2025 Miscellany #8 — Parade of the blimps

The last time Democrats had a say in Ohio politics was in 2010, and not much for twenty four years before. Ohio has become a corrupt southern state in those four decades plus. Primary and special elections are held whenever the party so chooses. On occasion, a ballot issue generated by the electorate succeeds, the Repukes often choose to dilute or ignore the new law. Of course, it is a different issue if the party and/or moneyed interests want an issue. So this year the primary was 6 May, and this was posted before entering the polling station. Repuke propaganda has invented the spectre of illegal voting. This year the ballot was very short on voting choices, my ballot was completed by filling in two circles. For that the wily, sneaky, foreign menace would risk punishment by a viciously focused punitive political conviction promoting Republican propaganda. [foto:JZ]

The Cleveland Art Museum has an annual Parade the Circle parade in mid-June. They have set up a workshop tent to work on materials. One is free to observe the working process. This year the theme is the snowy owl. These ballet slippers will decorate dress costumes

giant eight string guitar

On 3 June 1925, to celebrate the centennial of Akron Ohio the Goodyear rubber company had the inaugural flight of their first blimp/airship/dirigible. 3 June [Tuesday] they had three blimps take off from the shore base on Wingfoot Lake. This was open for public viewing from Mogadore State Park at Wingfoot. We got there a little late, as we saw them leaving

After walking our greyhound, and meeting other dogs at the park, we saw them further on the road we had travelled. They made a turn around over us at a donut shop parking lot. A fourth blimp has its home in Germany, and did not cross the ocean.

The blimp stationed here had a jacket similar to the 1925 model. The fotos are a little milky from the Canadian smoke of burning forests of the Canadian west.

C-bus foto safari

The National Road began in 1811 at Cumberland, and the building stopped for years.  Columbus was done in 1833, Springfield in 1838.  The construction was dependent on federal funding.  Its urgency for building was influenced by the building of canals, and railroads.  There was marker every mile on the north side with distance from Cumberland Maryland, and distances of other towns.  This one is read east to west anti-clockwise.  W.J. is West Jefferson.  The road became U.S. Route 40 in 1926.  In Columbus it is Broad Street.

A soldado from the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920) is outside a restaurant.

Colorful work for a store sign has a chapulín (Spanish for grasshopper).  In the states around Oaxaca, they are regularly eaten.

On one of the many 4th streets in Columbus, the naming and numbering of addresses in C-bus is idiotic. Many people's mail has to have been misdelivered over the years. [Clint Davidson, artist]

The Team. 2019. Columbus. 

In 1953 Pilot Dogs began at this location, to train dogs to be guides for blind people. They have started remodelling and expansion for c. $15 millions. There is a heap of dirt by this, and the fence is covered with banners, so that a look see is discouraged.

Justin Withrow. Peace Train. 2019. Columbus (Hilltop).

Engineer

Bluebird on Parsons Avenue

Weightlifting joint also has artwork.

Marion

Virginia Lee Burton had a marvelous children's picture book that came out in 1939,  Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel.  The steam Shovel was named Mary Anne. Marion Steam Shovel Company helped build many projects.  Miss Burton writes a litany of "Mike Mulligan and Mary Anne and some others...", in her story. The story was read, and the drawings shown on television episodes of Captain Kangaroo.  The factory buildings are long closed.  A shovel bucket remains next to the railroad as a monument.

Mary Anne's maw

This was my reason to see Marion.

Marion is the home to buildings honoring Warren Harding, one of the many Republican presidents from Ohio, and hopefully the last. Harding owned a town paper, and Thomas was a paper boy, and he as the other boys found Harding's wife a hard and mean boss. There are a few buildings in town named after Harding, i was not interested in scouting them out. I did go to find this marker standing in a parking lot.

Marion is the county seat of Marion County, and like many rural counties, the courthouse may be the most impressive building in town. Lady Justice crowns the building, good symbolism.

Beneath  the pediment is the Roman legal adage, Fiat justitia ruat coelum (Let justice be done though the heavens fall), also good symbolism. Roman law was also based on equity, and the current national régime has that to be scandalous anathema. There is no shortage of faded Chinese trumpster banners in rural Ohio.

Carved in the sandstone are several ornaments. There are eight portraits representing people. Four are 19ᵗʰC faces of county folk. Four are of the different races of men [supra is an American Indian].

Several cardinals (state bird) have been painted on various themes about town center. This is the one outside the courthouse.

roses bloom

Yesterday, 27 May, we were at Columbus Park of Roses. It had to be near this year's peak bloom. An approaching rain was threatening in the sky. The sky was a very pale grey, and no clear sky whatsoever. The bloom is weather dependent. May has been mostly rainy and cool, with a couple of days in the 80s. Still it was a great day to see the myriad of blooms, and yet few people were touring.

There were some that were waiting to bloom, and some with significant fall of petals; but overall, the buds were in bloom, mostly full bloom.

The camera did not capture the bright palette of colors here.

The rose park is within Whetstone Park, and is maintained by the city. The rose park opened in 1953. It has become an official Arboretum, and contains many plants outside the roses.

The walking paths were welcoming, and that included hounds of all kind.

Quinton is a three year old beagle, and currently, very shy and overly timid. Very recently, he was subject to experimentation at Ohio State U.

Rosa Alba is the flower of Bonnie Prince Charlie (Stuart). He was to be King of Scotland & England, until the Battle of Culloden Moor 1746.

Moonlight in Paris

Lady of Shallot

High Voltage

Gertrude Jekyll

Enfant de France

peony like Sunmaid

Varieties can be named anything, the wildest i saw was Screaming Neon Red.

2025 Miscellany #7 — Yumedono & foto safari

For the summer, Cleveland Art Museum has a replica of Yumedono (Hall of Dreams) at Nara (8thC capital), where Buddhism spread from in Japan.

New statue of Balto (also the other sled dog heroes who ran diptheria serum to Nome in 1925).

West side Cleveland, Old Brooklyn refers to Orange Caligula. — Ω ☨

West side Cleveland, also possibly referring to neurosyphilis, one of several mental diseases that may inhabit Orange Caligula's thought. — Ω ☨

Welcome Bear

part of long mural across Garrett Morgan High Cleveland, Starbeing 2025

front yard Buddha pool

2025 Miscellany #6

                                       Someone's front yard has a Cheerleader for Immigration.  Her torch is out.  Site undisclosed, to deter ICE terrorists an opportunity for a disappearance. Ellen's musketeers are attacking everything the federal government does for the public good. This billionaire is a greedy lunatic, and is allowed to be a loose cannon, and he has a coterie of minions who act likewise. One of his many targets is the national park system. A group has paid for billboards to remind motorists of what is being done. They have used the old format of vacation post cards to needle the prick.

After a period of wet days, Dayz Whun continues on his mural on Cleveland's St. Clair.

Akron Zoo has a dinosaur exhibit scattered through the park for the summer.