what about the plastic animals?

Robert Earl Hughes

As one of those weird kids that would read the Guinness Book of World Records from cover to cover I was well aware of the legend of Robert Earl Hughes.  This trip gave me a chance to pay my respects to him. 

When he was six years old Robert Earl Hughes weighed 200 pounds.  His peak weight was estimated to be 1069 pounds but the heaviest he ever weighed on a scale was 1041.  Hughes made a living by appearing at events, signing autographed photos of himself and hitting the carnival show circuit as a sideshow attraction.  By all accounts he loved the work.  He got to travel and talk to lots more people there than he ever would have in the nearly non-existent town of Fishhook.  At 32 Hughes contracted measles and died from complications from that disease.  He is buried next to his parents in the Benville Cemetery, a couple miles north of his hometown of Fishhook.

The Washington Times-Reporter has a great four-part (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4) biography of Hughes.

As a special bonus, while looking for information about Hughes I was pleased to find the AOL Benville Traffic Report.  All you really need to know about traffic conditions in Benville is on this map.

The Gems Of Quincy

Our first destination in Illinois was to see a Quincy Gems baseball game.  Before I get to the baseball let me just say to any Bay Staters reading that there is no "z" in Quincy, Illinois.  The Gems play in the Prospect League, a summer league for college players.  The quality of play wasn't all that great but the fans were having a good time.

I was really tired by this time of the very hot day and that tiredness shows through in these photos (or lack of photos).  The baseball stadium was one of FDR's Works Progress Administration projects as a baseball and football complex and is built out of a serious amount of local limestone.

The best part of the game was the post-game fireworks.  Even though it was the July 4th weekend I didn't have high hopes for a quality show.  Boy, was I wrong!  Donna and I left to get dinner in the middle of the game.  The game was still going on when we returned so we picked a location on the other side of the football stadium that we thought would have a good view of the fireworks.  That worked out perfectly.  We sat on someone's lawn and watched one explosion after another for quite a while.

2011 Holiday Display, Hipstamatic Edition

This page may load slowly.  I accidentally saved these at way too high of a quality level.  Just a few photos taken with my phone.  I like the glowing-eared lucky cats!

Let's go to Illinois tomorrow.

Mutant Carrots

Posing in front of my toaster.  Well, technically, I think that is Bob Harding's toaster but it's been mine for almost thirty years so I'm not giving it back.

One Year of Morningside Park

If you follow my Flickr account you may have noticed that I've been taking photos of the same spot, where the upper trail crosses the 120th street steps, in Morningside Park for some time.  I just passed the one year mark so it's time to look at the annual cycle.

At the beginning I didn't have a plan and I missed almost the entire month of April (and the green up of vegetation), but eventually I settled for taking a picture every 7-10 days.  Sometimes the photos were taken more frequently to catch things like the recent snow melt.  Almost all the pictures were taken around 7:45 a.m. when I was walking to the shuttle.

If you watch the slide show, or if you want to take your time pondering the individual photos, you'll see lots of white, brown and green, rain, fog, a few people walking, one person sleeping, the damage after Hurricane Irene and following the October snow.  Enjoy!