Collins House on Gorham Street

A beautiful old craftsman-style house that was most recently a well-known bed and breakfast. I don't know what it's used for at the moment. It appears to be vacant.

The Overture Center's "Falling Snow" Holiday Lights

The capital dome through the curtain of lights

One more look ...

Ice! Damn!

There is no frigate like a book to take us worlds away ...

Most Impregnable Snow Fort In Madison

Spotted on Pinckney Street last week.

Festive Pagan Seasonal Pine Bough 2007

The Jon Coulton Show at the Majestic

Opening act Paul & Storm (far left and far right) join Jon on stage along with audience participation volunteer Alyssa.

Evening Snowfall on Cap Square

Capital Dome In The Falling Snow

Nap Time!

Woodland Fairy Houses at Olbrich Gardens

The leafy veins of a bronze sculpture in Olbrich Gardens fill with new-fallen snow.

OMFG


We have one of these here? Seriously? I haven't seen one of these since the 1968 issue of My Weekly Reader with the cover story about Paolo Solari and all those goofy-looking buildings in the Arizona desert. Zow!

Is it just me ...

... or has advertising slipped to a new low?

The very latest in bicycle accessories:

The hoagie chain guard.

What I saw on my morning walk

Footprints in the sidewalk cement. A raccoon, maybe?

Homicidal electricity.

Ice already skimming the surface of the ponds
at the Edna Taylor park.

A cool-looking tree house with a custom-made circular stair.

Lazy Jane's for Lunch

I took My Darling B to Lazy Jane's Cafe for lunch. We've been driving past it for more than a year going to and from work and it always looked so appealing, but we didn't stop in for a bite to eat until last weekend.

The food is delicious and the atmosphere is cozily like home. Although their collection of decorations seems eclectic, it all seems to share a common vibe somehow.

Are there any cookies in that jar? I wasn't bold enough to find out.


It's on Willy Street, by the way. Worth the trip for a breakfast, lunch, or just a cuppa joe.

Unfinished building

At the southeast corner of State and Lake
there's this odd little building that looks almost as if
somebody began building an art deco office block,
got to the third floor and ran out of imagination, money and willpower
all at the same time.

An oracular voice speaks truth via the marquee of the Orpheum

A Morning Walk

With the sun still low in the morning sky,
the capital building catches the light in different ways ...

The northeast entrance catches the muted golden reflection
off the windows of the building across the street.

The north portico is tinted a subtle shade of aqua,
again a reflection off the windows on the other side of Mifflin St.

The northwest entrance is still in shade,
but the sunlight has caught the leaves on the trees across the lawn.

Uh-oh, time to feed the pig!

First Snow

It hardly amounts to more than a dusting,
but this snow fell last night and it was still there this morning.

Autumn leaves seen on my walk through the neighborhood this evening.

Opheum marquee poetry:

An autumn day in the country

A visit to Pleasant Hill Market Garden, a CSA farm just outside Stoughton, to pick up some pumpkins for pies and jack-o-lanterns.

Cirrus clouds hanging high over the farm fields.

Now there's something you don't see every day

A super-sized papier-mache mascot for the anti-tax rally last week on cap square.
I wonder if they plugged one parking meter or two?

The battleship Wisconsin, reduced to a size that's easy to display, at the Veteran's Museum on Mifflin Street in cap square. She plied the high seas with The Great White Fleet in the age of the dreadnaughts. That's the helmsman's wheel from the real thing off in the background.

A dive-bomber's-eye-view. The modeler put a lot of love into this one. Sadly, the artist's name isn't posted beside the model.

This version of Wisconsin, built to slightly larger specs, was launched on the anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. She's a sister to the Might Mo.

Again, the modeling is exquisite. Rigging the antennae alone must have required hands as steady as stone.
Again from above. When all the guns were blazing to hold off an attack, it must have looked, sounded and smelled like the crack of doom vomiting hellfire at the sky.


Wisconsin's fantail. How many sailors did it take to swab that clean?


The full-sized Wisconsin is still afloat and maintained as a museum in Norfolk, Virginia.

The Philosophy of Beer Drinking, in t-shirt form (part II):

Because the beer fest was inside the tent (instead of around the outsides of the tents, as it was at the Great Taste of the Midwest), I had some trouble getting a clear shot in the low light.

This happy sampler's t-shirt reads, "fizzy yellow beer is for wussies."

This guy was in a hurry to meet somebody at the other end of the tent and I couldn't catch his attention to make him stop a moment, so I had to take several snapshots on the fly. The final word of this "Scottish proverb" is thirst.