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Hodgepodge

Today is being brought to you by this and that. And a fine sort of day it is…

A Room With A View Neal's Yard, Covent Garden

A Room With A View—Neal’s Yard, Covent Garden

This is a space, a very few blocks or so, outside of Covent Garden, in London, England. Neal’s Yard is the actual name of the location. Another fine example of what can happen when sought and encouraged. The place used to be the sewer of the area, crawling with rats and trash.

R.I.P. Karl Lagerfeld,1977. Photo - Francesco Scavullo.

R.I.P. Karl Lagerfeld—1977. Photo – Francesco Scavullo.

Karl left us yesterday from Paris, where he had been living for the last several years. He was the master behind the Chanel line once Coco left this world. How handsome he was in his youth.

Fashions of the day. Cambridge Undergraduates 1926.

Fashions of the day. Cambridge Undergraduates 1926

This has a special appeal for me as my father, George Hansen, dressed this way upon some time long ago. There’s a very old photo of him sitting on a dockage pillar, dressed most exactly like the young man on the right. It was taken in San Francisco where he had been before meeting my mother. In the photo it is also possible to see a ring on his little finger, which had belonged to his mother, my grandmother. I inherited the ring and it sits in my jewelry box as this is being written.

Pictures In History

Pictures In History

“I ain’t afraid to love a man. I ain’t afraid to shoot him neither.” ~Annie Oakley, 1899

From the Depths - by William Balfour Ker (1906)

“From the Depths” – by William Balfour Ker (1906)

Isn’t this a testimony to the “nothing new under the sun”? The quote is from Ecclesiastes 1:9—What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. This also reminds me of the IWW, The Industrial Workers of the World, and big Bill Haywood—as was writ by John Dos Passos. I love the ending line: He died there [Russia] and they burned his big broken hulk of a body and buried the ashes under the Kremlin wall. 

Art Like This Page · 14 February · Gustav Klimt

20th Century Art

And that’s a wrap

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Too Much Horror

“To sin by silence, when we should protest, makes cowards out of men,” the poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox

These times, these times, these times. Hardly the best of times. Yet still the tale of two cities.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing,” John Stuart Mill

The things that that have warranted news items, some repeated, some only small articles. Such little outcry.

  • Families seeking refuge imprisoned and raped, tortured, broken.
  • Child trafficking by the government—children taken from their parents to be adopted by Christian families.
  • The Catholic Church found out beyond imagination in pedophilia, the rape of nuns, and nuns as sex slaves. Belated acknowledgement by at least 20 years because it is a process. A continued defense of the church, the Holy Mother Church. Not a church of God or Christ, but of the Pope.
  • A black doll found hanging in a Michigan dorm room. A Chrysler factory where hanging ropes and N—er go home is painted.
  • Sex abuse by Buddhist Monks
  • Red MAGA hats
  • Guns
  • Protests
  • The subjugation of women
  • The resurgence of the KKK
  • The Lie and liars
  • The betrayal and destruction of the Earth
  • War

The end of a virtuous state portents the end of the state, according to the Tao.

Erik Ravelosi, Los intocables 2012

Erik Ravelosi, Los intocables 2012

Too Much

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Happy Chinese New Year!

—It’s the Year of the Pig—
Wenceslaus Hollar. Wild Boar. Etching, 1644 - 1652. Rijksmuseum.

Wenceslaus Hollar. Wild Boar. Etching, 1644 – 1652. Rijksmuseum

There are no parades around here, but the holiday goes on, nonetheless. I do know of some parties this weekend. In anyway form, may we all have a year that is prosperous, filled with peace and joy.

Happy New Year all!

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We Continue…

cardinalDolanNY

Cardinal Dolan and Cumo—NY  Catholic News Service

And now we hear from Cardinal Dolan.

The U.S. Catholic Church “is no greater (an) offender than anybody else. In fact, some of the statistics would say that priestly abuse among minors is less than other professions,” the cardinal said. “Now he knows that, he knows that, and yet he singled out the Catholic Church and continues to do so for negligence in this terribly important area.”

This reminds me of when I was teaching. If you chastised one child for doing something wrong, inevitably he would say, “well what about Joe there, he was doing it too!” Then, as in now, the response is—we were talking about you, not Joe. Don’t worry about Joe, take care of yourself.

Of course. It’s the waaaaaaay things are because it’s the way things are.

 

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Snowed In

Wishes do come true, in their time, in their fashion.

aslice of life

A Slice Of Life

Although here in reality it’s not at all as in the photo. Yet the snow is beautiful, and constant. A true winter story.

This is more a scene from my childhood when everything was larger, and grander, and closer. Yet I am certain that the snow and the seasons were much more intense and bountiful those many years ago. There is in fact an old black and white photo of my aunt standing in front of a snow pile that was well over 10′ tall. It was taken in Fargo, ND. We took and kept the photo for posterity. It’s somewhere in a box from many moves remaining unpacked. Waiting—I suppose—for posterity to arrive.