Plenty of Nothing

Fiddleheads

Hoooops

In Ottawa the Spring Is Three Weeks Long

This photo is tagged April 6.  Yesterday, April 27, the temperature reached 30 degrees Celcius.  Today, though, was a bit autumnal.  There isn't much of spring that's springlike in this town. 

Evangeline Brandt "The Talk"

The Winter Club

 

Big yellow machines are currently clearing the rubble of three eighty-year-old structures in the downtown block bounded by Metcalfe, O'Connor, Slater and Laurier.  One of these, at 227 Laurier Avenue West, most recently a computer repair shop, was built in 1931 as the Rideau Winter Club, joint headquarters of the Rideau Curling Club and the Rideau Badminton Club.  Governor-General and Lady Bessborough presided at the opening.  The building had four sheets of ice, badminton courts, and two separate club lounges, and served the two clubs till 1949.  Only the front section of the structure survived into the 21st century, the back area replaced by a parking lot.  But a memory of its original function remained in two bas-reliefs, one showing a badminton racket and birdies, the other curling broom and rocks.  Douglas

Komatsu

Ruins

C. W. Jefferys

Charles William Jefferys (1869-1951) is Canada's historical illustrator par excellence.  Born in England, he emigrated to Canada around the age ten, and developed into one of those Canadian artists who took to heart the fact that they and their new country were of the same generation.  His renderings of Canadian historical subjects remain in many cases the definitive image; for example, Étienne Brûlé at the Mouth of the Humber" and "Rebels Marching Down Yonge Street".  Douglas

Japanese Word of the Day: Retsu

For this 2009 season, the first in their new ballpark, Hiroshima Toyo Carp baseball club have adopted the ten-stroke kanji retsu, signifying intensity.  Here is its entry in an online kanji dictionary, along with a sound file.  The calligraphy is by team manager Marty Brown.

Evangeline Brandt "Those Axewomen"