A rather different Thursday Arch series for you, from a different than your usual poster. This study in depth of field is also from the Saint Louis Mardi Gras parade from last Saturday. This was taken after the parade was over, and Strangetastes and I had walked quite a bit south along the parade route, and were walking back northwards. There were many, many of these carts selling beads and hats and other junk along the street, though it seemed silly to Strangetastes and me that one would want to pay through the nose for something that one could get for free (i.e., thrown beads).
I have several of these shots of the bead carts with the Arch in the background, which you can check out on Flickr, here if you are interested. So far this Flickr set selection is a bit random, as well as minimally edited, so please bear with me if you visit those pictures. Feel free to comment, though!
The "Light Up The Night" Mardi Gras evening parade didn't just get rained out, it got washed away down the Mississippi and headed toward the Gulf of Mexico. As I write this on Tuesday evening, we are having torrential thunderstorms with a temperature just a few degrees above freezing. Not a night to be out with a camera.
So, back to last Saturday's parade. I like to take pictures in the parking lot used for a staging area because the floats are standing still. So much easier on the photographer. I did not note what this float was supposed to be about. It reminds me of the work of St. Louis sculptor Ernest Trova, although with more detailed features. The figure looks like she is about to sweep the top off the Thomas F. Eagleton Federal Courthouse (factoid: it is the largest single courthouse in the U.S. and home of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and the Eighth Circuit Court of Apeals - I knew you'd find that fascinating). Lifting the lid on this building would probably release a lot of hot air. Consider the environmental consequences.
TOMORROW: Thursday Arch Series. Well, sort of. ShadowyOne is taking a turn.
I've been looking at some CDPB posts from cities that have Carnival or Mardi Gras celebrations. Carlos' pictures from Barcelona are outstanding. It's a pity we don't have a CDPB in Rio de Janeiro.
St. Louis' modest Mardi Gras is more plucky and unsophisticated than some. (I assume the blood alcohol content of all cities with such celebrations is similar.) No floats that cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to build, no enormous samba parties in the street. But where else would you get a guy riding a simple float in a gorilla suit and a fey pirate hat? It's genuine fun and not a bit pretentious. Not exactly a family event, though, unlike the charming children in Carlos' picture on Sunday. Take a look at the bigger set of St. Louis Mardi Gras pictures on Flickr (mine are here and ShadowyOne has some great ones here), note the number of suspicious plastic cups in people's hands and the - what can we say? - spontanious behavior.
TOMORROW: Well, the big night of Mardi Gras parade is downtown this evening. I'd like to go shoot it but it's supposed to be pouring down rain. If I make it, that's probably what will be on the blog tomorrow. If not, just come back for a surprise.
No, Michael Chertoff has no concerns here. This guy is a member of the local chapter of the Shriners, an offshoot of Freemasonry devoted to hijinks, the occasional tipple and supporting hospitals for crippled childern. What's not to like? Well the headgear may be a problem in contemporary society, inasmuch as the sign says it's Arab but fezes are Turkish, not Arabic, and anyway, fezes were banned in Turkey decades ago by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the father of the Turkish Republic. So nobody really wears them any more. Except Shriners. This man and his friends are driving tiny little cars around and around in circles in the parade, really go karts with fancy fiberglass bodies. Some are partial to huge, tricked-out Honda motorcycles. Shriners are known for things like this. All for fun in a fez.
St. Louis has a modest-sized Mardi Gras. After all, we were founded by French explorers. It's not the elaborate, multi-day festival that shuts down a city, like in New Orleans or Rio de Janeiro. There is a good sized parade on Saturday in the funky Soulard neighborhood just south of downtown. The floats and costumes are certainly low-budget compared to the Big Easy but it's full of tipsy enthsiasm.
ShadowyOne and I went down to shoot the parade yesterday. It's a good excuse to be drinking in the streets before noon (as many of the photos will illustrate) and people love to pose for pictures. Plenty of material for the next few days on the blog. There are lots more on my Flickr site (and yet more to come!).
Sunday afternoon update: I'm working away at editing this set of pictures. I'll add some to the blog here and there as I go.
Yesterday was a very gratifying day for this blog, breaking all its records. What could I ever do to top it? 316 unique visitors, 551 page loads, 28 comments and a little feature about the blog on the local paper's web site (which undoubtedly helped the numbers). And the blog's total visitors to date cracked 20,000 last night. Whew.
So, back to the salt mine, as we say at my office. Here's a little character for you. While we were out looking for eagles last weekend, we saw hundreds of these gull-like birds (never found out the name) hanging around the Mississippi. The biggest group was on the ice just below a big lock and dam. This guy seems to have an attitude, strutting over a frozen river covered with souveniers from his or her friends. Spending a day like that would tick me off, too.
TOMORROW: Mardi Gras in St. Louis. We have one, you know.
What comes to mind when someone mentions St. Louis? The Arch, of course, the baseball Cardinals for Americans, and all around the world, Budweiser. Those zillion beer ads you've seen on TV end with a deep voice saying in such a friendly way, "Anheuser-Busch, St. Louis, Missouri." Once, when I was in Argentina, someone identified me as an American (pretty damn easy) and asked me where I was from. "Soy de San Luis, en el centro del pais, al Rio Mississipi," I said in my halting Spanish. That didn't help much. Then I tried, “Es la ciudad de Budweiser, la officina principal de Anheuser-Busch.” “O, si,” he replied. “Yo entiendio. Me gusta Budweiser mucho.”
The movie Meet Me In St. Louis didn't enter my mind when I created this post. It's not prominent in our local consciousness. Since several of you mentioned it, here's a clip of Judy Garland singing the famous song in the movie:
Check these CDPB blogs, which are revealing the face they show to the world today:
TOMORROW: What could I possibly do to top today's response? How about this theme: You'd look pissed off, too, if you had to spend your day walking across ice covered with bird poop.
