Gotta be a Story

Happy Saturday morning. This past Monday we feasted on an early, 2” snowfall. By mid-week it was back to walking with Bermudas. But never fear, today is the day that Saint Nicholas (‘Sinterklaas’) arrives in the Netherlands (by boat from Spain no less). So, the season of cold and white and possibly more Northern Lights cannot be but closing in.

Now, coffee is done so best pour a mug

There are Stories – Last Saturday I took a 5½ mile hike through nearby Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum. It was a glorious day. Trees were on full display, and the ducks were causing the only ripples on the various ponds. On the back side of the park are some hills, and as the old saying goes, “the greater the climb, the better the view.” I had several of those ‘better’ views.

In no hurry and with gorgeous weather I made a quick decision. I wasn’t going to be there to set a time record. Instead, it was a visit to be filled with exploration. And, in a cemetery, what better exploring than to ‘poke’ around to take a closer look at some of the grave headstones.

Here are a few which caught my interest. And, at the same time, have you put together their story or history of the ‘resident’.

Just to give you a headstart here is one, selected primarily because ‘Karl’ was in his prime during the “Civil War” (or since we’re on the Kentucky line it could have been the “War Between the States“). I did look up Karl’s details; Charles J. ‘Karl’ Bolea. Born in Germany and little else. I thought that his time period was of interest.

This large headstone carrying the name; ‘Neeb” is of black marble. I thought the shape was unusual and yes, I did figure out Mr. Neeb’s background and the meaning of the shape. Good luck on your own path to discovering.

These two 5’ high SpongeBob headstones caused a bit of a ruckus in the local news. They were first approved by someone without the authority to do so – whoops. From the roadway they’re now not visible. Good luck with your own search.

The story behind this marker must be a difficult one. It’s three crosses each with the engraved photo and name of three young men, different names (2 same surname), differing birth years but same death year. I found out a bit of detail, but not much.

This bust is one of three in the cemetery. Each of these three have glass eyes. The result is that from whatever direction you approach the eyes look at you and follow you as you move about. It’s a bit surreal.
Charles C. Breuer Sr. (1845-1908) born in Germany. His occupation? He was an Optometrist, now, does the ‘eye’ gain some meaning?

And last on these few unusual markers is this one with the headline: “Through Their Thoughtfulness Knowledge Grows”. It was placed by the University of Cincinnati, Body Donation Program, Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology.

Ok, one more. Enough of the death thing, this sculpture is about ‘life’. The sculpture is on Spring Grove’s grounds and celebrates a Rev. John Chapman (1774-1845). Yes, he of ‘Johnny Appleseed’ fame. A Swedenborg pastor, Chapman roamed these parts with bible and a sack of seeds to bring ‘life’ to the earth. You know the story.

It’s a Wonderful World – And it is definitely so in the city of Belém. The whole Global Warming scam just keeps giving us these wonderful “what the?” moments. Now in Belém, Brazil the world’s elite and rabid believers are gathering to ‘save’ the world. The airport is being enlarged to accommodate the fleets of jets. But it gets better. To accommodate the limos thousands of rain-forest trees have been cut down to accommodate an 8-mile long 4 lane highway. It’s serious work these folk have embarked on.

The corner (well not quite) – Looking out the front window, Marcia and I saw a full-sized Coyote cross the street. Something must have spooked it because it started loping off. Too bad or I would have put on the song “Coyote.” Canadian singer—songwriter Joni Mitchell’s mega hit from 1977 and thereby enhance the whole event.

Mid-Week, on an afternoon walk a couple of streets away, I came across this Volkswagen sitting in front of one of the houses. Personally, I think it’s a tad beyond salvageability. I do think Marcia caught the whole event on the scanner. Think that is close enough to count as a Corner of Chaos & Mayhem item?

Then yesterday our building required ‘after-the-storm’ work on our building’s soffits. This is what a 48’ extended ladder looks like. And yes, it took multiple trips up-and-down to affect the fix.

Let me leave you with a couple of pictures from last Sunday’s Jazz@First Chamber Jazz Series at the nearby little First Unitarian Church.

The alto saxophone soloist was Christopher Andrews. Instructor at the University of Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and a slew of work with notable artists, he was exceptional. As mentioned last week we explored the evolution of the alto saxophone in jazz: Showcasing Jazz through several decades (mostly 1930s through the 1960s) with almost 15 pieces of music.

I couldn’t get enough.

Life is AMAZING!

Dirk

BONUS POINTS:

This week, in Philadelphia, the last US Penny was struck. I believe the idea is to not yank them out of circulation but to let time take care of it. How many are in circulation?

1) “1 trillion”
2) “500 million”
3) “780 million”
4) “800 billion”
5) “300 billion”
6) “1.25 trillion”

Different ‘tunes’

Happy Saturday morning. For a while now, a few times a week, I’ve tapped into my Dutch roots. Alongside my morning coffee I’ve been enjoying a morning “beschuit met kaas” (rusk with cheese).

I have no idea why I hadn’t tapped into that source of pleasure for so long. Maybe I rediscovered this pleasure once I remembered that locally Jungle Jim’s International Marketplace carries this delight. In fact, they carry several variants, including whole wheat.

An Election – Ok, early this week we had an election. Marcia and I voted early at our County Board of Elections, which is headquartered in nearby Norwood. The facility is much more conducive to ease of entry and accommodation for Marcia.

Anyway, that’s not what I want to write about. I wanted to mention my viewpoint on the election results:

“Close the door, put out the light
You know they won’t be home tonight
The snow falls hard and don’t you know
The winds of Thor are blowing cold” Led Zeppelin, ‘No Quarter’

Riding the wave of politicians we’ve unleashed on our communities is akin to the reason we should ride a horse and shouldn’t ride a sparkling cute Zebra; i.e. their innate reflexes will kick you in the rear surprisingly fast and without warning.

Oh well, it’s a new beginning. Do it well:

Outages – Last week it was the electric outage, this week it was the internet. Here is how it started.

I’ve been looking for a new printer. Finally, Costco had the model I had on my list, and it was on sale. Tuesday, I pulled the handle and returned home with a box under my arm.

Wednesday, I began the installation. What promised to be a simple procedure went on and on. I checked the router, the modem, our connection, and all checked OK. But no communication between computer and printer.
Repeat!
Every time installation screens flashed by to then eventually pop up with a notice that the process could not be completed.

I quit and had some lunch followed by a well-deserved break. Near 2:00pm I felt ready to get-the-job-done.

It was Marcia who interrupted my ‘work’ with a quick; “did you get the Spectrum note stating hat there’d be intermittent internet disruptions?”

Thursday, started with renewed energy. The internet was back to normal and a short time later everything was running, printing, including the scanner and photo functions.

In fact, I felt so upbeat that I set out right after lunch on a 7.99-mile hike! An early prep for my Thanksgiving Day ‘Turky-Trot 5k’ starting next to our TQL Soccer stadium. All is good!

Creep – Wednesday Marcia and I were off to where granddaughter Vai and her 25-member school Steel Drum band, ‘Genesis’, performed for family, friend, and neighbors. They did several numbers including “Yellow Brick Road”, from the We’re off to See the Wizard.

As I expected these teenagers would zero in on one specific number and I hit the ‘bullseye’, it was “Creep”, by English rock-band Radiohead. I didn’t get a chance to record her playing it so here is a piece of the audio from the 1992 original performed by Radiohead.

Keep in mind that Steel Drums are tuned for every note on the scale, no matter what musical instrument, be it clarinet, violin, guitar, etc., can be replicated. So, what you hear on the track below is pretty well what we heard on their drums – very cool stuff! Very fun!

Remember the 2023 movie, Boys on the Boat – It focused on the Washington State rowing team. It describes a real event where this rowing team competed in the 1936 Summer Olympics. What we saw were rudimentary wooden boats, and where the Coxswain bellowed instructions through a handheld vintage megaphone.

Our Dinah, now rowing for Syracuse University rows and practices in a whole different world. On the Syracuse website I found this closeup of one of their Coxswains and all the electronics for her to track, strategize, and communicate with.

Comic – A strike, whether it’s a Congress, a government group, a Company, or even a school system, it usually all boils down to the same. Same old, same old, and mostly just a lot of same old losers.

Now get ready for some exercise hiking – it’s the last of the long list of great Fall days. Starting tomorrow there’ll be a serious temperature drop with rain and, possibly, the first snowflakes of the season, i.e. a ‘wintry mix’. So to celebrate, tomorrow I plan to head out for a bit of an intimate performance with the Jazz@First Chamber Jazz Series

We’ll explore the evolution of the alto saxophone in jazz with Jazz Alto Sax Legacy: Hodges, Bird and Cannonball – Johnny Hodges, Charlie “Bird” Parker and Cannonball Adderley. Showcasing Jazz through swing, bebop and soul-infused hard bop. It should be a fine time.

Life is AMAZING!

Dirk

BONUS POINTS:

2 questions:
1st, who was the first U.S. president who spoke English as a second language. Name: ………
2nd part: What was his first language?

1) “Welsh”
2) “German”
3) “French”
4) “Danish”
5) “Dutch”
6) “Irish”

Batsh*t-Bonkers?

Happy Saturday morning. You’re probably wondering why the title? And no, I am not going to start doing the daily UK’s Katie Hopkins’ delightful Batsh*t show from her perch in jolly-old Britain. But more later.

Now, back to normal it’s time for a morning coffee after Halloween, or maybe for Marcia I should say: Happy Cacao-Iloween for just this weekend – she loves hot chocolate. We did experience another first this year. The first year in many, many where we did not roam the neighborhood watching grandkids race around in costume. Time does pass doesn’t it?

Actually, it’s a bit nutty here at “The Corner of…blah, blah.” Thursday morning at 12:30am we had a power outage. Then I got a text that power would be restored by 4:40am. One hour later I received another one telling me that out of the 1967 ‘lucky’ in-the-dark customers all but 759 were still impacted. We, on ‘The’ corner of blah, blah, etc. were still in the dark. Then another text, power would be on by 5:15am. Apparently, our power did come back on five-ish.

OK, so building on all my Batsh*t-Bonkers (now to be referred to as just ‘B-B’) of nighttime fun, I had to reset several clocks. Always thinking, I dealt with the fact that tomorrow morning all those same clocks must be set back an hour (an event that too is ‘B-B’). In a brilliant move I ended up putting all those blinking clocks on the soon to be Sunday time.

This works great, except that now half our timepieces give one time and the on-line others another. I believe that Marcia has stuck her head around one corner or another umpteen times with the words; “now what time is it?” Was this move on my part a ‘B-B’ move?

Batsh*t-Bonkers 2 – is the lovely Chagrin Falls, Ohio annual Fall tradition referred to as “The Pumpkin Roll”. It’s an all night event otherwise I’d shoot on up. In any case enjoy these few minutes of ‘B-B’ seasonal fun:

Final Decoration pic – It’s been fairly strenuous, deciding on the final “best of” Halloween home decoration picture of the week for 2025. Keep in mind, the lucky winner was selected by me, came from houses I pass during my walks, and is completely subject to my subjectivity for this selection process.

I toyed with going for houses with the most decoration stuffed into the smallest yard. I quit that effort when I lost track of just how many bony fingers sticking out of the grass I could count. Then, another negative was the weather, two days of rain plus gusty winds meant that too often the massive inflatables had either blown over or purposely been deflated. I settled, again, on simplicity.

I love this winner’s décor. As a kid, would you walk a long dark drive towards a massive and imposing house only to be greeted by these two gatekeepers? As an aside, this is the house Adrianne’s best buddy since kindergarten, Gillian, grew up in, and Marcia and I have attended parties at. Maybe that last bit helped lock in my decision. Click on picture for full size.

Batsh*t-Bonkers 3 – Is the politics current in our city as managed by Mayor Aftab Pureval (think “Pure-Evil”). Finally, we’ve reached national status. We’re quickly placing ourselves alongside some other cities. To find the others, just grab the top contenders in an array of stats; crime rate, murder increase, carjackings, or in financial straits, don’t be choosy, pick any other undesirable category.

The latest is the firing of our Police Chief, Terri Theetge (who they made responsible to the City Manager who’s appointed by the mayor). This means that her work was overseen by a political group heavily entrenched with the DEI, WOKE, and Progressive twaddle of the day. This last bit is important.

As a career officer she rose through the ranks with nothing but positive reviews. Her parents, sibs, uncles are all in law enforcement. Personally, I don’t know her other than that she has a sterling background.

Anyway, crime in the core city areas is out of hand and aside from inept courts it’s also the ‘white glove’ treatment the ‘perps’ receive from the city.

All of this finally received National attention when a racially initiated brawl broke out downtown, and since neither the mayor or City Manager take any responsibly Chief Theege was quickly tossed under the bus.

And here is the problem – her record, is sterling! And is deemed so unanimously by the Fraternal Order of Police. So here is their ‘brilliant’ solution, she’s been put on paid leave (i.e. fired), a new ‘acting’ Chief appointed, and a Law Firm hired on the public’s dime.

Why hire a Law Firm you ask? The firm’s sole job is to discover cause for her firing! To a former neighbor and Past President of the NAACP this and much more is so bad that he is recomending that a Federal case be opened.

Let that sink in; first fire than find the crime for the firing! History comes full circle!

Quote – “give me the man, and I will find the crime“, or “show me the man and I’ll show you the crime” The saying is commonly attributed to the Stalinist-era the secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria, ? or possibly to Stalin himself by Soviet jurist Andrey Vyshinsky in his memoirs.

A Peppercorn for your house update – And here is Bulsh*t Bonkers 4 and it’s from the UK no less. Last week I focused a bit too much on all that ‘kingly’ stuff. Not to worry, this is just a quick update. It appears that King Charles has made up his mind and is booting his younger sib, Prince Andrew, out of the Royal Lodge and ‘disrobing’ the guy of his royal titles. There goes that sweet, single Peppercorn a year rent deal, and Andrew can now ‘display’ his new magical, invisible, royal robes.

I wonder if it’ll affect World peppercorn prices and if “Naked Emperor” comics will soon reappear?

Life is AMAZING!

Dirk

BONUS POINTS:

After splashing down southwest of Hawaii, completing man’s first moon landing, astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins had to…………. (only one of these is correct)

1) “stay isolated in their capsule for 8 days”
2) “while still in their capsule used a scale to weigh their moon rock stash”
3) “drink a liquid diet for several days”
4) “complete a standard U.S. Customs form”
5) “use a dual engine GM highway bus to travel to Houston”
6) “flew from Hawaii to Houston on the Concorde dressed in isolation garments”