An Afternoon Storm Rolls In

Historical fiction. But more or less what happens at least four days out of seven in Florida summer. Around mid-afternoon stuff starts building. Often as not a line of lightning, thunder, and rain blows through. I think these pics may have been taken a day or two apart.

Ellen Paints Some Bibble Birds

Ellen paints in her studio. The subjects Bibble birds made by our neighbor ... Bibble. 

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Stuff I Was Doing

Some stuff I was doing before I left on my trip to Indiana. At that time Fort Pierce was involved in a beach project where lots of sand gets sucked up from the ocean, brought in, and pumped onto shore to make a bigger beach out of one that has been diminished by wind and waves. 

I took a few pix of the operations. Rode around and checked the sights. Met a man who had been a carrier pilot during all that went on in Korea during the fifties. He was jogging. And when he asked me to guess his age before telling me his background, I missed it by twenty years. "Drink a lot of fluids" he told me.

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Inside The Art Building

A few looks around the great, grand, and glorious art building at Purdue. Now what they need is some more students to fill the classrooms and the hallways. Purdue's new prez is asking tough questions about value returned by programs, facilities, and personnel.

The claim at the time had been that a real building would give the Purdue program credibility. All the arts (fine, music, and theater) would be in one place along with design and other cultural draws. The reality is that a small and open department went from an active community into a new building with cell-block windowless offices where the air smells like institutional air always smells in large impersonal buildings. With all the locks and doors and floors and distances there was no longer any reason to interact. And the new dynamic became one of the mechanics of teaching with little left of the arts.

And here's the big-ass sculpture that's visible in the top pic. Seen from the ground. 

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A Trip To Black Rock And Ride In The Wabash River Valley

Early start on Tuesday morning and a cut over to a road along the river. There's a long hill a few miles out of town. I've never been one to avoid it, but I've known other cyclists to go miles out of the way. Automobile traffic is a factor. But what I think cyclists don't like is that it meanders with blind corners, until near the top when it becomes a steep straight climb for a few hundred yards. And I did not stop to take pictures. No sir.

My friend asked "how high is the corn." And I had to say "its as high as an elephant's toe.

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Three More Pictures From Independence

Crossing the bridge into Independence. The old iron bridge with wood and tar floor was, ah, interesting. And a little bit spooky. I kinda miss it, but a concrete shoulder feels better. - Cicott Park is where you make a choice of roads. Riding I came in from the right side of the pic and went out of town on the center road. The road meanders along a field's width from the Wabash until it turns for some climbs out of the river valley.

On The Road To Independence

Independence is on one side of the Wabash. Riverside is on the other.

A short road connects the two. When rains are heavy, the road goes underwater and the gates are closed to keep fools from trying to drive.

There's a loop ride from where I am in West Lafayette and includes a lot of farms and fields. Maybe forty miles of Indiana.

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A Good Place For Watching Amtrak

Little spot on the map called Ash Grove. And a decent spot to be when Amtrak comes through running as fast as these tracks will allow. It's The Cardinal sometimes: Washington, DC to Chicago, IL. Other times the Indy-Chicago train. Depending.

I was looking at the river when I heard a vehicle stop. Looked over to watch a window go down. Woman asking how to get to Lafayette on SR 25. And I said "Maam, I'm from Florida. But I think if you go up to the T and turn right, that should do it." She says "Thank God." And I'm wondering just how lost can you get out here. Farmland is gridded on the mile NS and EW.

And then there's a little Indiana bonus for riders in the Hoosier State. Not only cold on Tuesday morning, but mosquitoes too. I was hustling to make the pic here while thinking maybe I just wouldn't bother.

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In The Recovery Mode

With flu subsiding into an annoyance, really what it was all along only more so, I'm getting out and looking around.

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