respublica

They are the champions

Last night Christ Community Lutheran School's soccer team played Immanuel St. Charles for the district championship on the Lutheran South High School football field. Our grandson Christian plays for CCLS and emotions were running high before the game because Immanuel is always a tough opponent in any sport and because CCLS teams have won this game 4 straight years. The pressure was on for our 8th grade guys to keep the streak going.

And they did! They won by a score of 2-1 and Christian had both sets of grandparents in the stands, a rare thing.

I just had to zero in on Christian holding the trophy afterward. He's on the right.

Tally up

Mattresses 103

Ladders 100

One of each has fallen in the past 12 hours

Oh deer

This is an odd law. In Illinois if you hit and kill a deer you can keep it. If you witness someone else hitting and killing a deer and he doesn't want it, you can take it. But, and this is the odd part, you can only take that deer if you are and Illinois resident not behind on child support payments.

What an odd codicil to a road kill law.

She touched the Stanley Cup

I'm telling you, sometimes it pays to work in Washington DC. Yesterday Katie went to the White House to see the St. Louis Blues and today the Stanley Cup arrives where she works.

Unreal

The good old typewriter days

Dale's Meyer Minute for today reflects on his early days at his first church in Venedy, Illinois. Most of it is about how he wrote his sermons and bulletins on typewriters. There was no such thing as computers back then. I pulled out an old black and white photo I'd taken of him at that desk and it got me to remembering just how that picture came about.

I'd put the date at around 1976. It was our nation's Bi-Centennial year and I'd been dabbling in photography and took some classes at the local (Centralia) junior college. In those days photographs were taken with film which had to be developed. In one class I took we learned how to develop our own film, all black and white. Color was a bit too difficult without a lab. I liked this so much that Dale bought me darkroom equipment to do this at home. The Venedy parsonage had a long narrow attic type room on the second floor which was perfect because no light at all seeped in. You had to be in the dark in a dark room or the photos would not turn out. The enlarger which was needed for making prints came with a dim red photo light which was all the light that could be used.

Also involved with developing photos was a can for developing negatives and then 3 rectangular trays for making the actual prints. Each tray had a different fluid. I spent a lot of time messing around up there making photographs and it's one of those clear memories. A few years ago before the parsonage was torn down to make way for a new fellowship hall, I walked through it for old times sake. Lo and behold, a couple of the pictures I'd tacked to the wall of my makeshift darkroom were still there.

Here is a picture I did back in 1976 and attached to his Facebook Meyer Minute for today.

Oh how young we were. But both of us were learning things by the bucket full.

STL Blues at the White House

Our Stanley Cup Champions will be guests at the White House this afternoon around 2 CST. The best part of this is that our daughter Katie somehow wangled herself and invitation to this event. She could not be more excited and I'm hopeful that some news station will carry it.

New store

This weekend Total Wine and More opened a new store in Fairview Heights. We've gone to that business in Brentwood since it opened several years ago and really like it. There is a huge variety of beers, wines, spirits, even cigars and glassware. The best part is the prices, they are hard to beat. And, the store itself is nice, not warehouse in appearance. So I was happy they opened in Fairview because when we are over there I like to be able to get a bottle of wine and they have more choices than the grocery stores.

I went yesterday to check out the Fairview grand opening celebration. This store seems slightly bigger than the one in Brentwood and laid out similarly but with some slight variations which I liked. The Brentwood store has steep steps to climb to get into and no smaller carts. Not so at Fairview, easy in and out and they have two cart sizes. One thing is the same and that is the huge selection of beers, many of which you can buy in single cans. This idea is a good one considering the crazy variety of beer out there these days. So many beer makers must believe there is a big market for adding fruit flavor to beer because you will see a lot of this. Every fruit and flower imaginable shows up in beer. Is this a Millennial thing?

I bought a couple of cans of this type of beer for a friend of mine who loves fruity beers. I got a kick out of the weirdness of one of them. Chamomile Flowered ale.

Week's tally start

We've had a jump in mattresses and ladders falling onto local highways since I last posted. The last report was mattresses 97 and ladders 93. Now it stands at:

Mattresses 100

Ladders 98

WHOOPS  A new ladder on the middle lane 44 at Antire.

Mattresses 100

Ladders 99

Christopher Columbus

We know a bit about Columbus who is recognized each year with a day off of school and the closing of federal offices. What do we really know about him? My memory him goes kind of like this: "Columbus discovered America." Or, "In Fourteen Hundred and Ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue." He was Italian who was sponsored by Spain when the Italians would not go along with his plan. Queen Isabella of Spain had a big part in this.

He actually landed in what is now the Bahamas and named that area San Salvador. He also made landfall at four other locations throughout the Bahamas, at Cuba, which he thought was China, and at the island called Haití by natives. But the island he named San Salvador is not the same place with that name today. 

In any event, he was probably the first European to find the Americas, just not north America. Even today no one knows the exact place he first landed and even after 4 trips over, Columbus insisted to the end that he had landed on islands very near Asia.

However it happened his trips encouraged other Europeans to make the trip and they would end up in North America eventually. It's weird how we now read of people who want no part of Columbus Day. No matter where he landed, the fact that he and his crews had the nerve to just set out across an unknown ocean for unknown miles is noteworthy. And here we are today.

Timeless Love

By artist Stephen Shortridge

I love this. The artist was an actor in the 70's and 80's who was on such programs as Welcome Back Kotter, The Love Boat, The Bold and the Beautiful soap opera  and any number of others. But his heart was in art and he has done some wonderful things.

Poop signs

Springfield Missouri came up with a great idea after a growing problem of dog poop in public places. They had signs made and put them around their downtown parks and parking lots in hopes people will start picking up after their dogs.

We need to get some of these. There are too many dog owners who think they don't have to do this.

Let there be no light

This is the nuttiest thing I've come across in a long time. From The Economist : "There is little evidence that light and electricity truly transform people's lives."

This was from a supposedly smart periodical. One wag commented: "Did....A candle write this?"

Another wrote: "Easy to say when you’ve had it all your life. Experiment: I would love to see the author of this article live w/o electricity for a few months."

 

Risky frisky

IDOT posted this today: "Fall driving can get risky when deer get frisky."

All this means is that we are now entering the time of year when deer begin to mate and they are apt to be jumping onto roads and highways. "With the onset of autumn, the school year is in full swing, pumpkin lattes are steaming - and Illinois deer are feeling amorous. The Illinois Department of Transportation and Illinois Department of Natural Resources are reminding motorists to be vigilant during deer mating season as the animals become more active, especially in the early morning and evening hours."

I can attest to the sudden appearance of a deer on the road. We've hit or been hit, by deer several times during our marriage. They come out of nowhere. It pays to be watching the sides of any road these days, October, November and December with November seeing the greatest number of deer/car accidents. Madison County had the third highest number of deer accidents last year in Illinois.

This link from IDOT has some advice on what to do if you come in contact with a deer.

Quite frankly, after having run ins with deer over the year I am very paranoid when I'm driving on the interstate or country/county roads.

As if there wasn't enough to worry about

Now comes a suggestion from the New York Times to clean the remote in hotel rooms you stay in. "It's touched by everyone but rarely cleaned."

Let's talk pockets

I bought a couple of new pairs of light cordoroy slacks last week knowing the temperatures were going to drop and shorts just wouldn't cut it. It wasn't long before I wore one of the pairs last night that the pockets were tiny. So tiny, in fact, one car key would not fit in them at all. This frustrates me because I see no need to lug around a purse everywhere I go to hold my wallet, car key and phone. I'd like at least one pocket like men get in their clothes.

Why do womens' clothing makers do this to us? It reminded me of an article I read sometime back in which the woman writer confessed she wants to wear men's clothes. She wants to wear them because they have real pockets. I never understand why so many women carry around pretty big purses and wonder just what they need that requires such a big thing. And, do they need all that's in the purse everywhere they go? Isn't it easier to go to the grocery store without a purse dangling over a shoulder or plopped in the cart?

Here is the reason I found for the lack, or tiny-ness of pockets on womens' slacks/shorts/skirts. It's aesthetics. "pockets give an outline or the fabric for the pocket bump out on the sides especially since pants for women are pretty tight and no pockets = smooth thigh area at a distance. Think this is quite noticeable for tuck-in tops aka the pants are high waisted Having pockets on the sides can make hips look bigger too which is a no no most of the time."

This is kind of nonsense. Not all pants for women are yogo-style tight. Khaki slacks could easily be made with pockets. So could shorts in summer.

In the end, it's good it's getting chilly. Light jackets for women are still made with decent pockets and the often have zippers to keep things from falling out.

Improvement or not?

One of the contributors to the Facebook page, Original Chicago, posted two photos showing before and after images of commuter train pedestrian tunnels which connect the Red and Blue lines. I found myself studying the differences and my impression was that the newer look was pretty dim, darker which would make me nervous walking alone through there. But other readers came up with some other issues that made sense.

Here is the Before tunnel

And the renovated tunnel, I can't imagine what it must have been like for those assigned to put up all those tiles.

One comment noted that the new version left out the directional signage so you know where to go.

But several mentioned the choice of small tiles which means more grout leading to more dirt. Very true. Also that the smaller tiles make the tunnel seem much longer.

And then the many comments on pee. Yes pee. It seems it is not uncommon for men to pee in this tunnel, note the gutter along both sides of the floor, used to collect liquids.

"It looks like a very long Euro-style urinal, and is used that way."

"I've once seen a dude on a skate board pee the entire length of this tunnel"

In any event, no good work goes un-criticized in any city.

 

Tearing up the basement

For weeks Dale has been demo-ing our basement walls in Collinsville. This is due to some water science that I cannot comprehend, but is necessary in order for a water basement systems company to come in and rectify. We've had some water seepage after rains this winter and it seems an underground tile or tiles along or under the foundation have broken. Now we're having them come in and jackhammer holes all around the inside of the foundation walls and add a drain somehow which will attach to a sump pump. We've never had a sump pump but now we will. After this, we will never have water again, so they say. 

This has been extremely messy and a ton of heavy work for Dale, but he wanted to clear all the walls to save some money, and, he liked doing it. This morning 3 men from Woods Basement Systems arrived with jackhammers in tow and all kinds of other stuff. They said when they got here that since he gutted everything they should be finished tomorrow. Hurray for that, except then we're left with the age old, "now what" as to how to put it all back together. Dale is not going to do that! Gutting he can do, finishing work, no.

The walls only had to be gutting 18 inches above the floor, but in most places he took the entire wall down and demo-ed the entire basement bathroom. In the end things should look much better with new walls and a new bathroom.  Hopefully in my lifetime.

I'm getting out of here and headed back to the quiet, no dust, seminary while he stays to observe.

And so it begins

Yesterday the seminary board of regents announced that Dale would be retiring after this school year. We, of course, had made this known to them, but it was a bittersweet day. He has been the longest tenured president in 50 years and we've been a part of this campus in one way or another since 2000. A major part of of lives will see a major change.

But, so many people sent the nicest messages after the announcement went public that it made us teary eyed most of the day.

Change is part of life and we'll return to our roots in Collinsville and be content. (After the hard, physical work involved moving is finished.)

Those electric scooters

You've probably seen them sitting around sidewalks or next to curbs, electric scooters which more and more people are using to get around. You get yourself a code which will allow you to use any scooter sitting alone anywhere. I'm sure there's a fee involved. The issue for many people is how dangerous this is becoming at worst, and how annoying at the least.

When you use a scooter to get where you're going you can leave it anywhere. We've seen them left all over our neighborhood, including right in the middle of driveable alleys and on sidewalks. There has been a spate of these left on the campus, especially on the edges of campus. I don't have a particular problem with them except for the problematic places they're left, but most importantly, how dangerous they are. Several times I've started to back out of our driveway and there came someone zooming down the street on a scooter not paying any attention. And, when they are on busy local streets, like Demun you just don't see them.

Why this year has become so busy with these scooters when the lime green scooter of a couple of years ago were a bit of a flop, I don't know.

But, one man in Florida got so weary of the many scooters littering his neighborhood, lawns, sidewalks and streets that he took to going out in the middle of the night and disabling them. More than 140 were vandalized in the Fort Lauderdale area and police blame this man. Police set out surveillance cameras and caught Randall Williams walking around the neighborhood in a stealthy fashion, utilizing the shadows and the alleyways to conceal his movements. He would walk up to an electrical scooter on the street, slap a white sticker on its QR code, and cut its brake lines, essentially rendering it impossible to use.

He was arrested and booked on charges of criminal mischief, resisting officers, and loitering or prowling. He was released Monday after posting $500 in bond.

He must have really been upset by these scooters.

A surprise ancestor photo

My sister is a avid family history researcher and goes about this hunting for ancestors in spurts. Yesterday she sent me a photo of one of our great grandmothers, Anna Barry. Anna was the mother of our father's mother. I'd like to know the date of this photo since it has to be quite old.

I was curious about the color in the photo since this does not seem possible considering when it was taken. Everything was black and white. So, my question is, was it a photo of a painted portrait? It could be since you can see the reflection of a room or windows behind her which meant someone took a photo of a photo or painting.

This was quite a surprise.