Around Mallard Lake

Posted on April 20, 2020 by admin

Another Sunday, another longish walk with the dog. Yesterday, with all the snow melted and the sun overhead, we went to Mallard Lake, which is part of the Forest Preserve District of Du Page County.

Considering the time of the year, it didn’t look so much different from this visit. One difference was the number of people. With fewer out-of-house diversions now, people seem to be visiting parks and forest preserves more than before. A fair number of them came to fish, while others like us had their dogs along, or were just out taking a walk. Even so, there was plenty of room to keep at a good distance from everyone else.

The entrance is on Schick Road. I marked the entrance with a red diamond.

From there we drove to the parking lot, circled in red. Then walked clockwise on the white path (gravel) around Mallard Lake, 1-2-3. A mile, maybe. Between 1 and 2 are two small islands connected by footbridges, and the rest of the path partly hugs the shore.

Nice walk, except for a while the wind kicked up and blew across the still-cold lake, dropping temps a good deal. Without much wind, it was an early spring day; with the wind, it was a late winter day.

The Former Rex Theatre, Amarillo

Posted on April 19, 2020 by admin

Our back yard view, Friday morning.

Enough already, I cried to the heavens. Not really. It was more of a mutter. Yet I seemed to get an answer, because the snow melted by Saturday and today we enjoyed a fine spring day.

I even heard people out mowing their grass this morning. The flush of spring hasn’t quite inspired me to yard work, however.

Two years ago, when I spent about a day and a half in Amarillo, I took a walk along Sixth Ave. the evening I arrived. It has the distinction of being part of U.S. 66 at one time.

“The U.S. Route 66-Sixth Street Historic District comprises 13 blocks of commercial development in the San Jacinto Heights Addition west of Amarillo’s central business district,” the NPS says. ” Developed as an early 20th-century streetcar suburb, the district was transformed by the establishment of a national transportation artery running through its center.

“The U.S. Route 66-Sixth Street Historic District is Amarillo’s most intact collection of commercial buildings that possess significant associations with the highway. Featuring elements of Spanish Revival, Art Deco, and Art Moderne design, these buildings represent the historic development phases of this early 20th century suburb and the evolving tastes and sensibilities of American culture.”

I’d read about the street, but more importantly at that moment, I was looking for something to eat. I didn’t find anyplace I wanted to eat, but I did see some of the historic buildings on the street. I was inspired to take a picture of only one of them. A detail of one of them.Skulls. They’re on a wall of the 6th Street Massacre Haunted House. Note also the plaque. It says that the building is on the National Registry of Historic Places. This is a wider view.

It was once the Rex Theatre, which opened in 1935 and lasted until 1956 as a movie venue. It’s a little hard to see it as a theater building from Sixth Ave. The view around the corner shows it better.

A movie palace, it probably wasn’t. Just a neighborhood picture show. I think that makes it just as interesting, historically speaking, as one of the palaces, but not as nice to look at.

Along Poplar Creek

Posted on April 14, 2020 by admin

Another Easter activity of ours: a long walk. Lots of people can say that. The pandemic has done more for getting people out on the sidewalks than anything I can think of, at least here in a suburb that has sidewalks.

Easter Sunday happened to be warmish this year, especially when compared to Easter Monday. By late in the evening on Monday, it was already down around freezing, headed for a morning low today of 28 F. Bah.

At about noon today, there was snow. At least it didn’t last long and it didn’t stick.

Back to Sunday. In the afternoon, we went to the Arthur L. Janura Forest Preserve, also known as the Poplar Creek Forest Preserve. All of us, including the dog.

That’s only one section of a much larger property, which is part of the Cook County Forest Preserve District. Fortunately the state hasn’t ordered such places closed, though various events in the district have been cancelled. Such an order would be nonsensical, considering how much social distancing you can do in such a large expanse, but some jurisdictions don’t seem to have much sense.

A modified version of the map.

We walked from the parking lot (circled in red) along the paved path (in white) until we got roughly to where I’ve put a red octagon. From there, we headed overland to the banks of Poplar Creek (the next octagon) and then followed the creek along its curve, reaching roughly the position of the third octagon. We returned more or less the same way. Looks long, but I don’t think the walk was more than a mile and a half round trip.

There on Poplar Creek, it’s hard to believe you’re in a metro area of 9 million or so — except for the traffic on Golf Road. Not visible, but audible, even if the sound is a little diminished in these pandemic days. The creek, fairly full from spring rain, gurgled along.

Poplar Creek is a tributary, ultimately, of the Fox River, which feeds the Illinois River. That in turn flows to the Mississippi. So the water we saw was destined, mostly, for that mighty river and the far-away Gulf.

The route was muddy and sometimes strewn with fallen branches and rocks. The grass and weeds and other foot-level plants are greening nicely, while the trees and bushes are getting their start, but haven’t caught up yet.

I think dog thoroughly enjoyed her walk, tramping through the mud, sniffing everything she could, and chewing on blades of grass when we paused. We didn’t have such a bad time either, momentarily away from shelter in place.

British Air ’88

Posted on April 5, 2020 by admin

In early April 1988, I visited London for a week, which included laughs in the basement of a pub and time at the British Museum and the Imperial War Museum and a lot more. A good trip.

To make the trip a reality, some time earlier I called a travel agent. The agent who also booked tickets for my company, whose office (I think) was somewhere on Michigan Ave. For me, the ticket buyer, her services cost nothing. Hard to imagine now. I’d call her even for ordinary domestic tickets. The last time was to book passage to Japan in 1990.

I told her where and when I wanted to go, fully expecting to pass through New York to get to London. That’s what you did to get across the Atlantic. Get to New York first, as surely as Lindbergh did.

I reconstruct the conversation:

Agent: We have a flight leaving at x, arriving at Heathrow at y.
Me: Leaving New York?
Agent: No, it’s direct from Chicago.
Me (a touch astonished): Really?
Agent: Oh, yes. So is the return.

A pleasant surprise. I bought a package: RT air tickets, a week’s accommodation at a middling hotel — but very well located near Paddington Station — and a week’s pass on the Underground. Good value.

British Air was the carrier. That too was a first for me. In fact, still the only time I’ve flown that airline. Flew across on a charter in ’83 and on the upstart Virgin in ’94.

A souvenir of the flight. A menu.
I don’t remember what I had, and I’m not going to bellyache about how much better flying was then compared with more recent times. On the whole, that might be true, but I suspect the differences are exaggerated. Jumbo jets have always been pressurized cattle cars. You put up with it, enjoy the view if you can, and get where you’re going in hours. Worth a little discomfort. Now that air travel is mostly gone, maybe it will better appreciated when it comes back.

Downtown Chicago St. Patrick’s Day Parade, 2018

Posted on March 29, 2020 by admin

I fell asleep to light rain and occasional thunder on Friday night. A comforting sound. During the hours when I was dreaming odd dreams — damned odd, but it all made perfect sense at the time — the rain must have picked up its pace, since large puddles had formed in our back yard by Saturday morning, as usually happens with inches of rain. But not quite this much.

Two years ago we went into the city in mid-March and found ourselves near the Downtown Chicago St. Patrick’s Day Parade. We were going to visit the Art Institute that day, and the parade was passing next to the museum, on S. Columbus Dr.

We walked over to see it, but the crowd was so thick that we never really got a close look. Often enough, the view looked something like this.The crowd was festive, with many dressed for the occasion.

We stayed for a little while and saw what we could.

The solid-waste industry was well represented. Downtown Chicago St. Patrick's Day Parade 2018

Some participants were off to the side. I suppose they were finished and watching the rest of the parade.

Crowds thronged in front of the Art Institute and elsewhere.
No social distancing in evidence. It would have been weird if there had been. No wonder the parade was cancelled this year.

Yakov

Posted on March 26, 2020 by admin

Though not particularly warm today, we took a mile or so walk beginning at about 5:30 this afternoon. Just an afternoon stroll. There’s still traffic on our suburb roads, of course, but in volume it was more like a Sunday afternoon than a weekday rush hour.

One more item from the early 2000s. I didn’t realize it until today, but everything this week has been from that period, except for Sunday. An unconscious choice, probably, signifying — like all that sound and fury — nothing.

The first time we ever passed through Branson, in 2001 as a short detour on the way to Dallas, I picked up a Yakov ad pamphlet. Probably at the restaurant we ate lunch, which was the only thing we did in town.

Why? We weren’t planning to see the show. I think I’d heard of him, maybe even seen him on television by chance, such as his beer commercial, though I didn’t watch much TV during his heyday.

I’m sure I picked up the pamphlet because of the billboards we’d seen between Springfield, Mo., and Branson, which amused me. There were a lot of them advertising his Branson show, which he did from 1993 to 2015. The billboards looked a lot like the pamphlet, if I remember right. A big Yakov face promising a wacky Soviet — that is, Russian — comedian.

For the record, Yakov Naumovich Pokhis — his stage name taken from the vodka, apparently — was actually from the Ukraine. He’s still touring, or presumably was until recently, and probably will be again sometime.

Telegram From Japan

Posted on March 22, 2020 by admin

Most indoor spaces are off limits for now, but we’re free to wander around outside for the most part. So what happened today? It snowed. Still, I’m sure I’ve seen more people walk by my house than usual, some with dogs, some without.

Thirty years ago, I boarded a flight in San Francisco bound for Tokyo, with the intention of living in Japan for a while (but not Tokyo). That’s what I did. Occasionally I think for moment, did I really do that? But it doesn’t take much to remind me that I did.

Not long after arriving in Tokyo, but before I left for the Kansai, I went to the main post office in Tokyo and sent a telegram. I had never done that before, and I haven’t done it since, and never will.

A Mailgram, actually. So no uniformed representative of Western Union arrived at my mother’s door. Even by 1990, they existed only in increasingly old movies. The text went to the United States, maybe Middletown, Va., where it was printed and then mailed to her.

Strange Days Indeed

Posted on March 19, 2020 by admin

For the equinox today, rain. Also, robins. A lot of birds, actually, to judge by the volume of birdsong I hear when I’m outside. Only outside briefly today, anyway. Lots to do inside. Sometimes, though, I can hear mourning doves doing their whoo-whoo while I’m inside, if it’s quiet enough.

Speaking of animals, file this picture under the category of Good Luck With That.

Was this only about a month ago?

That’s a short clip I made at the Grand Central Market in Downtown Los Angeles on February 22. I’d planned to leave a few minutes before, but it was raining, so I used the idle moments to take pictures and the single clip.

Ah, those carefree days… of yore? How long ago does yore get to be? Longer than a month, usually, but these are unusual times.

Or usual? So far the 21st century seems to have gone off the rails every 10 years or so.

Late last year, I watched the short series Good Omens, which was amusing, especially for its main characters, and noted that the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, who make an appearance, had a substitution. Instead of War, Pestilence, Famine and Death, they were War, Pollution, Famine and Death (and they rode motorcycles, but never mind).

The thinking, I suppose, was that Pestilence had abated enough to give Pollution a slot. Events have overtaken that notion. Seems that Pestilence won’t be denied its place in mankind’s woes.

All Saints Catholic Cemetery & Mausoleum

Posted on March 18, 2020 by admin

Recently I was in suburban Des Plaines in the mid-afternoon on a sunny day, not too cold. I expect such forays, even a few suburbs over, will become much less frequent in the weeks ahead. They already have.

While there, I took the opportunity to visit All Saints Catholic Cemetery & Mausoleum for a few minutes. Such a visit counts, I think, as social distancing. Few other (living) people were there, all of them way off in the distance. I don’t think I came within 200 feet of another living soul.

All Saints is enormous, with two sections straddling N. River Road (US 45), and is just west of the Des Plaines River. It’s also across the road, Central Road, from the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, which I visited back in 2011.The eastern lobe is the oldest section, opening in 1923. It’s dense with upright stones.

Some larger monuments.

And a handful of private mausoleums.
Curious, I looked up Sherman J. Sexton (1892-1956). In the 19th century, his father founded John Sexton & Co. (Sexton Quality Foods), which evolved into a major Chicago-based national wholesale grocery. Sherman Sexton ran it for much of the 20th century. After much M&A, a corporate descendant is still in the wholesale food business.

Find-A-Grave lists a number of notables buried at All Saints: pro sports players, Congressmen, others. The only one I knew was sportscaster Harry Carey, though I’ve also heard of the band Nine Inch Nails. James Woolley, the group’s keyboardist for a time, reposes at the cemetery. I didn’t come looking for notable graves anyway.

The western section is much larger and includes upright stones, memorials flush with the ground, and a lot of land for expansion.

Along with statues of Jesus and saints and other figures.

The archdiocese must have seen which way the demographic wind was blowing in the 1950s, namely to the suburbs, and so acquired a lot more land for the cemetery while the getting was good. The western section opened in 1954.

The ’70s-vintage community mausoleum, like the cemetery itself, is large. I don’t know that I’ve seen a larger one. It includes a number of wings and looks something like a NASA office building.
I didn’t go inside, but I did take a look at the statues lined up outside. Place of prominence is for Jesus. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s Him.
Six Apostles line up on either side of Jesus.Not long before I left, I drove to one of the edges of the western section, past graves that were clearly for children. Three people were standing there. I drove on and parked at some distance from them, to take a look at St. Benedict, pictured above.

When returning to my car, I looked back in their direction.
They had released balloons into the sky.

California Leftovers

Posted on March 12, 2020 by admin

I drove by Randy’s Donuts near LAX, but didn’t stop to buy any. The first place I did go in Los Angeles, practically right off the plane on February 21, was Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles on W. Manchester Blvd. Mm, good. Almost as good as Maxine’s in Indianapolis, which is high praise.

After I ate chicken and waffles there — a late lunch — I determined that I didn’t have time to go all the way to Venice and stroll around the canals before I had to be back in Ladera Heights to check into my short-term residence. So Venice, California, remains an unfulfilled ambition. Like Venice, Italy.

Instead I drove over to Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery, which is on the edge of Culver City. It has everything it needs to be an aesthetic cemetery — land contour, trees and other greenery — except upright stones or much funerary art.

Still, I found Jimmy Durante. That’s something. Inka Dinka Doo.

I had lunch my first full day in Los Angeles at Grand Central Market downtown. Once a market, now it’s mostly a food hall. A popular place. The likes of which will be largely empty for a while now? This pic is status quo ante.

A large selection of eats. With some good neon.Overpriced, though. While I was eating, rain started to fall outside. Heavy for about half an hour. That was the only rain during my visit.

Saw all too many of these on the sidewalks of LA.
I even saw a man kick one hard in disgust.

I was within sight of the Santa Monica Pier when in Santa Monica, but I didn’t have the energy to actually visit the pier. Didn’t want to put up with the crowds, either.
I did see this.
That would be the opposite of the sign in downtown Chicago.

The East Garden at the Getty Villa includes this fountain.
“The enchanting central wall fountain represents a replica of a mosaic and shell fountain from the House of the Large Fountain in Pompeii,” Alice’s Garden Travel Buzz says. I’ll take Alice’s word for it.

On my return from Texas on March 1, I had a fine view of Chicago as we flew in. First to the south of O’Hare, which was visible as a whole, then across the city and over downtown — I didn’t know that was allowed — and out over Lake Michigan, where we turned. The flight back to O’Hare crossed over the North Side of Chicago, so I got a sky-high view of Wrigley Field, and then lower and lower over the suburbs near O’Hare. I recognized some of the larger roads. Some intersections. A building or two. Wait, what’s that pyramid-shaped building?

The guy next to me on my flight home from Texas rubbed his hands with sanitizer three or four times over two hours. After touching the seatback tray table, I think. If one impact of the novel coronavirus is to encourage people to wash (or clean) their hands more, that’s a good thing.

Been There, Seen That

By Dees Stribling

Category Archives: Been There