Half-Hearted Halloween

 I gotta say, the Halloween decorations are much better up north.  In Naples, the few people who decorate for Halloween just add it to whatever else is already there.  Here is a golfer, a stone supporting the Miami Dolphins football team, and a pair of skimpy pumpkins and scarecrows.

Flamingo

 The Naples Zoo has a new cage for flamingos.  This guy stood right next to the glass.

Lee County Courthouse

A dead oak tree stands in front of the 1910 Lee County Courthouse in Fort Myers.  After it died, a local sculptor got permission to carve the remaining trunk into an eagle. 

An old banyon tree guards one side of the courthouse.

Artsemble Underground

A nondescript Fort Myers building has a mural showing butterflies and a dancing woman being blown free.  Very appropriately symbolic for the All Out Bail Bonds business operated in the building.

Artsemble Underground painted the mural.  It is a collaboration between muralists Cesar Aguilera and Brian Weaver.  This post is linked to Monday Mural. 

Sandy Parker

 Sandy Parker is the founder and author of Sparker’s Soapbox, a website and newsletter that she established in 2010. She provides non-partisan information and education to voters in Collier County.

In the current season, Sandy has given 15 lectures about federal, state and local candidates and the six proposed state constitutional amendments that are on the November ballot.

Toledo Swimming and Diving

The swimming and diving team from the University of Toledo swarmed into Starbucks.  

They were in town for a match against Florida Gulf Coast University and other schools.  

So, of course, I asked if I could take a photograph.  (And, I checked the results:  FGCU came in first and Toledo came in third out of five schools in the match.)

Ann

Ann was in line at Starbucks behind me.  She was coiffed and made up flawlessly and dressed boldly.  A Montana-born former stewardess (not a "flight attendant," she told me), Ann married a United pilot from Wyoming. An aunt told her that if she wanted to marry a real man, find one from Wyoming. 

Her husband later went into the oil exploration business.  They lived in Libya for seven years and, with their children, caught the last flight out of Tripoli after Muammar Gaddafi came to power.  They lived in Colorado and then moved to Southwest Florida 29 years ago, after he retired. 

Ann played golf, tennis and pickleball but has had to stop because of an arm issue.  She still plays bocce and works out in the fitness center.  Ann is a charming person.  We had a good conversation.

Roush

 

A handsome silver car was parked where I was getting a new auxiliary battery installed in my car.

The windshield identified it as a Roush.  I was leaving, so I didn't take the time to ask the garage about it.  But,  Google tells me that Jack Roush is a noted automotive engineer with a Hall of Fame career for designing NASCAR racing cars. 

The symbol on the steering wheel identified it as a Cobra.  Roush started work at Ford.  Even though he left to start his own company, the vehicles he designs nearly all have a Ford heritage.

1928 Model A Ford

 Back in Florida with a car battery problem.  While I was waiting, a man drove by with a 1928 Model A Ford.  (I know only because I asked him.)

I asked if 1928 was an early year for Model A's.  He told me it was the Model A's first year and this car was so early that Henry Ford might have been there to watch it roll off the line. 

 

Looks like there are other Model A's in town.  Saw this the next day on Fifth Avenue South.  No idea if it is original, what year, a replica or what.  

So Long For Now, Connecticut

It's time to go to Florida for the winter.  Before then, here are some random Fall photos from Ridgefield.

On my walk.

My first view of the Northern Lights.  From my deck on the evening of October 10.

Keeler Hill Farm.

A lone tree in the Fall.

The Fountain Inn, different days, different spots, different light.

The Fountain with yellow chrysanthemums for the Fall.

Photos from Florida begin tomorrow.

Georgetown

 Welcome To The Historic Village of Georgetown.  

The man at the left end with tousled white hair is Mark Twain, whose last years were in Redding, of which Georgetown is a part.

Linked to Monday Mural.

Charles Ives

 Charles Ives was born 150 years ago today  in nearby Danbury, Connecticut.  Ives was an American modernist composer.  He was also a very successful and wealthy insurance executive.  His wife and he bought a plot in West Redding, Connecticut, and built this fine "cabin."

"Three Places in New England" is Ives' best known work.  The work is in three movements.  I have taken photographs for each of the three movements.

The first movement is inspired by Augustus St. Gaudens' statue on the Boston Common, Robert Gould Shaw and Massachusetts 54th Regiment.  Shaw was a white officer from Boston in the Civil War, who led  Black volunteers on a failed assault on Fort Wagner, South Carolina.  Shaw and many of his men died.

I visited Boston in August and went looking for this statue, which is across Beacon Street from the Massachusetts State House.

The second movement, Putnam's Camp, Redding, Connecticut, is inspired by American Revolutionary War hero General Israel Putnam's encampment in the harsh winter of 1778-79 .  Today the site is  a Connecticut state park.  In 2023 I photographed this statue of Putnam by Anna Hyatt Huntington.

Ives enjoyed hiking with his new wife when they honeymooned in the Berkshires of Massachusetts.  That pleasure was in Ives' mind when he composed the third movement, The Housatonic at Stockbridge.  I took this photograph in August when I was in the Berkshires to hear Yo Yo Ma at Tanglewood.

Country Road

I pass through here every time I return to my Ridgefield home.  

It is always pretty, but in the Fall it is special.

Scarecrows

 The Town of Ridgefield likes nothing more than dressing up the Main Street business district and raising money for worthy organizations.  Over the summer large painted sneakers were all around, raising money for children and arts programs in the poorer community of Bridgeport.

In October, every lamp post in the district has a scarecrow attached to celebrate fall and to raise money.  The top scarecrow was created by a small store.  It is publicizing a Walk to End Alzheimers.  The bottom scarecrow is by a designer of floral displays for weddings and events.

Skeletons

 

What is the plural of "skeletons"?

Pumpkins

I think there are enough for everyone.

 

Golden Hour

 

Golden hour is always beautiful, but especially in the Fall and beside a lake in Connecticut.

Some Chinese People

I like photographing people.  Sometimes as planned portraits, sometimes just capturing people as they go about their lives.

She demonstrated a tea ceremony and showed us how Chinese people brew a range of different teas.

An artist and a merchant in a Beijing hutong.

A woman taking a break after posing for someone else.

An energetic jade saleswoman.

A man greeting guests at a restaurant.

Two people greeting guests arriving for dinner and a show.

People arriving to see the Terracotta Army in Xi'an.

A craftswoman making small clay terracotta warriors for sale in a big shop.

David, our guide in Xi'an and Beijing.

A girl outside the Xi'an wall, playing with the equivalent of a big yoyo.

A man in Zhuijiajiao.

Cooking.

Displaying knickknacks.

Two men in Haitan Ancient City.

Belle, our local guide for visits to the Summer Palace and the Lama Temple.

This three week trip to China was wonderful.  I'm back in Connecticut briefly before heading to Florida for the winter.  Photographs from Connecticut will be here tomorrow.