We acquired a tree on Saturday at the same lot we’ve visited for a few years now. Prices were indeed higher this year, as has been reported. Seems that fewer trees have been planted since the late 2000s recession, and the cost of transporting them is up this year as well.
Got one anyway. A little smaller than most years, but not bad. I set it up and put on the lights.
The girls put most of the rest of the ornaments on. They learned the everything-here-and-there on the tree approach to Christmas decorations from me, as I learned it from my mother and brothers.
The result, with the room lights off.
All together, it only took a couple of hours to get the tree, set it up and decorate it. Much faster than last year. The whole process happened in between dinner, which was take out Japanese food, and a movie we watched together later in the evening, which was The Princess Bride. None of those things ever gets old.
Been a cold November so far, especially late last week, except for a few hours on Saturday afternoon. So I took a walk at the Chicago Athenaeum International Sculpture Park that day. It’s pretty much the same as ever, though of course a sculpture was added in 2019.
There’s still a side path through the woods.
As well as along water destined for the Mississippi.
That same day, I went to the Sears at the Woodfield Mall. It was about to close for good; it did so a few days later. So my stroll was through mostly vacant retail space, the ghost of a once-vast enterprise.
But not quite empty.
It was the last Sears in Illinois, the state formerly home to the Sears Tower. A retailer ending with a whimper.
I didn’t buy a rug. I will say that my lawn mower before the current one, a Craftsman, was a Sears acquisition.
Even further back is the cast iron table on our deck, purchased ca. 2003 at a Sears. Looks as solid as the day we got it, so like my cast-iron frying pan — bought ca. 1983 at a Nashville grocery store, not a Sears purchase — the table will certainly outlast me.
I was glad to see that Barbara’s Bookstore, a metro Chicago chain, has opened in the mall. I don’t go to the mall a lot, so I’m not sure when. The Barbara’s branch I remember best was the store in the lower level of the Sears Tower, which I visited sometimes ca. 2000-05 (gone now).
Most everyone in the mall was masked. Otherwise, everything was about the same as any recent year. The crowds were thick, and I’m sure they’ll get thicker still as the days progress toward Christmas.
I interviewed a British retail expert not long ago, and she happened to mention the prospects of Black Friday retail sales this year in the UK. I’d heard before that is now part of British retailing, and I told her I thought that was funny.
“What’s the special occasion?” I said. “The fourth Friday in November?”
She chuckled. Like Japanese merchants importing Valentine’s Day, their British counterparts have imported Black Friday — and come to think of it, American merchants are doing their best to expand Día de Muertos in the United States. About a month ago, I saw a Día de Muertos-themed box of Pop-Tarts in a mainstream grocery store.
We also discussed American Halloween, which she said the British have taken to as well. I hope not to the detriment of Guy Fawkes Day, I said. Some customs have faded, she answered, such as a penny for the guy, but there are still bonfires.
Good. We see no reason/ why gunpowder treason/ should ever be forgot….
Laurice John Inglis was born in South Australia on the 2 March 1898, the only son of Henry W. and Lucy Inglis. He enlisted on 1 November 1916 and took part in the assault on the Polygon Wood and the capture of Black Watch Corner. Private Inglis, aged 19 years, was killed in action at Broodseinde Ridge, Belgium, on 5 October 1917.
Back to posting around Halloween. Speaking of which, this two-story skeleton can be found about a mile from my house. I’m not planning to get one for my yard.
Also, I’m not planning to watch or care about The Squid Game. Or is it The Octopus Meet? Hard to keep track of all the fashionable shows.
Here’s a question I’ve never considered at all before, for any reason: Where is the world’s largest Santa Claus statue? Guinness World Records and other sources put it in Portugal, where the municipality of Águeda erected a 69-foot Claus made of aluminum and iron and LED lighting in time for Christmas 2016.
Yet other sources assert that the 42-foot-tall, 900-pound fiberglass Santa statue in North Pole, Alaska, deserves the honor, as a more permanent fixture. It is definitely older, having graced the Fairbanks suburb since 1983 after making its way up from the Lower 48 (Seattle, specifically) in a tale told by Roadside America.
I don’t have an opinion about the champion Santa statue. I did see the North Pole Santa, though, not long before I drove down to Denali NP.
Santa stands at the Santa Claus House in North Pole, pop. 2,090 or so. I couldn’t come to greater Fairbanks and not see that. The establishment dates from nearly 70 years ago in the early days of the town, which supposedly renamed itself North Pole to attract a toy factory that never materialized (“Made at North Pole” could be stamped on such toys.) One Con Miller and his wife Nellie capitalized on the name, however, by calling their trading post Santa Claus House.
These days the place isn’t particularly a trading post, but most definitely a tourist attraction, still owned by the Miller family. I came myself exactly because it is a tourist attraction.
Santa-themed murals decorate the exterior walls.
Inside, as you’d expect, is a large retail store devoted to Christmas decorations and other holiday paraphernalia.
Not as large as the Bronner’s Christmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, Michigan, but pretty impressive all the same. In one corner, a Santa and an elf were standing by, waiting for children to visit. I understand that a Santa always stands by at the store, no matter what time of the year it is.
Santa Claus House might be the main tourist attraction in North Pole, but other parts of the city play to the theme. For instance, visible from the highway is Universal Welding, and its locally themed sign. Local street names include Santa Claus Lane (what else could that be?), Snowman Lane, Mistletoe Drive, Kris Kringle Drive and Donner and Blitzen drives.
Then there’s the North Pole post office.
I had lunch at a diner in North Pole, Country Cafe. A nice ham and cheese sandwich. The place didn’t have a Christmas theme, but rather model military airplanes. No surprise, really. Eielson Air Force Base isn’t far down the Richardson Highway (Alaska 2) from North Pole. Santa Claus House and its tourist draw is nice, but I’m sure it’s Eielson that supports the local economy.
At-home Independence Day weekend this year, unlike last year or the year before. Or rather, a metro-area holiday, since I spend some time on Saturday tooling around the border area between Cook County and Lake County before attending a backyard party in north suburban Wilmette, hosted by an old friend and her husband.
The weather turned conveniently dry (and pretty hot) after July 2, so the air temps were just right for an evening outdoor party, as well as for viewing the fireworks show in west suburban Westmont on Sunday. That morning, I got around to mowing our lawn, front and back, which had been greened up by the considerable late June rains. More rain is expected in a few days, so I’m not done with lawn maintenance for a while.
The weekend also involved a lot of time on the deck reading, or, during one particular few minutes at dusk on Monday, listening to cicadas. I hadn’t noticed them this year until that moment. There seemed to be only one (or maybe a small knot) of the insects in the tree over our deck, singing 20 or 30 cycles before being quiet for a moment.
More distant lone cicadas seemed to be doing the same in other trees. Are these the vanguard of the cicada army that will loudly fill the late afternoons of late summer?
Also, how can something so small be so loud? That’s a question new parents tend to ask themselves as well.
What do you know, Juneteenth’s a federal holiday. I have to say that I made a correct prediction on that score. But it wasn’t really that hard to guess. Anyway, I welcome it, and in fact have tomorrow off.
August-like heat has returned here in northern Illinois, though it looks like next week will cool off a bit after possible rain, as summers tend to do in the North. We could use the rain.
So far much of June has been more like summer down South: early and sustained heat, though not quite as bad as all that, since we haven’t hit 100 F yet. The high was supposedly 90 F today, and it felt like that outside. I had a simple lunch of a sandwich and a banana today out on the deck, make tolerable by the deck umbrella, which cut at least 10 degrees out of that high for me.
An HVAC tech, who has been looking after our air conditioning and heating for years now — I don’t remember how I found his company, it’s been so long — came by the other day for the annual check of the AC. Our antediluvian AC, whose mechanicals were assembled in the 20th century.
It’s a miracle it’s still running, the tech said (I’m paraphrasing). Got my fingers crossed that this won’t be the summer it gives up the mechanical ghost. We shall see. Years ago we bought a central AC unit for our small, postwar-vintage house in the western suburbs, not because the old one failed, but because the house didn’t have one. Imagine taking a new house to market these days without AC. Bet that’s a nonstarter even in a place like Fairbanks.
Much work these days. Lots going on. Will post again on January 19. The more holidays the better, and I’ll bet — considering the inclinations of the incoming administration — Juneteenth will be a federal holiday before long. Or at least the closest Monday.
Ice crystals on our deck. They didn’t last long. Later came snow, which mostly melted. To follow Sink the Bismarck!, a taut 1960 British war movie, for contrast I recently watched Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Portrait de la jeune fille en feu, 2019), an engaging French love story set just before the Revolution. I haven’t seen many movies as painterly Portrait of a Lady on Fire.
A few weeks ago, before the violent national scrum, we started watching the short series The People vs. OJ Simpson. Top-quality historical fiction. Doesn’t feel historic, just like a good while ago. An increasingly long time ago, more in feeling than strict chronology. When the trial was actually happening, I remember thinking, do I have to hear about that again? Enough time has now passed for the subject to be of some interest.
That said, do I ever feel nostalgic for the ’90s? No. The underappreciated ’70s is more my flavor, and for the exact same uninteresting reason as most people. Nostalgia for one’s youth.
I didn’t know until I read about it a little while ago, but The Great Gatsby is in the public domain now. I could publish 100 words from that book, in order, or maybe reverse order, until I’d gone through the entire book, with the time needed to put the text in my only real cost. I don’t think I’ll do that, but it’s nice to know I could.
The immortal Ella.
A much later version. Recent, in fact, by the highly talented Hot Sardines.
The Hot Sardines’ singing is top notch, but I’m really taken with the animation in the video.
Another recent version by the Speakeasy Three.
Fine harmonies. The video is so stylized that it approaches parody, but doesn’t quite get there. Somehow, that works. Also, am I right in thinking there are celebrity lookalikes in this video? Recent celebrities, not swing-era ones. I don’t care enough about celebrities to find out, but I get that sense.
A site that visit every few months: The Comics Curmudgeon. On Jan 13, he mocks the comic strip Crock, which isn’t hard, but it is hard to be funny while doing it. The writer of the site, Joshua Fruhlinger, pulls it off.
One the characters says to another one, “I can’t wait to meet the blind date you got me. When can I call her?”
“Anytime but the weekends,” the other character says. “That’s the busiest time for blacksmiths.”
Fruhlinger comments: “I was going to go all in on ‘Why is it funny that this woman is a blacksmith,’ but we all know the reason why it’s supposed to be funny: blacksmithery is not a traditional feminine job so can you even imagine going on a date with a woman who would engage in it? What would you even call her? A blacksmithrix? Haw haw! Anyway, that’s stupid, so instead I’m going to focus on something actually puzzling: the assertion that weekends are ‘the busiest time for blacksmiths.’ I guess that’s when most Renn Faires are? Are we dealing with a universe where blacksmiths are a vital part of the everyday economy, making horseshoes and tools and such, or are we in a more modern environment where mass manufactured goods are omnipresent and easy to get, and the only people who go to blacksmiths are weirdos who are obsessed with swords? This is the Crock worldbuilding background that I have a million times more in interest in than I do in Poulet’s love life.”
I’ve started reading American Slavery, American Freedom, subtitled “The Ordeal of Colonial Virginia,” by Edmund S. Morgan (1975). I’m not far along, but enough to know he’s a good writer. The first chapter is unexpectedly about of Sir Francis Drake in Panama in 1572, but I think I can see where he seems to be going with the narrative, which will get to colonial Virginia before long.
Today was the last day for the Christmas tree. As usual, it’s been nice having it around, but its time had come. Before long, I’d removed the ornaments. No one volunteered to help. Including Eggplant. I think we bought that one at an impromptu crafts sale at an apartment building near where we lived the year Lilly was born. I expect she was there with us, strapped in a carrier. The lord. Got him about the same time as Eggplant, though I can’t remember where. I like to think of him as one of the 10 Lords A-Leaping, resting between leaps.
Soon all the ornaments were off. Except the Star of Bethlehem. It’s always the last to go. I bought it at a garage sale years ago because it is a gold colored version of a silver star I put on our tree growing up. The exact same style.
After everything was off, I dragged the tree outside. The dog decided to investigate the mass of needles left behind in the living room. We will find needles in odd spots for months. Until next Christmas, probably. Last stop (on our property, anyway): the curb. That’s the tree well-illuminated by the nearby street lamp.
Another Christmas, come and gone. We opened presents in the morning that day, as usual.
Not as usual, we had a family Zoom in the afternoon. My brothers, and my nephews and their expanding families, Lilly, and Yuriko and Ann and I were all linked. A geographic diversity: Texas, New York, Washington state and Illinois. We had an enjoyable time, even if the connection was wonky occasionally.
Later in the day, our Christmas movie was The Day the Earth Stood Still. The original version, of course. I hadn’t seen it in at least 30 years, but it was as good as I remember. The movie also inspired me to look up its source story, “Farewell to the Master” by Harry Bates, originally published in Astounding in 1940. No doubt a copy of that edition is somewhere in the house in San Antonio, among my father’s sizable collection of SF. I’d never read the story before, so I found in on line. I did know about its unnerving, surprise ending, however. I heard about it from a college friend years ago.
Another New Year’s Day has gone as well, featuring ice precipitation on top of an inch of two or snow that had fallen a few days earlier. Not enough to rise to the level of an ice storm, but enough to keep us within our walls, occasionally listening to the tap-tap-tap of ice hitting the ground or roof, but mostly paying attention to electronic entertainment, or lost in a book or two, for me including American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House (Jon Meacham, 2009) that I put down this summer and which I’m finishing now, about half way through. Big things ahead: Old Hickory is going to destroy the Second Bank of the United States and go up against nullification, and win, along with a second term. He’s already set the Trail of Tears in motion.
