City of Champions?

Posted on December 19, 2023 by admin

The air was chilly, but still above freezing when Ann and I arrived in Joliet on Sunday just after noon. Not bad for December.

I’d never heard Joliet called the City of Champions, but there it was in a new-looking mural facing one of downtown’s parking lots. The city’s web site says, unhelpfully, that “[Joliet] is known as the ‘City of Champions’ for it’s [sic] world class bands. Music, art, theatre and history are found throughout the city.”

A line vague enough that could have been AI generated, except that a robot writer probably wouldn’t use it’s for its. That’s a human-style mistake. Just a hunch.

Champions or not, Joliet was a prosperous place once upon a time, and its downtown reflects that. The city could well be a growth hub again someday, once the Sunbelt gets just a little too sunny, but that’s a discussion for another time.

Rather than put it in a park, Joliet situated this sizable tree on the edge of a parking lot, near a dry fountain that I hope runs in the warm months. The tree does make the spot look a little less forlorn.

Downtown Joliet sports some interesting buildings, and we spent a few minutes taking a look. Such as a bank building from a pre-FDIC time when banks dwelt in sturdy-looking edifices with Corinthian columns.

Dating from 1909 with a design by Mundie & Jensen of Chicago, most of whose work wasn’t far from the metro area. It’s still a bank, incidentally.

Nearby are other works of similar vintage.

Even older: the Murray Building, 1886.

A giant guitar marks the Illinois Rock & Roll Museum. I didn’t know Illinois had one of those.

That is because it’s new. So new, in fact, that the galleries aren’t open yet, according to its web site, but the gift shop is. Next time I’m in Joliet, if it is all open, I might drop in.

A look at Google Street View tells me that the guitar was fixed to the exterior sometime after November 2022. There have been museum promotional materials in windows since 2018 at the earliest. Before that, a pinball/video game arcade called The Game Show, of all things, occupied the ground floor (in 2017). Back in 2007, the earliest image available, the building was occupied by Phalen’s Fine Furniture. Guess the Great Recession proved to be the end for that business, as Phalen’s was gone by ’13.

The Illinois Rock & Roll Museum has been inducting artists since 2021, with an inaugural roll that year that included Chicago, Cheap Trick, Ides of March, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters, REO Speedwagon and the Buckinghams. Most of those I could see, but Cheap Trick and REO Speedwagon had an Illinois connection? Cheap Trick was from Rockford and REO Speedwagon from Champaign. Shows you what I know.

The connection doesn’t have to be that strong, apparently. As long as the performer was either born in Illinois; started a musical career in Illinois; was based in Illinois; or recorded in Illinois, then he, she or they can be inducted. Note that as of this year, there’s no “she.” That is, not a single female inductee. Better get on that, IR&RM, before someone more vocal than me calls you out on it.

Next to the museum is the former Ottawa Street Methodist Episcopal Church, a structure dating from 1903.

“The Ottawa Street Methodist Church is a two-story, Neoclassical Revival style structure built by George Julian Barnes in 1909 on a Joliet limestone foundation,” says the city. “The structure is a wonderful and bold interpretation of the Triumphant Arch motif as applied to a Neoclassical Revival institutional building.”

These days, the building serves as part of the Joliet Area Historical Museum.

My fingers were getting a little cold, so we didn’t linger for a picture of the former church, as grand as it is. Except for this detail.

For The Good Of Man is inscribed under the side pediment. The church didn’t realize it in 1903, of course, but it’s a good thing it didn’t read To Serve Man.

A block away is another former church building.

Old St. Mary’s Carmelite, which hasn’t been an active religious structure in 30 years. New owners are currently rehabbing the property and by next summer it will be an event venue for “weddings, corporate events, fund-raisers, proms and more,” Patch reports. Good to know. I’d say that’s a good re-use for a neglected church, much better than destroying its unique beauty.

One more pic from our short Joliet walkabout: Joliet himself in bronze, beside the local library.

Seen him before, and I probably will again.

The Kingdom of Elvis

Posted on December 14, 2023 by admin

Is December here in northern Illinois evolving – devolving – into a chilly but snowless period? So far not much this year, including forecasts for the next week+. I can live with it.

I picked up Ann from Normal not long ago. Part of that involved a solo drive of two hours, much of it through the flat, featureless winter darkness of rural Illinois. Odd thoughts bubble up at such times and along such stretches, and that’s one reason I like this kind of driving, provided I’m not too tired.

A thought bubble this time, on the long road, fleshed out a little bit more later: Say there’s a major religion in 500 years – 1,000 years – whose founding document is the song “Elvis is Everywhere” by Mojo Nixon. The song makes a welter of theological claims: read them here. They might sound dodgy to you or me, but people believe the damnedest things, and I don’t expect that to change in the coming centuries.

The Kingdom of Elvis, let’s call it, but it isn’t a secular state. It’s a religion with certain tenets:

• Everyone has a bit of Elvis in him or her, and in fact inanimate objects participate in Elvis nature. That’s every human being, regardless of their other differences.

• There is an anti-Elvis – the hallmark of whom is that he has no Elvis in him. The evil opposite one walked the Earth at (roughly) the same time as Elvis, calling himself Michael J. Fox. Not much is known about him, but lore and artists depict him as diminutive and able to travel in time. A female figure, almost as evil (a nightmarish succubus, according to certain interpretations), called herself Joan Rivers.

• Elvis has been a creator throughout history, including before he made himself flesh in the 20th century (First century, to believers). Stonehenge in Britain and the Pyramids of Egypt, which Elvis lavished special attention on, are venerated as especially holy sites, as is Bermuda and the waters around the island. The homeless population of Elvis’ time (roughly) are regarded as saintly, since Elvis himself spoke to them, but that doesn’t apply to later homeless.

• Elvis has a special connection to the maritime industry, which has its own Elvis lore and ritual, though it isn’t clear why – scholars and laypeople have long debated why Elvis needs boats (compare with a parallel religion also with roots in the 20th century that asks, what does God need with a starship? Elvis believers think of that other religion as “jive.”)

• Intelligent beings that live elsewhere in the Universe resemble Elvis, “a perfect being.” Eventually the people of the Earth will more and more resemble Elvis – and indeed ultimately animate and inanimate matter alike will become Elvis. This process is called “Elvislution.”

• Believers are active participants in Elvislution, first speaking to Elvis, calling on him for healing, and to bring the perfect Elvis light. Elvis responds by calling on them to sing – like He sings — singing being a major form of worship for them. Exactly what kind of singing has been the subject of much acrimony down the centuries, but the practice has also produced ethereally beautiful songs.

• Posture is also important when singing like the King, but (again) different groups have different ideas about how to position and move their legs and lips. Stories are told of a fool called “Billy Idol” who didn’t worship Elvis properly.

Naturally, I could elaborate more – about how Mojo Nixon was widely regarded as Elvis’ prophet, but very little was actually known about him; and in fact a splinter group accepts a different prophet, a singer from the mid-21st century, who did one of the countless thousands of different recordings of the song; or how depictions of Elvis vary widely, but usually he wears sparkling white clothes marked by rhinestones and always — always — long sideburns.

The lyrics, demented as they are, are fairly easy to hear, to Mojo’s credit. Enjoy.

Refrigerator Magnets

Posted on December 13, 2023 by admin

The web site of CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire), of all places, has a page on refrigerator magnets. This from an organization that otherwise concerns itself with Higgs and other bosons, antimatter, and other arcane nature, though I suppose magnetism is an essential interest of the org.

“Fridge magnets only ‘stick’ to the fridge on one side, not on the other,” CERN says. “This is because the magnetic field they create is very different from the one of simple dipole magnets… instead of having only one North pole and one South pole, these fridge magnets consist of strips with alternating polarity. We call them multipolar magnets. This setup, called a Halbach array, generates a magnetic field on one side which is two times as strong as it would be if not arranged in this particular way, and on the other almost zero.”

Something I didn’t know. This site purports to offer a short history of the refrigerator magnet. Invented at the dawn of household refrigerators and mass tourism, it seems. In the 1920s, that is — why am I not surprised?

I was inspired to look into refrigerator magnets after taking pictures of our refrigerator the other day.

Left door top.

Left door bottom.

Right door top.

Right door bottom.

Freezer door.

Side (the other side is flush against the wall).

I documented the magnet-bedecked surfaces because soon we’d be getting a new refrigerator, since this one had quit working last month, after – how many years? We weren’t sure. The purchase documents are in a file downstairs, probably, but I didn’t feel like looking for them.

The magnets are in a paper bag. Each is light, but together they weigh several pounds. The refrigerator came today. It stands in the kitchen, naked for now. Soon the magnets – some, most? will migrate to the new appliance.

I Didn’t Know It Existed Until It Didn’t

Posted on December 12, 2023 by admin

There I was today, a cold but clear December afternoon, cruising along Golf Road, a major northwest suburban artery, when I noticed the destruction of a building in progress. A building I’d scarcely noticed before. A nondescript office tower headed for nonexistence. I had to stop to take a look at that.

Later I found out that it is (was) 2550 Golf Road, a 10-story, 270,000-square-foot structure in the city of Rolling Meadows. The insurance company next door acquired it not long ago, already vacant. Such is the anemic state of the office market that re-tenanting must have seemed undoable, and such are the economics of repurposing such a building that razing it must have been the best option.

Not a huge office building. Mid-sized I’d say, but still large enough for numerous people over the decades to spend countless hours there. Every work space has an invisible drain into which one’s life slowly disappears, workday after workday. I wonder how many human-hours (formerly man-hours) – or how many human-years – this building represented.

New York in the Days of the Omicron Variant

Posted on December 10, 2023 by admin

Has it been two years now since the omicron variant reared its ugly – head’s not quite the word for viruses, but anyway made a splash? Seems so. I happened to be visiting New York City at that moment in Covid history. I got through it. Even had a good visit, spending a lot of time outdoors, a safe place to be, I suppose, as New Yorkers went about their business.

Among other things, I enjoyed a Uyghur meal for the first time – I really need to do that again – washed down with an apple-flavored drink I’d never had before either, Laziza, a non-alcoholic malt beverage made in Lebanon.

It is really? Not something I think of when I think of moving.

It might be beyond belief even now, but not in the way meant in 2021.

What does Manhattan need that it doesn’t have? A system of alleys, for garbage pick up and other uses. There are some epic piles of trash out on the sidewalks.

The Korean War memorial in Battery Park, honoring not just U.S. forces, but all who fought against the North Koreans and red Chinese. Note the flags; others are on the other sides, including the U.S., ROK, UK, France and more.

In the pavement around the memorial are the names of those nations and how many of their troops died and were wounded. Luxembourg suffered two killed and five wounded, for instance. (If I remember right, a wounded and missing Luxembourger soldier was a plot point in a M*A*S*H episode. Yes.)

Near Little Island park.

Hard to read, but it’s (sort of) a Titanic memorial. Marks the dockside where the steamer would have docked, had it not had its date with an iceberg.

On the wall near the men’s room at Dos Caminos, a Mexican restaurant.

A comment on the food? A reference to a record label? An app I’ve never heard of? Couldn’t say, but it’s the kind of detail I like in a place.

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like LED

Posted on December 3, 2023 by admin

Unlike some years, when snow fell just as the month started, December 2023 began with cold rain. Not heavy at all, but persistent through the first morning of the month, and then again Saturday night into this morning. Very pleasant to fall asleep to.

Near Volkening Lake, the local park district has put up a small patch of seasonal lights. Some are nets of blubs wrapped around tree trunks, a fairly ordinary display. There are also other light displays.

Less standard LED constructions, looks like. Come to think of it, the bulbs probably are LED as well. Never seen ones quite like it, but for all I know, they could be the rage among municipal holiday lights.

More Manhole Covers

Posted on November 16, 2023 by admin

Almost warm today, except in the house, where I maintain temps at a skinflinty 68° F. in the colder months. It wasn’t warm enough outside to raise the inside temps, and it was so windy I decided not to built the possible last back-yard fire of the year. Maybe tomorrow.

One thing leads to another online, and from Hello Kitty I eventually made my way to the Atlas Obscura article on Japanese manhole covers.

“In Japan, many manhole covers are works of urban art — elaborate, curious, distinctive, even colorful,” AO notes. “They have become a tourist destination unto themselves, and attract a legion of dedicated manhole enthusiasts who travel the country to visit some of the thousands of unique designs.”

This seems to be a thing that has happened in the about 30 years since I lived there, so I’d never heard of it. At least, the article puts the origin of the covers as a local initiative in 1985, and it probably took a while to become a mass phenomenon.

“Typically, ‘local manholes’ or ‘design manholes’ feature elements special to a particular location: a town emblem, landmark, event, or official bird or flower,” the article says. “While there is some logic to the placement of the covers… [some] appear to have been placed without rhyme or reason.”

The last image in the article, depicting Osaka Castle, would hew to its place even without the kanji for Fukushima Ward, Osaka – it has the miotsukushi.

That’s something to look for, should I make it back to Japan. In the meantime, I sometimes look down at manhole covers in other places. Such as in Ireland and Spain, and in San Antonio more recently. Here’s one weathered by many decades, probably.

At least the lettering is barely visible. A much newer cover reminds us to protect the downstream fish.

East Jordan Iron Works are headquartered in Michigan, and the company these days is known by the less specific moniker, EJ Group. No substance to that name, if you asked me.

Simple, but with a certain style.

Not a manhole cover, but sharing a similar shape, and displaying an intricate design, at Lake Plaza in Elmendorf Lake Park in San Antonio.

Best visibility would be with a drone, looks like, but the edge-on view isn’t bad.

Hello Kitty at 50

Posted on November 15, 2023 by admin

Yet another press release that isn’t in my professional bailiwick appeared in my flooded in box the other day, except maybe you could call Hello Kitty, in some cases, part of experiential retail. Anyway, the cover letter for the release begins (all sic):

Happy Anniversary Hello Kitty!

The loveable character from SANRIO® has inspired generations with her message of friendship, kindness and inclusivity for 50 years. In celebration of this milestone, fans old and new will be introduced to several new digital and virtual opportunities to engage with Hello Kitty online, including an AR (Augmented Reality) app, short animations on TikTok, monthly promotions in My Hello Kitty Cafe on Roblox and a presence in the digital world of Zepeto. Hello Kitty is also receiving the Cultural Ambassador Award from the Japan Society of Northern California, recognizing her as an international symbol of peace and friendship.

For me, Hello Kitty falls into that category of distinctly Japanese creations, along with the likes of pachinko, most manga and tea ceremony, that flutter off in the distance, visible in passing, but which has never has excited much interest. Just a matter of personal taste. As Sanrio would tell you – is trying to tell the world – the curious anodyne feline does excite interest among many.

Also, I had to look up Roblox and Zepeto, which are an online gaming platform and an app to create avatars, respectively. I don’t expect to interact with them in any way. Sounds like something from the golden age of pulp SF: Zepeto of the planet Roblox, terror of the galaxy.

Desiderata, Revised

Posted on November 14, 2023 by admin

When I was young, I used to write parodies of all sorts of things — songs, as you might expect, but also such items as job applications and income tax forms. I came up with a parody of the first few chapters of the Book of Genesis that got some traction once at a high school speech tournament in the humorous reading category or some such. I made it to the semifinals, but was disqualified when the judges found out I’d written it myself; we weren’t supposed to be reading original material.

Juvenile works, but I was a juvenile. And juvenile silliness beats juvenile delinquency anytime.

Not long ago, I happened across an online mention of “Desiderata,” something I hadn’t thought about in years, and in re-reading it, my old instinct for parody woke up and yawned and stretched. Now that needs to be made fun of, I thought.

Further investigation revealed that the text is in the public domain now. Of course, you ought to be able to parody anything, regardless of its copyright status, but even so it was nice to know what I can play with the thing, no questions askable.

This is what I came up with.

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,

and turn off that damned phone.

As far as possible without surrender

be on good terms with all persons, since that is less trouble.

Speak your truth quietly

and clearly; but remember people rarely listen anyway.

Listen to others,

since you never know what weird things you’ll hear.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, because

they are assholes, and who needs that?

If you compare yourself

with others, you’ll be upset, but you’ll do it all the same.

But at least you’ll be glad there are

lesser persons than yourself; that will make you feel better.

Enjoy your achievements as well

as your plans. Might as well.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble;

it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time,

except when you are laid off and

find that your skills are obsolete.

Exercise caution in your business affairs; full stop.

Most people are actually honest,

but no one ever got rich being honest.

Many persons strive for high ideals,

and there is heroism, but mostly people just watch those things on TV and in movies.

Be yourself. Unless you’re an asshole, though you probably wouldn’t be self-aware enough to know that.

Especially, do not feign affection. Your partner will figure it out soon enough.

Neither be cynical about love;

it is as perennial as the grass. And dandelions.

Don’t expect love to be the same in middle age as in your youth.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, and act your age, for crying out loud.

Surrender the things of youth, or you’ll be ridiculous.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. Also, have some money in the bank.

But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.

Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness, or watching TV news that’s out to scare you for ratings.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,

be gentle with yourself. Perfection is a delusion.

You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. Keep telling yourself that.

And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Keep telling yourself that, too.

Therefore be at peace with God, or you’ll regret it, big time.

Whatever your labors and aspirations,

in the noisy confusion of life

keep peace with your soul. Again, turn off the phone. It really helps.

With all its sham, drudgery,

and broken dreams,

it is still a beautiful world. Especially on Friday afternoons.

Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

Smile, damn you, smile.

~Max Ehrmann, with minor modifications by Dees Stribling

OLLU & Elmendorf Lake Park

Posted on November 1, 2023 by admin

Despite the cold, we had about 40 kids show up yesterday to collect sweets, maybe half again as many as the busiest Halloweens of the past, though I don’t count every year. We ran through an entire box of full-sized candy bars plus some other smaller confections. Almost all of the kids came before dark, which has been the case for many years now. Another example of widespread nervous parenting that’s pretty much entrenched, I figure. When I was that age, we went out after dark in our Invisible Pedestrian costumes and we liked it.

Most of the costumes this year were buried under coats, but I have to say the best of ’23 was a tallish kid in no coat and a white-and-red full-body chicken outfit, complete with a comb as prominent as Foghorn Leghorn’s. The costume might well have been warm enough for him to go without a coat. The color scheme reminded me of Chick-fil-A right away.

I’m just old enough to remember sometimes receiving baked goods and fruit on Halloween; those vanished by about 1970, victim of the lurid nonsense stories about razor blades in apples, poisoned cakes and chocolate Ex-Lax being given to kids. We found the thought of that last one pretty funny, actually.

This morning we woke to about an inch of snow destined to melt later in the day. A small preview of winter.

The cold is an unpleasant contrast to South Texas last week, where it was hot for October. (Temps have fallen there since then, I heard.) Just after noon on Saturday, I headed over to the campus of Our Lady of the Lake University, OLLU. I’d heard of the school for a long time, but my knowledge of it never rose above the level of hazy.

Main Building, the sign says. A name refreshing in its simplicity. The building’s a little more intricate.

Mere steps away is Sacred Heart Chapel.

The school recently marked the chapel’s centennial. At your feet at the entrance, a date.

“The English Gothic chapel was the vision of Mother Florence Walter, Superior General of the Congregation of Divine Providence from 1886-1925,” says the university web site. “In 1895, she looked down from Prospect Hill at a swath of wilderness and declared, ‘One day we will have a chapel here. And its spires will be seen throughout the city of San Antonio.’ ”

That must have a good day for the superior general. Funding the chapel took 11 years, but eventually the Sisters, who had founded the school in 1895, were able to hire a renowned architect, Leo Dielman, to design the chapel. A prolific architect of sacred space – more than 100 churches to his credit – Dielmann had his funeral in 1969 at Sacred Heart Chapel.

When I went in, a funeral was going on. I gazed in for only a moment from the very back of the nave. Looked like this, except for the sacrament pictured.

OLLU borders Elmendorf Lake Park, with walking trails ringing a small manmade lake, created by the damming of Apache Creek. I took a walk. When the sun periodically came out from behind the clouds, it felt like it was about 90 F. It was a sweaty walk. Needed that hat I’d left in Illinois.

Thick foliage luxuriates on the lakeshore.

Almost no one else was around on what, compared with South Texas temps only a few weeks and months earlier, was merely a warm day. A Saturday at that. The place gave out no sense of being avoided out of fear for one’s person; just ignored. A few recreational fishermen stood on the shore, angling. One was in a small boat. That was all.

Another, more hard-surface part of the park includes benches. Parc Güell sorts of benches, but without the crowds.

No human crowds, that is. Birds were another matter. An astonishing number of birds occupied a handful of the trees in the park, ca-ca-ca-ca-ing with a resounding volume, especially on a small island I saw later is called Bird Island. Thinking on it, their Hitchcockian vibe might keep some people away. A lot of people.

Birds looking something like herons with completely black plumage. I couldn’t place them, but my bird knowledge is pretty meager. Crows? They look leaner of build than crows. But what do I really know about crows?

I do know enough not to walk under them. A few of the bird-occupied trees were along the path of my walk, so I took minor detours to avoid any direct bombardment. I passed through the park without being the target of any droppings.

I thought of a Red Skelton TV sketch featuring his characters, seagulls Gertrude and Heathcliff (I had to look the names up, but not that fact that he did those characters). One of the birds noted that the beach below was very crowded. The other responded, “There’s no sport in that.” Odd what sticks with you after more than 50 years.