Windmill Fest 2017 and a prelude to a flood
Today ended up being a perfect day to attend a festival--warm, sunny, just overall pleasant. Mom and I left about 9:40 and, by the time we parked and walked over, it was close enough to the start of the pet parade at 10 that I didn't want to do anything else. I think mom might have taken a quick tour of some of the booths (the craft and food booths were nearby) but I stayed by the big tent across from the stage. As per usual, it was mostly dogs--LOTS of dogs--but there were four, count 'em, four, entries into Most Unusual Pet! I saw someone with a lizard, which ended up being a blue-tongued skink, and a boy came up with a turtle in some sort of rolling plastic container with water at the bottom (like a tall, clear 13-gallon garbage can; the boy said his turtle's talent was pretending to be a rock, heh), and there was one girl with a critter I couldn't see, until I saw the tail curling around her left side. Aha, another lizard. Her family ended up sitting near me on these little bleachers--likely the only time you'll see a lizard's head peering over someone's shoulder--and I'm going to guess it's an iguana. And then there was the family with a dog, but the girl in the family apparently had some other sort of pet. I was off to one side and couldn't see it; we were perplexed as to what she had. And then we heard it--she had a bird. And it was just loose on her shoulder, not in a cage; its wings were clipped. Her name is Sweet Pea and she's a small parrot, not quite Kirby's size but close. While we waited for the judges to finish up, I ended up sitting in the little bleachers to the side, and the girl and her mom were there--and we were joined by another lady, who'd also owned a bird (cockatiel) at one point, so we were all talking about birds. Yeah, us bird people, we flock together. :) Alas, the bird lost the category to the turtle AND the skink, but that's okay. Sweet Pea really was sweet. Other notable items from the parade were all the dogs that were up for Best Kisser who refused to kiss their owners, which was amusing. One was a dog named Mr. Furley like the Three's Company character. Well no wonder he was a bad kisser--Mr. Furley never had luck with the ladies that I recalled. Oh, and the turtle's name was Flash, which amused us. A couple dogs did tricks where their owners pretended to shoot them, and then the dogs played dead, rolling on their backs or sides. The one on her back actually had her paws in the air. It took a couple tries but they did it. One category was Highest Jumper and there were hardly any entries for it when one dog just jumped during the introductions; the judges saw and encouraged the family to enter for that title. Oh, and there wasn't a category of Most Spots, likely because the same dog, Otis, always wins. I think Otis was there again this year; he wasn't introduced by name for some reason, but his owner said it was his 8th year competing, and his kids were now old enough that they didn't care to come any more. Aw. Another cute pair were these retriever-type dogs whose talent was that one hugged the other--one stood still, and the other hopped up and put his paws on her, something like that. (Mom was like, we used to call that something else. Mom, he came at her from the side. It's not what you're thinking.) The one dog kept "hugging" the other, which was kind of sweet, though they didn't win. Some tiny dog won pretty much for being cute. There were lots of tiny dogs there, and many of them were at the start of the intro part, and lots of large dogs (think Tibetan mastiffs and Great Danes) were toward the back, leading Foltos the emcee to ask if they'd sorted the dogs by height. No; it just appeared that way.
Once all that was over, mom and I went to the farmers market across the river. This was the first place we could see how high the river currently is--and remember, it's not supposed to crest up north until about Tuesday or Wednesday, so we're sure to go higher--as the bike path along the river is all flooded out. It's not quite high enough to spill into the Pal Joey's patio area, but there's only about a foot or two to go before that happens. The other notable thing on that side of the river has to do with a new construction project. There is going to be a massive building put at the corner of Wilson and Washington, and they'll eventually take down the existing parking deck that's at River and…whichever cross street is just north of Wilson. To keep enough parking spots in the area, the city bought what's known as the Larson Becker property, just north of the bike bridge, tore it down, and paved it. It's actually a really nice parking area and very convenient for things like the farmers market and various festivals. They don't plan on keeping it once the new building, complete with its own parking deck, goes up, but they should. They've not only taken down the old buildings that were there, creating an open space overlooking the river, but you can tell a lot of trees and other vegetation came down--but not the cormorant tree. This is a tall, dead tree where cormorants can be found hanging out. I've read that the tree will come down, and they'll put up some sort of perch in its place, but it's still up as of today. There weren't as many cormorants on it as I've seen before, though. They're kind of creepy en masse, to be truthful.
Back across the river, we got lunch at the food booths. Mom got a steak taco from El Taco Grande's booth, and I got a brisket sandwich on a garlic toasted bun from the barbecue booth. We each got a lot of meat for our money, which was great. We then decided to walk around the Riverwalk, in part because I wanted to see how the river was doing. The Depot Pond honestly didn't seem that bad to me, but the steps that lead down to the water were closed off because they were underwater. This year, the park district did something different--they fenced off the entirety of the area considered to be part of the festival. You couldn't even walk down Houston Street freely. (There also isn't a traditional carnival; they only had bouncy-house-type rides.) The only official entrance was at Houston and Island. Now, after we left the pet parade, we briefly walked around the crafts, just east of the Peg Bond Center, and were able to openly walk through the fence as the adjacent parking lot hadn't been blocked off. Now, when we wanted to take the walking path north along the Riverwalk, we found it blocked off. Mom asked one of the park district workers if it was okay to go through the space left between the fences--the ones on the parking islands couldn't exactly meet up with the ones down on the pavement. Mom was like, they're not going to arrest us, are they? (Note that this is directly across from the police department. It's a legit question.) The lady said no, so we snuck out that way. We discovered a barrier at the one entrance to the Riverwalk, though that area wasn't flooded…yet. The water was clearly high, though--the sign on one of the scenic overlooks telling people not to take the paddle boats out of the pond only had its top line visible, and ducks were swimming all around the sign. Oh, the ducks are loving this. The north point of the peninsula is starting to get soggy with water; the river is crashing over the dam, so that any fishermen were situated along the pond side, not the river side. Of course, that could also be because the river is starting to flow onto the walkway on the river side. Mom and I had to pass a wet portion to continue walking, and we soon got to a point by a light post where we couldn't pass without walking through several inches of water--as well as a duck paddling, which was amusing--so we turned around and went back the way we came, pausing to let a large gaggle of geese walk across the path at one point. Mom apparently doesn't know how aggressive geese can be and practically walked through them. Mom, seriously, let them go first. Oy. There was definitely water moving from the pond to the river, as the causeway had rapids flowing down it at one point, which was seriously impressive. Most years it's completely dry. The bridge to the river side of the path was not yet underwater--I've seen it that way with past floods--but sure enough, we found the point where the ducks were swimming by the light post. There really wasn't much of the path that was covered, we discovered, but you still didn't want to walk through it.
After I got a few last pictures of the river, we found ourselves visiting our feathered friends at Bird is the Word. The only two cockatiels there were store-owned, but they were white--really beautiful--and named after Sheldon and Amy from The Big Bang Theory, heh. The one closer to the aisle was chatty and kept talking to me, so I figured that one was Sheldon. His "vocab" was impressive, with multiple whistles and other sounds. He kind of sounded like a cat at one point. (Now, I don't know for sure that was Sheldon, but I'm going with it.) There was a couple who were hanging out with their parrots; they were born in March, and are still a bit young to go home, so the couple said they came every day to visit with their babies and they were walking around the store with them. I personally was taken with the lovebird with the peach face. There were four birds total on a table near the front door, two greenish lovebirds together, the peach-faced one in the middle, and a blue parrolet in a third cage. The peach-faced one had been owned previously, but apparently not really handled, so it was kept separately from the rest of the store's flock as it cannot be rehomed in its current state. Poor baby. But he was perfectly happy being by the other boys, and got very excited when the parrolet got a seed treat; the worker then had to put the treat in all three cages to avoid a riot, heh. (By the way, I always thought it was "parrotlet," which spellcheck prefers, but the signage read "parrolet," for the record.)
We then found our way to the library not just for books but for a bathroom break, and we also stopped for a drink at the coffeehouse. I've never been, and I liked that they had old Scrabble tiles set up around the place which said things like "thank you" and "come again." Clever, cute, and appropriate. By that time it was after 2 and I was tired. Mom wanted to see the band performing at 3, but I really just wanted to go home, so I walked. It took about a half-hour, but it wasn't so bad and I enjoy walking through some of the older neighborhoods. When you live in a cookie-cutter subdivision, it's interesting to see what other houses look like. Also, at the coffee shop I'd commented about how heavy my bag was, so I thought to weigh it when I got home: 10 pounds. Yikes. (To think I've lost more than that since the start of the year…I used to carry that around every day. Kind of amazing.) I'd gotten peaches and cherries at the farmers market, and mom got apple butter and some sort of strawberry rhubarb bar (we'd eaten the gooseberry one), and that was in addition to my purse and water bottle which were already in there. No wonder my shoulders were sore. And, the strap of my bag wore away my sunscreen, so my shoulders were red from both the rubbing *and* the sun. Great. The rest of me stayed protected and looks okay. I was most worried about my back, in case I hadn't been able to reach everywhere with the sunscreen, but I did a good job. Overall, it was a good if long day. Mom must have stayed and listened to the band for about an hour, as she made it home about 4:15.
Once all that was over, mom and I went to the farmers market across the river. This was the first place we could see how high the river currently is--and remember, it's not supposed to crest up north until about Tuesday or Wednesday, so we're sure to go higher--as the bike path along the river is all flooded out. It's not quite high enough to spill into the Pal Joey's patio area, but there's only about a foot or two to go before that happens. The other notable thing on that side of the river has to do with a new construction project. There is going to be a massive building put at the corner of Wilson and Washington, and they'll eventually take down the existing parking deck that's at River and…whichever cross street is just north of Wilson. To keep enough parking spots in the area, the city bought what's known as the Larson Becker property, just north of the bike bridge, tore it down, and paved it. It's actually a really nice parking area and very convenient for things like the farmers market and various festivals. They don't plan on keeping it once the new building, complete with its own parking deck, goes up, but they should. They've not only taken down the old buildings that were there, creating an open space overlooking the river, but you can tell a lot of trees and other vegetation came down--but not the cormorant tree. This is a tall, dead tree where cormorants can be found hanging out. I've read that the tree will come down, and they'll put up some sort of perch in its place, but it's still up as of today. There weren't as many cormorants on it as I've seen before, though. They're kind of creepy en masse, to be truthful.
Back across the river, we got lunch at the food booths. Mom got a steak taco from El Taco Grande's booth, and I got a brisket sandwich on a garlic toasted bun from the barbecue booth. We each got a lot of meat for our money, which was great. We then decided to walk around the Riverwalk, in part because I wanted to see how the river was doing. The Depot Pond honestly didn't seem that bad to me, but the steps that lead down to the water were closed off because they were underwater. This year, the park district did something different--they fenced off the entirety of the area considered to be part of the festival. You couldn't even walk down Houston Street freely. (There also isn't a traditional carnival; they only had bouncy-house-type rides.) The only official entrance was at Houston and Island. Now, after we left the pet parade, we briefly walked around the crafts, just east of the Peg Bond Center, and were able to openly walk through the fence as the adjacent parking lot hadn't been blocked off. Now, when we wanted to take the walking path north along the Riverwalk, we found it blocked off. Mom asked one of the park district workers if it was okay to go through the space left between the fences--the ones on the parking islands couldn't exactly meet up with the ones down on the pavement. Mom was like, they're not going to arrest us, are they? (Note that this is directly across from the police department. It's a legit question.) The lady said no, so we snuck out that way. We discovered a barrier at the one entrance to the Riverwalk, though that area wasn't flooded…yet. The water was clearly high, though--the sign on one of the scenic overlooks telling people not to take the paddle boats out of the pond only had its top line visible, and ducks were swimming all around the sign. Oh, the ducks are loving this. The north point of the peninsula is starting to get soggy with water; the river is crashing over the dam, so that any fishermen were situated along the pond side, not the river side. Of course, that could also be because the river is starting to flow onto the walkway on the river side. Mom and I had to pass a wet portion to continue walking, and we soon got to a point by a light post where we couldn't pass without walking through several inches of water--as well as a duck paddling, which was amusing--so we turned around and went back the way we came, pausing to let a large gaggle of geese walk across the path at one point. Mom apparently doesn't know how aggressive geese can be and practically walked through them. Mom, seriously, let them go first. Oy. There was definitely water moving from the pond to the river, as the causeway had rapids flowing down it at one point, which was seriously impressive. Most years it's completely dry. The bridge to the river side of the path was not yet underwater--I've seen it that way with past floods--but sure enough, we found the point where the ducks were swimming by the light post. There really wasn't much of the path that was covered, we discovered, but you still didn't want to walk through it.
After I got a few last pictures of the river, we found ourselves visiting our feathered friends at Bird is the Word. The only two cockatiels there were store-owned, but they were white--really beautiful--and named after Sheldon and Amy from The Big Bang Theory, heh. The one closer to the aisle was chatty and kept talking to me, so I figured that one was Sheldon. His "vocab" was impressive, with multiple whistles and other sounds. He kind of sounded like a cat at one point. (Now, I don't know for sure that was Sheldon, but I'm going with it.) There was a couple who were hanging out with their parrots; they were born in March, and are still a bit young to go home, so the couple said they came every day to visit with their babies and they were walking around the store with them. I personally was taken with the lovebird with the peach face. There were four birds total on a table near the front door, two greenish lovebirds together, the peach-faced one in the middle, and a blue parrolet in a third cage. The peach-faced one had been owned previously, but apparently not really handled, so it was kept separately from the rest of the store's flock as it cannot be rehomed in its current state. Poor baby. But he was perfectly happy being by the other boys, and got very excited when the parrolet got a seed treat; the worker then had to put the treat in all three cages to avoid a riot, heh. (By the way, I always thought it was "parrotlet," which spellcheck prefers, but the signage read "parrolet," for the record.)
We then found our way to the library not just for books but for a bathroom break, and we also stopped for a drink at the coffeehouse. I've never been, and I liked that they had old Scrabble tiles set up around the place which said things like "thank you" and "come again." Clever, cute, and appropriate. By that time it was after 2 and I was tired. Mom wanted to see the band performing at 3, but I really just wanted to go home, so I walked. It took about a half-hour, but it wasn't so bad and I enjoy walking through some of the older neighborhoods. When you live in a cookie-cutter subdivision, it's interesting to see what other houses look like. Also, at the coffee shop I'd commented about how heavy my bag was, so I thought to weigh it when I got home: 10 pounds. Yikes. (To think I've lost more than that since the start of the year…I used to carry that around every day. Kind of amazing.) I'd gotten peaches and cherries at the farmers market, and mom got apple butter and some sort of strawberry rhubarb bar (we'd eaten the gooseberry one), and that was in addition to my purse and water bottle which were already in there. No wonder my shoulders were sore. And, the strap of my bag wore away my sunscreen, so my shoulders were red from both the rubbing *and* the sun. Great. The rest of me stayed protected and looks okay. I was most worried about my back, in case I hadn't been able to reach everywhere with the sunscreen, but I did a good job. Overall, it was a good if long day. Mom must have stayed and listened to the band for about an hour, as she made it home about 4:15.