Tuesday, May 18, 2010

On the Way to OK

On the way to Oklahoma, we stopped in Springfield, Illinois. I had no idea it was the home of Lincoln, but Casey said he had studied a lot about Lincoln and the Civil War when he was younger and so would like to see it. Sure! I don't really care much for history and war history especially, be when we got downtown, I really enjoyed waling around the "Lincoln neighborhood." It's two blocks of homes that have been preserved and created into a historic site with museums. We were able to walk through one neighborhood home on our own, but to go through Lincoln's home proper, we had to get tickets (which were free) and group up with a tour guide. Neither one of us were really into that, so we just enjoyed walking up and down the two blocks, reading the markers in front of each of the homes, and then headed on downtown to an art fair going on. The park ranger who took our picture in front of Lincoln's home had told us about it, and we couldn't think of a more perfect way to start our first official vacation together. The weather, however, did not cooperate so well. A steady light rain started, and, had it been our own town, I'm sure we would have stayed, but traveling and knowing we had to be somewhere, the rain was more incentive to get going. A great stop, all in all, completely unexpected and very enjoyable.

Tuesday, May 04, 2010

Graffiti Me

I love street graffiti. Well, I love most anywhere you can find graffiti, bathrooms, hallway walls, table tops... I'm not talking gang sign graffiti, although that has its place and merits in terms of art and culture. What I appreciate are cool images in unlikely places, subtle graffiti, symbolic, or poetic graffiti that gets the viewers to think. Nothing is cooler than cities who encourage and allow sidewalk art in the summer months. It doesn't have the same appeal of unlawfulness as unsanctioned graffiti has, but it does allow a unique canvas and the time for artists to develop a whole different kind of art. Either way, I'm a fan, and snap it up when I can. Here's a few I caught last time I was in Traverse City. Some of these will definitely be going up on my office door!