I didn’t go down there. Too crowded. I watched it on TV and then went down later on.

There was still a small, slowly changing group of people standing around the tomb of the unknown soldier.

I like how people toss their poppies on the tomb. They look like drops of blood to me.

Pic 626
Root veggies

November 11, 2009

Two years ago:
Pic 266
Rock n’ leaves

November 11, 2008

On the way

On the way to Remembrance Day, I walked down Cooper and then on Bay.

This squirrel had nabbed a french fry out of a dumpster. To the tree! To the tree!

Curling club

Nice try

Scharf Grocery

Down on Wellington, I passed by the DOJ.

I noticed that the DOJ is decorated with this frieze of DOGs. Or am I missing something? They sure look like DOGs. Mean ones too.

Remembrance Day

That was all very nice, but I was on my way to the Remembrance Day ceremonies. I was a little late due to stopping to look at squirrels and things, so I missed the march of the veterans from Parliament Hill to the war memorial. In the past I have enjoyed seeing them. People in the crowd are very appreciative nowadays, and some of them call out “Thank you!” as the oldsters march by. It’s nice. It brings a tear.

But I missed it. And naturally it was too crowded for me to get close to any of the ceremonies. Here’s a crowd standing on a little hill across the street from the war memorial. They had a relatively good view.

But mostly it was one of those made-for-tv events. Here’s the Jumbotron.

These jets went flying over low. It’s pretty shocking. Makes you think of what it would be like to live in a place where there are jets flying low and dropping bombs on you.

This dog didn’t like the jets, the crowds, or the cannons that went off once every minute for 21 minutes. Every cannon blast came as a complete and utter surprise to him. I also think he was embarrassed about his coat.

Someone had papered some of the poles. I like these.

These people were watching the cannons. Once a minute everybody would plug their ears and that guy would raise his camera to try and get a shot of the blast. I probably would have done that too, but I couldn’t get close enough.

Then I got pictures of those kids. And that’s it for Remembrance Day.

What else?

Poem

Movies

Over on the other part of this blog, I got caught up on my movie reviews. I watch a lot of movies and I’m committed to posting some kind of review of all of them.

I’m of the opinion that about 5% of all movies are worth watching, and consequently I don’t bother with new releases much. Nowadays I’m trying to fill in some gaps in my movie education by watching Hitchcock films and other classics from the Fifties, and French films from the Sixties. And I recently caught Breakfast at Tiffany’s for the first time. I liked it a lot!

I don’t claim any great expertise about movies, but I’m dedicated and fairly opinionated, and I tend to notice symbolism. I invite comments on my reviews (such as, “You idiot! You know nothing about French cinema,”) but I hardly ever get any.

That’s it for now. Thanks for visiting my blog!

Kid 1

Kid 2

I still don’t have anything to say. Here’s a few pics. Let’s start with a light bulb. It represents all the new inspiration that is coming my way this winter. (You too.)

I don’t know if these signs work or not. I know “No flyers please” works. If this works, I’m getting one.

POW bridge. Not that POW.

You might think posting every single day would make for some very dull posts, but I find I’m enjoying them. I just like reading blogs. Especially local Ottawa ones. Here are the blogs I know about that are posting every day in November:

• Urban Pedestrian
• No More Decorators
• Also a Talker
• Asteroidea Press

I know I swore off pictures of leaves, but what else is there? This is such a one-track place, this Canada. Nothing but leaves and then before you know it, it’s nothing but snow. And summer’s just green, green, as far as the eye can see. (Spring is kind of fun though.)

These leaves are floating on the water of the canal. At least they’re not all red and hanging on a tree or something. I like the variety of textures you get in a mass of dead leaves.

This one has got some of those lush green things that grow under the surface. (Sigh… more things I don’t know the name of.)

OK, just one more leaf pic. I promise. I like this one for the range of colours in it.

Red light. Not a leaf.

Hallowe’en thing

That’s about it. It’s Remembrance Day. This is a pretty big deal, here in the nation’s capital, so maybe I’ll go down and see if I can get any pics. Thing is, I’ve been to it before and I know it’s an extreme crowd scene. You end up watching it on TV in person.

As Yogi Berra said, “Nobody goes there anymore because it’s too crowded.” That’s pretty much the way I feel about everything. So I might see you later.

I like how people toss their poppies on the tomb of the unknown soldier so they look like drops of blood. Unfortunately some people had put other stuff on there too, so the purity of the gesture was lost. I took a picture of these few discarded poppies on the steps. I think they look as good as drops of blood should look. Those other red things are rose petals.

Then I walked home and took pictures. I decided to focus on the erotic side of the statues on Parliament Hill. Love and death.

There is very little that is erotic about the statues on Parliament Hill. But how about this guy Alexander Mackenzie? What’s with the naked boy draped across his plinth? Does Stephen Harper know about this?

Then there are these depictions of Upper Canada (that’s us) and Lower Canada (Quebec), waiting languidly for the Act of Union.

Upper Canada

Lower Canada

I think we’re a lot cuter than Lower Canada.

On a sterner note, I took a look at the statues in front of the Supreme Court. Here is Iustitia (Justice):

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And Veritas (Truth):

I don’t think they are erotic but they are statues of beautiful women.

Back at my street corner I noticed the pylons had been painted. They look pretty nice, all bright yellow and everything. It’s almost enough to make you forget about the planters they have on the other side of Somerset, and the fact that we’ve still got the same old rusty chain.