Spotted at the antiques mall on Cottage Grove Road yesterday morning ...

An Odd Fish

On a stroll through an antique mall on Cottage Grove Road, I ran across this contraption, advertised as a German-made "folding boat."

The strange boat's skeletal nature made it quite eye-catching. I'd never seen anything like it before.

A clever system of hinges and hooks allowed the boat to be broken up and stowed into five canvas bags, according to the sign.

Barbie wants a new dish washer

So, with no small amount of trepidation, I took the doors off some cupboard space, grabbed a saw, a wrecking bar and a BFH and made some space for it.

After lunch I'll wire a circuit for it and sweat a three-way valve to the hot water feed under the sink.

Then, some time just before dinner, the good people at Sears have promised to deliver said dish washing machine to our door.

If the gods smile upon us, this evening's dinner dishes will be washed through the miracle of modern technology.

If the gremlins are instead out and about, there may be a short delay ...

Defoliated

I'll come back in six months when the leaves have turned all this stonework into a lost temple.

Kimonos with a fish theme

On display at Whole Foods on University. Many more there; worth a look.

Gratuitous Winter Snapshot

I don't normally approve of grafitti ...

I can't help but nod and grin at this, though.

The Coffee Shop Ground Zero Sunday Night

About fifty or so people gathered for an anti-war rally.

Among the guests at the rally

His honor, the mayor of Madison, Dave Cieslewicz, and Representative Tammy Baldwin.

On The Menu at Ground Zero

A look out the front window

After enduring weeks of snowless weather in December and January, slate-gray skies finally dump a load all at once over southern Wisconsin.

If you listen closely, you can hear the whine of thousands of snowmobile engines all cranking up at once.

A look out the back window

A bit chilly ...

Couldn't resist the pun. Sorry.

Reserved Seating

A stone bench in Elizabeth Link Free Park, between State and Gilman streets.

Not-Quite-Patiently Waiting

Coffee at Cleveland's

"Hey, I didn't notice the restaurant's picture was on the table cloth!" said my breakfast date last Saturday morning.

Up from the bottom

It's a limestone quarry redeveloped as loft apartments. It's a modern art installation titled Concrete Poop Dee Doo. It's the core of a nuclear reactor. It's about as far into the bowels of a downtown parking lot as you can get. It is.

A Back Alley near University Ave

There was so much going on here that it caught my eye.

Outside the Chazen Museum

Mother and Child, although nude, would be warm enough on this fine day.

Penguin Love

Pasted to a store front window on State Street.

That smell means it's time for a brat

The clock on the corner of State Street Brats telling me I've got just twelve minutes to get back to the square before my lunch hour is over.

Hot Time in the Old Town

While the western states are digging out from under several feet of snow, Madison is enjoying unseasonably warm temperatures and beautifully clear skies.

Just the day to get out to stretch the legs ...

No better destination than a book store ...

Paul's Books stands at the other end of State Street from the square, on the very edge of the UW campus.

There aren't many places like this left. I happily spent as much of my lunch hour as I could before I had to head back to work.

A Warm Welcome

Eight-foot-high stacks of books ... throw rugs across the floor ... a fancy pressed-tin ceiling above ... the cockles of my heart couldn't be gladder.

The room is filled with twists and turns

Ends of book shelves are gloriously festooned with old fly leafs, newspaper clippings, post cards and photos. It's a warm, cozy place.

Happy New Year!

New Year's Eve was a quiet night in for the O-folk, watching movies and eating plenty of party food.

At eleven-thirty I began to fade, so I made the rest of the family gather for a photo. With just fifteen minutes or so left before the appointed hour we all look as though we've had maybe one too many.

By the Shores of Beautiful Lake Monona

A flock of ducks on the lake ice caught my eye, so I risked crossing Monona Drive on foot (note: Don't do it!) to snap a photo of them but they all flew away as I approached. Not stealthy enough, I guess.

This stump looked rather photogenic, though, so I thought I'd try it out.

Fairchild St in the Evening

Looking southeast up the hill past the Overture Center.

The relatively modest Hovde Building seems to tower over all else.

If I were a betting man I'd put all my money in developing the 100 block of State St, those older buildings to the immediate left, across the street from the Overture Center. The only thing my money has the muscle to develop, though, is film.

Tinkering together a track plan ... in 3-D!

The bench has been ready for months but I've been putting off laying down the track because, well ... because I'm a scaredy-cat, that's why.

I suck at track planning. I'd much rather just piece a loop together and watch the trains go round. And that's all I've done to date.

But I found that John Armstrong track plan -- see it? Way back there in the upper left? -- in a July 1954 issue of Model Railroader last night and a light went on over my head. I could almost see the room get brighter.

So tonight I found as many of the storage boxes as I could that were stuffed with the collected model railroading track and rolling stock of many years. Many, many years. Some of this stuff hasn't been trotted out since 1989.

Striking a pose

A PA in Milwaukee livery waits to stretch its legs.

If only I could find an affordable (okay, so I'm cheap) B-unit on e-bay.

Smooth-side passenger cars lie like beached whales in the background, waiting for me to find their wheelsets. They might wait quite a while.

A once-proud livery, reduced to this ...

The rolling stock of my tiny railroad empire finally sees the light of day.

Well, not daylight, precisely; the light over my workbench will have to do for now.

Some of the hardier models seem to be intact, but a few have seen better times. To the right, the smooth-side sleeper in Milwaukee colors and the overturned Pennsy coach have both lost their wheelsets at a bad turn somewhere.

This will take a bit of work ...

The freight manifest hasn't fared any better ...

Even though the box was stuffed with packing, the cars seem to have tumbled a bit.

On the plus side, I've been looking for the screwdrivers in the upper left compartment for more than a year now.

The Death Ray by night

I'm sure that the "artwork" installed in the entry of the federal court house is loaded with meaning, and I would love to hear what it is so I could laugh and laugh and laugh.

Madison Museum of Contemporary Art

The prow of Madison's newest flatiron glows incandescantly on a recent overcast night.

Pengins!

In the store window on State Street.

Evening foot traffic on Mifflin St

Front window of The Exclusive Company by night

Where Once There Was Snow

Two weeks ago we had lots of snow and temps in the twenties. I snapped a picture so I could remember what it was like, knowing it was a sure bet that it'd all be gone soon and we'd have anything but a white Christmas. I don't miss the sub-freezing temps, but these snowless weeks leading up to Christmas exacerbate my chronic grumpiness. Ho-ho-ho.

What's the Scoop?

Every time I've walked past a vantage point that gave me a full-on view of this side of the new Dane County Court House, I've looked at the big scoop in the side of the building and wondered: What was the architect thinking about when he did that?

Sunset's Reflection

Looking across Fairchild St and the buildings along West Main. The Inn On The Park is to the left, the Jackman Building on Hamilton just beneath the reflected sunlight in the windows of the Anchor Bank building.

Lost in the Fog

Capital hill veiled in fog earlier this week.

Kill 'Em All & Let God Sort 'Em Out?

A not-so-thinly-veiled threat stenciled on the sidewalk near the intersection of Carroll Street with Langdon. There must be a better way to use the guarantee of free speech to address this problem.

DATELINE: BELGIUM

I hadn't been in the Dane County Veteran's Museum before last week. No interest. Then last Friday I saw at least four busloads of school kids go in there, bringing back memories of field trips from way back, and I had to take a look.

They represent American veterans' involvement in wars through history by standing costumed dummies in dioramas all around the walls. I've always liked dioramas. My Mom thinks they're pretty cheesy, but I like cheese, the more sentimental and cornball, the better.

And I liked that I could look at a diorama and know in an instant what it was supposed to be. I glanced at the scene in this photo, for instance, and recognized the Battle of the Bulge from across the room.

I didn't have much time, so I couldn't linger at the display cases, but I did take the time to gaze long and hard at the model ships.

At the peak of my model-building career I probably owned at least one-hundred fighter planes. I would've given them all up to build something like this. And I would've had to live in a house the size of a dairy barn to display something like this.

It's the USS Wisconsin, naturally. The full-size one was built back just before aircraft carriers took over as the ultimate warships of the high seas. She was mothballed after the world war, briefly came out of retirement to fight in the Persian Gulf war, and I believe she rests in a comfy berth once again.

They made a pretty nifty display out of the model, with the ship's bell and the brass name plate mounted on the other side of the display case. And what display would have been complete without an example of the 16-inch shells fired by those big guns?

Best thing in the museum, though, was the periscope, no contest. Who doesn't go gah-gah over a periscope? Okay, my wife wouldn't, but what guy wouldn't shove his way through a rugby scrum for the chance to look through a real periscope? You can pan it around for a good look at most of the buildings in cap square, but you can't increase the magnification to see if anybody's sleeping at their desks or photocopying their butts. Still, a periscope! Freaking awesome!

Ceci n'est pas une pickup truck

There aren't a lot of teeny-tiny pickup trucks around any more, so when one of them shows up at a local parking lot, it's eye-catching, particularly when it's painted pink and is parked alongside a bulked-out SUV.

To make it appear even smaller than it already is, the owner had taken the trouble of dropping the suspension as low as it could go. The truck's frame was about three inches off the ground.

"I expect you to die, Mister Bond!"

The entry to the federal court house, on Henry Street

The more I look around, the more I'm astonished at how many really ugly buildings there are in downtown Madison.

Surely this has got to be in the running for the ugliest. There aren't any others that combine indigo-colored steel cladding with red highlights, and no other building in town has a death ray hanging over the entrance.

A Gator on the loose at Emian's Bakery

Tim told us about Emian's on Monona Drive near his high school. He said he has lunch there every so often, and if they can appeal to his picky tastes, we figured they had to have a pretty good selection.

Barb and I have only ever stopped for coffee and some baking, but we haven't been disappointed yet. They have lots of scrummy rolls, muffins and cookies, and the dining area is very cozy.

On our first trip we slid into a booth and lingered over the Sunday paper for an hour while we noshed on scones. Today we stopped by for a coffee but couldn't resist grabbing some goodies, too.

The eyes of this pastry gator caught my attention on the way out the door.