disgorged.
•     Legal action to pay back money made illegally. 

degorging (noun)

•     Procedural preparation done generally to eggplants by adding salt creating sweat to remove bitterness and toxins.

Friday a court in New York City found Don the Con Dipshit, et alia., guilty of financial frauds. The remedy was many millions of dollars in disgorgement. I knew what to gorge meant, but disgorgement was new. We have all seen how Trumple-thin-skin gorges himself in a never ending feat of gluttonous desires. Here he was made to regurgitate some.

We saw the usual modus operandi used by Orange Caligula. He had three earthly mentors. One was Roy Cohn, who taught him to admit nothing, smear all opponents, attack, attack, and attack. Cadet Donnie Bonespurs did this to the legal system, and very defiantly to Justice Arthur F. Engoron. This time Donnie Diaper lost.

from page 87 of 92:

Refusal to Admit Error
The English poet Alexander Pope (1688-1744) first declared, “To err is human, to forgive is
divine.” Defendants apparently are of a different mind. After some four years of investigation
and litigation, the only error (“inadvertent,” of course) that they acknowledge is the tripling of
the size of the Trump Tower Penthouse, which cannot be gainsaid. Their complete lack of
contrition and remorse borders on pathological. They are accused only of inflating asset values
to make more money. The documents prove this over and over again. This is a venial sin, not a
mortal sin. Defendants did not commit murder or arson. They did not rob a bank at gunpoint.
Donald Trump is not Bernard Madoff. Yet, defendants are incapable of admitting the error of
their ways. Instead, they adopt a “See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil” posture that the
evidence belies.

This Court is not constituted to judge morality; it is constituted to find facts and apply the law.
In this particular case, in applying the law to the facts, the Court intends to protect the integrity
of the financial marketplace and, thus, the public as a whole. Defendants’ refusal to admit
error—indeed, to continue it, according to the Independent Monitor—constrains this Court to
conclude that they will engage in it going forward unless judicially restrained.

Indeed, Donald Trump testified that, even today, he does not believe the Trump Organization
needed to make any changes based on the facts that came out during this trial.

Who may have begun this defeat of the failed yam casserole?  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez asked the apt questions at her first congressional hearing. She asked Michael Cohen what many in New York knew for decades.

"Here’s the moment from 2019 — her very first committee hearing after being sworn in — where@AOCasked Michael Cohen the question that led to NY AG Tish James’s investigation into the Trump Org., culminating in Trump being fined over $350 million today."  [click here]

see:  businessinsider   also see:  independent.co.uk  

===========================

Saturday, i was preparing a meal with an eggplant, which i degorged. A serendipitous conjuncture of rarely used words in 24 hours.

Also on Saturday, Cheeto Mussolini unloaded his latest grift in Philadelphia. There was a "sneaker" convention going on. He was pitching ugly Chinese tennis shoes for a shekel under four hundred dollars. He is incorrigible. Since this was not an organised fascist trumpster rally, he was booed off the stage.

Wonder if the customer will choose a left, or right shoe as the third.

 

symbols and humour

 

a trinitarian symbol as a subtle foliate man? on a former Lutheran church 1895, east side Cleveland O. 

For some centuries before the Modern Age, stone carvings of a face surrounded by leaves, and/or vines were sculpted onto churches. There is no real evidence of why such a decorative motif. There also were many grotesques, and chimeras. An article by Julia Somerset in 1939 has her conjecture, which many have picked up. He is the green man, a symbol of pagan, vegetable fertility. Some hippies, and later new agers have ran with the ball she put on the field. But what others know, is that these artists had a sense of humour, and their little jests were frequent.

from the House on Clifton for St. Valentine's Day 

Taking lawn decorations beyond a clothed cement goose. First, i saw this lawn decorated for Hallowe'en. It has been set for Christmas, Thanksgiving, and now i see for Valentines. Perhaps there are other occasions coming.

St. Clair

This is all by Slovenski Narodni Dom (Slovenian Auditorium) on St. Clair in Cleveland. There are many decrepit buildings, and an increasing number of empty lots. Public art is a temporary answer to the blight.

Mayan maybe

Man in the Moon has benches.

This ornament is on the former Raymond Chapman Public Baths, the St. Clair Avenue Bath House. Chapman was the star shortstop of the 1920 Cleveland Indians, who was killed by a pitch. The building was completed the same year. It had a gym, a laundry, and a swimming pool.

Bože požehnaj naš dom is Slovak for God Bless our House. A former butcher shop has many unrelated items there now, whether they are in temporary storage, or for future sale is not apparent. On the glass entry door, there are soaped letters advertising fresh potatoes.

Recently a building has been removed, and bare walls of the then adjacent building were painted with birds. In the last few years, a lot of wall murals have been created in the city; and more are planned. Some are done in a realistic style, and some not.

 

Kurentovanje begins Cleveland's festival year

headdresses of kurenti 

Kurenti are the stars of Pust (the pre-Lenten Carnival of the Slovenes). I think it was the Albertville Olympics of 1992, that Charles Kuralt introduced America to the Kurents. He said these were his people.

Kurent

A little Kurent happy to pose.

A musician that stands above the rest.

Chardon Polka Band was playing in a tent. I was not in a good spot to get good fotos. Parts of the tent were dark, others light. Some places were not safe to stand, when the tent is packed. People who polka, hop and bounce up. You must hop out of the way, to save your foot. The heads and arms in the air, block shots. A father holding his child high was a foto i wanted.

Assorted Krampuses and bishops enjoy Fasching, so they came for Pust.

Crosier goes up.

Princess of the festival

Hamlet would not have had such a device.

___________________________________________

Postscriptum: I have posted about this event in past years. Looking back to 2019, i had a post ready with fotos, but never got around to writing the copy, similar stuff.

2024 Miscellany #2

a Tessa LeBaron mural for a bike ministry, Cleveland west side

This gas station has been empty for maybe decades. It is currently being advertised for just under a million. It is not because once they were built to please the eye, it is because Cleveland Clinic is across the street, and is building on their lots.

detail

January 22nd, Canadian geese landing on Lake Erie shore, Lorain O. 

January 27th, the lagoon is aerated, the surface ice was waning.

February 9th, Cooper's Hawk, i think, Lake View Cemetery.

Summit Lake

Ohio and Erie Canal had a towpath on Summit Lake on a boardwalk where the mules pulled. The first canal boat left in 1827. The railroads took much of the canal business in the 1860s. After that canal system was used as a water source for business and industries. Summit Lake (Firestone) Pump House began in 1911 pumping water for the rubber companies, and waste water was fed into the lake. Some decades ago the pump house became idled. In the summer of 2021, the pump house became a nature center. Akron gave the building to Summit Metroparks, and they made it into a nature center, and are continuing to add and, this is important—upkeep and maintain the park.

Also the lake was a site for parks beginning in the 1880s. Summit Beach Amusement Park was in operation from 1917 to 1958. It had the world's largest tile pool (75'x180'); the health department forbid swimming in the polluted lake. The Wisteria Ballroom claimed to be the world’s largest dance floor. A Ferris wheel, a roller rink, a carousel, and other amenities were there too. Rapid decline in quality came in the 1950s.

coots a.k.a. mudhens

The lake above the buried sediment is clean to have much waterfowl now. My camera was too weak to get clear pictures from a certain distance. Coots (mudhens) were very numerous. When one was close enough to shore, its one note call could be heard. It sounds like a mechanical pulse. Canadian geese were plentiful, a few ring billed gulls, and some individuals of several duck species. Besides the ones shown below, there were mallards of course, but also redheads, canvasbacks, shovelers, ruddy, and bufflehead ducks.

male old squaw (now called long-tailed duck) in winter plumage, a sea duck

same bird with a lesser scaup

male hooded merganser

Parking is an ability some people are not good at.

Between the lake and highway construction some tree removal was done. Some lovely grain, slices would be good for table tops.