I hope you all had a marvelous Christmas or, if you don’t celebrate that holiday, I hope you had some quiet, quality time with your family. To ease into another shortened holiday week, I decided to start off with some random images which didn’t quite call for a post of their own, some not even a comment, but seemed worth seeing the light of day.
I used to do this more routinely, but since I’ve focused full-time on the blog it seems there is always something (usually several things) that needs to be written about. We’ll get back to the bigger issues and stories next week, but for now here are some images I think you’ll enjoy, along with a comment on some of them regarding what inspired me to take the picture in the first place.
Of course, interesting people make the city the great place it is. My favorite people are the ones who are just a bit different and are pretty happy to be that person. The guy eating the pie said I could take his picture, though I didn’t seem to be an important piece of the equation for him – it was all about the pie. A guy in a cape walking down the street without irony. Mark Burns painted Elvis after the other one was destroyed by a storm, making Gay Street just a little more enjoyable.
Then there’s the guy who’s been singing Christmas Carols while “playing” a shaker. Shake what you got, right? As far as I can tell, he’s not doing it for money or bothering anyone. Maybe it’s his ministry and, if so, I appreciate it better than the screaming evangelists we get from time to time. The art facing the street on the J.C. Penney construction site caused a brief eruption of debate in the local arts community as to whether it was legitimate art. This was the year Al took to the street with his ukulele. As I recall, he told me that day that he’d seen others around with ukes. Maybe it’s a movement that will have its breakout in the city in 2015. You saw it here, first.
One shift that made me really happy this year was the advent of Tailor Lofts and 5 Bar in the place of our former Arby’s and a mostly-vacant building. That’s a real save and I’m appreciative to the Johnsons and others for doing it. I was sort of startled when I saw that food truck. With its curvaceous cowgirl offering mobile poutine, I’ll admit I did a double take. Am I the only one who’s mind went there? I subsequently learned poutine is a French Canadian dish made of french fries, cheese curds and gravy. It’s probably delicious and I hope to try the Poutine Mobile Truck in 2015. Big Don the Costumier moved this year, leaving this building pretty endangered. I hope somebody saves it. How many of you remember the previous incarnation: Big Don’s Elegant Junk?
I’ve had a great year with Urban Girl in the city this year. She’s really grown up on this blog and this year she realized her minor celebrity when I explained why people walk up to her and call her Urban Girl. She later confided in her mother that she is quite famous because she’s on the internet. Do you know the building in the black and white photo above? It’s sort of hiding in plain sight.
If a man’s face immediately comes to your mind when you see those pictures, there’s a very good chance you frequent the Market Square Farmers’ Market. Those peppers have to be one of the most beautiful images I usually run into. The leaves seemed late to me this year, but when they hit, they really hit.
The “Save the Penises” protest one Saturday morning this summer should get an award of some sort. I’ll let you decide. Good for them for finding a cause, I suppose, but I couldn’t help that think protesting to protect the vulnerable males in the world might not be my first priority given a pretty long list of evils all about us. Honestly, and I may offend some of you, I could hardly keep from laughing. I felt like I was in the middle of a Saturday Night Live skit.
I’ve got tons more, but we’ll start the year with this batch and hit some others later on. The next couple of days we’ll look at the top posts of the year as we head toward 2015.