Chicago Public Radio – June 29th
(link to the photo on my flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/phule/651642713/)
I took this photo just yesterday of a demonstration in the plaza of the Federal Center. This is where the famous "Flamingo" sculpture is located, which is what the orange metal objects in the frame are a part of.
Here's a photo by someone else of the plaza and sculpture if you're not familiar with the location.
Rhubarb
We have rhubarb in our back yard that originally came from my maternal great-grandmother's house in Chicago. She was a prolific gardener, a tradition that passed down to my grandmother and my mother. As did the rhubarb. My mother planted some of it in our backyard where, as rhubarb does, it grew and flourished.
When 
helloheather and I bought our house, we transplanted some of the rhubarb to our back yard. At first I wasn't sure it survived but last year it came back. This year, the growth has been strong and, for the first time, I harvested some. helloheather cooked up a strawberry rhubarb crumble that was simply fantastic.
The key to rhubarb, as I understand it, is size: small stalks make for good eating. Once the stalks get large, even though they're nice and red, they're very, very tart. Most people that complain about rhubarb have simply been eating the wrong things at the wrong time.
Unfortunately, I may have harvested too much. Research indicates that one should not harvest more than 1/3 of the plant at any given time. I harvested about 3/4 if not more. Most of it was very large stalks that I simply removed, but I realize now I should have left them. Hopefully this will not be the end of the plant and the wonderful crumble.
House of Crosses
Back in May I made a fairly lengthy walk up to the neighborhood of West Town, right next to Ukrainian Village. I did this in order to visit a rather famous house that was in the process of being renovated. And I believe by "renovated" they mean "torn down."
The house is known as The House of Crosses.
I will not replicate what's already on the web regarding this house. You can read some of the story of the house here:
http://www.weirdchicago.com/crosses.html
Of particular interest is an audio segment linked to at the bottom of the page for iTunes users. The conversation with the nephew of the owner of the house is quite interesting.
I was not expecting to see anyone there, but two men were busy removing the crosses from the house. I tried to strike up a conversation with them and inquire about the future of all those crosses but I think they were annoyed at my cameras' presence.
If you take a close look at the images you can see the outlines of the crosses that had already been removed. There were a staggering number on the front and (not pictured) the back of the house. I'm glad I was able to see some of the house before it was gone, but I do wish I had made the trek earlier.
Visited States meme – 2007 edition
The "which states have you visited" meme is alive again (again) and so, as I've not done any traveling to new areas since the last time I posted the map, I'll simply link to my previous post 
Photos – February and March
Photos of Nathan from February and March have been uploaded and (mostly) captioned.
Declination
Yesterday:
June 20, 2007
Sun Rise: 5:15 AM
Sun Set: 8:28 PM
Length Of Visible Light: 16h 22m
Length of Day 15h 13m
Tomorrow will be 0m 1s longer.
Today:
June 21, 2007
Sun Rise: 5:15 AM
Sun Set: 8:29 PM
Length Of Visible Light: 16h 22m
Length of Day: 15h 13m
Tomorrow will be 0m 1s shorter
(stats from wunderground.com)
The sun has reached its northern most point today. The solstice marks the beginning of summer and the somewhat ironic increasingly rapid decline in the length of our days. I say somewhat ironic because, in my mind, summer is marked by impossibly long evenings. Evenings where games of ghost in the graveyard seemed to last for hours and hours. Evenings where we roamed on our BMX bikes for what seemed like forever.
But today is the tipping point. Today the sun begins its move back to the south. Shadows at noon will slowly start to lengthen and the days will slowly shorten.
Take a minute, regardless of your hemisphere and regardless of which season you're entering, and celebrate today.
Batman: The Dark Knight
"Batman: The Dark Knight" started filming in Chicago earlier this year, but full production began in June. As with "Batman Begins" the empty lot next to my building is one of staging areas for crew and equipment. The roof of a parking deck near work is also being used for a couple of sets. One area is the roof of the Gotham City Police department, where yesterday the Bat Signal was sitting. The rest seems to be set up for some sort of car crash/chase activity.
There's not much to see right now, and admittedly the only window I have for most photos is during lunch but nevertheless what photos I do grab will be posted to my flickr account.
Farmers Market 2007
My post from 2005 still stands. There's so much goodness at the Thursday Farmers Market in Daley Plaza.
Today I came home with: asparagus, sweet cherries, snap peas, orange blossom honey, and a slice of cherry pie.
What I wanted to buy but didn't: some of those specialty cheeses, the garlic chives, the dried apricots, and a box of mushrooms.
The end of The Sopranos
I watched the final episode of The Sopranos yesterday. Having had the second to last episode spoiled, I was determined to not let myself have the last episode spoiled as well.
And in that vein, if you've not yet seen the last episode, look away.
Really. Look away.
There's a lot of people up in arms over the ending. I don't think there is a reasonable scenario that could have been filmed that wouldn't cause some group to be all upset. People have too much time on their hands and have stupid priorities.
But anyway. The final episode. The hard cut to black.
I loved it. I still love it. After thinking about it for a while, and thinking about how much tension I felt at the end, I can only conclude that this was the best choice for an ending. I was on the edge of my seat during the diner scene, completely wrapped up in it and the hard cut was like a sudden breath. By shocking the viewer with...well...nothing, I think David Chase was explaining why a show that was only supposed to be around for a season or two had instead grabbed peoples attention for six.
The character of Tony Soprano was larger than life in many ways. It is very fitting that we do not learn what happens. Was there a hit? Was the FBI there ready to humiliate him in public? Did everyone simply live happily ever after? Was the whole episode a dream? (For the record I don't believe for a second it was all a dream, but that's another discussion).
I'm not a fan boy, I simply enjoyed watching it. And that includes the end.
Four
Love is patient,
love is kind.
It does not envy,
it does not boast,
it is not proud.
It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts,
always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.
Happy Anniversary Heather.
Love,
Rob
A Change is Gonna Come
Yesterday at the Chicago Cultural Center, blues man Vino Louden was playing. I was walking through the building when I came upon the free show and so I stuck around as long as I could. Sadly, I wasn't able to stay until the very end where he was going to sell CDs and I was disappointed to find out you can't buy them from his website. vinomusicman.com
But the songs I did hear were really quite wonderful. Here's a few minutes of a cover of Sam Cooke's "A Change is Gonna Come."
click to open - 40MB MotionJPG AVI file
I shot the video only because I wanted to look up the song later and I didn't have any other way of recording the lyrics. I did not know the name Sam Cooke and prior to today didn't know the history behind this particular song. But really, that's all secondary. It was simply really nice to spend 45 minutes listening to a really talented musician singing the blues.
Chicago Public Radio – June 1
Thanks to Chicago Public Radio for selecting another photo of mine to be featured on the homepage.
Memorial Day Weekend 2007
This past weekend was a lot of fun. It started off a little shaky with us needing to drive Nathan around at 4:00 AM on Saturday trying to get him to sleep (thus preventing us from leaving early Saturday morning). He had been up every 45 minutes to an hour since midnight and the lack of sleep pushed us back to a noon departure. But Saturday was very rainy, traffic was light, and Nathan slept much of the way to the lake house.
The weather only improved during the weekend but not really enough to go swimming. We went out on the boat a couple times though and Nathan seemed worried. He didn't really like the life vest and being in the sun so much, so the trips were short. But that's not to say he didn't have any fun out there. He liked the wind blowing in his face and liked looking at people as we went by. Serena and Charlotte came up for a visit on Sunday which was fun. Charlotte is getting so big, it's hard to believe.
On Monday we went to the Wisconsin Rapids Municipal Zoo. It's a small thing with only a few animals, but Nathan was very interested. We first stopped at the petting zoom where he actually became a bit scared at the noises the baby pigs were making. As a result he was a bit unsure of the lambs, the calf, and the goat and her kid. (He would actually clutch very close to me when we'd go near one of the pens.) But he was very interested in the hen and her chicks and all the ducklings. For the rest of the zoo Nathan was happy and very engaged. When we visited the pen with alpaca, donkey, turkeys, and two very large goats, he was most happy. He kept saying "Hey!" or "Eh!!" to the goats (which were laying down near the fence). When the tom turkey would make his call and stomp his feet, Nathan would stare in fascination. Surprisingly, he was also rather interested in the large tortoise sunning itself near the door in another pen.
As the sun was setting, I decided that, even though it was too cool for swimming in the lake, Nathan should at least experience the water a bit, so I rolled up my pants legs and sat down on the steps leading into the water. Nathan loved dangling his feat in the water, kicking and splashing, and wanted to jump in.
Tuesday, on the drive back, we stopped off in Milton to see Aaron and Charlotte where we had lunch at a local diner.
All in all it was a nice respite.