VOICES OF SPRING

Today's musical theme: https://youtu.be/s0sjS92tkNI .  Seen on Saturday in Tower Grove Park.               

ISN'T IT ALL?

Found in a storefront window on Locust Street. It gets your attention but doesn't communicate anything. I mean, isn't it all down to that in the end? (Unless you want to get even smaller - three quarks for Muster Mark!) 

This is a branding and marketing company. I don't think it did an adequate job for itself.      

TICK TOCK TAVERN

They are a shrinking breed but there are still neighborhood bars in St. Louis. The Tick Tock Tavern is in the Tower Grove East neighborhood, not a high traffic location. Cash only, no more food than bar snacks, just local and regional beer (although that includes Anheuser Busch products). Frequent musical entertainment. You can go there because you want to have a drink and talk to someone, or sit in a corner by yourself yet not be alone.         

JUST WHAT IS A TINY TOTEM?

I suppose you could ask Lohr or one of the other ancient Articans. They (the totems, not necessarily the Articans) tend to be short, eclectic assemblages, on wheels with something to pull them. And bizarre. Don't forget bizarre. But it's not absolutely necessary to have one of these. One marcher carried an armload of plush toy pigs.

Yesterday was a blogging day off due to the inconvenience of surgery. I had an inguinal hernia, not a major problem (yet) but it had to be addressed. The procedure took an hour and required general anesthesia. Sleep is sometimes called le petit mort but anesthesia is a much better metaphor. And it's not like a sliding switch: you are and then you are not. And then, quite remarkably, you are again - small scale resurection. 

They sent me home with a jar of narcotic pain medication, predicting I'd use it like popcorn. Haven't needed a single one. Great job by my surgeon, Dr. Omar Guerra, and his team.       

NOW, WHERE WAS I?

There are still Tiny Totem photos to get through. These are right in front of or approaching the Tick Tock Tavern.  We will finish the series with that.

The birdman we saw recently has put his regalia to rest for a bit. It shows birds who hunt for a living, nothing like our pretty local cardinals and jays. The bar has a policy of no raptors inside. Other people ambled across the street with a collection of toy plush pigs.          

STL DPB ON THE ROAD - OFFICIAL BUSINESS

Wandering down the same art walk alley in Clare, a visitor will see some puzzling signs. (I could say arresting signs but I will not, for reasons that will become clear quickly.)  The city morgue? It looks like a small refrigerated building jutting into the alley containing . . . what? Not the bodies of unfortunates who could not survive a central Michigan winter, but rather everything you need to make sweet, fried pastries.

This is at the back of Clare's renowned Cops & Doughnuts. It was the town bakery, dating back to the late 19th Century. When it was about to go under in the 1980s, all the members of the small police force pooled their money, bought it and rebranded the business. This blog has visited there before - see https://www.flickr.com/search/?user_id=88921809%40N00&sort=date-taken-desc&text=Cops%20%26%20Doughnuts&view_all=1 The place serves many kinds of yummies and is full of small-town police jokes.

I bought a dozen for the family. Nothing went to waste.       

CITY DAILY PHOTO THEME DAY - YELLOW

Well, pretty close. It's what I got. From the art walk alley in Clare, Michigan.

The clock doesn't work, which feels right. Time doesn't stand still in small Midwestern towns but it sure can creep in its petty pace from day to day.