The Ghost of the General Assembly

The Doomsday Seed Bank which is dug into Platåberget Mountain which is near the village of Longyearbyen, Svalbard** off the coast of Norway added three new seeds this last week.  A mold-resistant bean, a German pink tomato and a wild strawberry plucked from the flanks of a Russian volcano (Russia has volcano's?) .  I HOPE they have dandelions and quack grass seeds.

The reason you need those two seeds is in case of a natural OR man made disaster happens which kills all the plant life on earth, one of the most important things will be to build up industry again and  one way would be to put dandelions and quack grass everywhere so company's like Trugreen will be able to lead the way to recovery. There first job will be to kill all the dandelions and quack grass and you know THAT ain't going to happen. 

** I'm pretty sure they picked a place with so many letters so no one can actually pronounce it. No one can  ask directions when looking for the place. 
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koobaddog - I have something for you but your email address in your book seems to be written in some American dialect I can not understand to perhaps some Scandinavian country's language. HOWEVER - I see the book you let me borrow is actually Chuck Chvala's book as he has his mug shot plastered on the back. Maybe I'll contact him.

ANYWAY - koobaddog is a tour guide at the Wisconsin Capitol and she had some interesting talking points when she was looking at my images.

One was the ghost of the Assembly Chamber.  SO, I had to go back and look for myself and take some photos.  What I had forgotten ALREADY was that I could spend a lifetime in that building taking images of all the unseen art that is hidden in shadows so . . my work is not done.

I have to find a REAL place to exhibit this project . . . before I'm dead.

So after work I went to the Assembly Chamber and set up shop (before I forget,  koobaddog, you will have to show me how I can get in the balcony. From the main floor there is a glare on the  mural, I need to be upstairs). Also, think how my canvas works would be with some written information next to it explaining the details and interesting facts.  People would just soak that up!!

This is what the mural looks like from about the middle of the Assembly.

NOTE - you will see some dots - those are not dust. I have been told those are happy spirits from the past that float around. Although you will hear some "techno" people say they are shadows from the diaphragm in the lens caused by the bright skylight because each dot has 6 sides!  Yea - good one, if it was only that easy we would have all the answers!  Move along!    

While I was taking this shot which takes about 3 minutes and 5 separate images I was looking around and noticed the Eagles in the corners. They are in darker shade and the contrast between the sky light and the Eagles are huge and a  real problem.  To me they look like they are covering their privates like in soccer.   I knew Eagles did not play soccer in Wisconsin way back when those things were designed so I had to look into the birds when I was finished with the mural. And why do eagles have wings AND arms.

So now that I had the entire mural I had to go deeper to get the ghost.  As I was setting up for the ghost shot a tour of name tagged suits came in and I THINK the tour guide was an Assembly person because she said  "this is where I sit"  (and I took all my stuff off her chair).

So they all started looking for the ghost and I helped out and pointed.  It seems that once the mural was finish someone said "we need a Badger in the mural".  I'm sure this pleased Edwin Blashfield  who was probably THRILLED and said like " Well LA DE FREAKING DAA!   I will gladly put a freaking badger in the freaking mural and I am so glad you thought of this once I was freaking finished".

HOWEVER - because he or somebody had ADD and everything has to be symmetrical in the Capitol something has to vanish.  So a Civil War hero was painted over and replaced with a short-legged, heavy-set omnivore of the weasel family. And all the politicians were happy because there was another weasel in the Assembly.

HOWEVER - in 1970ish a varnish was put on the mural and it was turning yellow so in 1988 they worked on taking the varnish off and in doing so . . . . . .the Civil war dude started to appear.

You can see his hat and a little of his face on the left knee just above the badger.

The Ghost of the Assembly Chamber

I then turned around and took some quick shots of one of the Soccer Eagles to see why he was covering his privates and it seems perhaps it's just the way he looms from 30 feet below him.  I don't know, seems strange.

All I know is that I have a lot more work to do in the Capitol.

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I received an email yesterday from a former friend telling me that perhaps I should not blog if the only thing I can talk about are the RED HOT MILWAUKEE BUCKS!!   He suggested perhaps Toe Fungus would be more entertaining.

Even though he is now a FORMER friend I do appreciate requests because I know many people probably want to know all about toe fungus!  Of course I know toe fungus as Dermatophytic onychomycosis which is what everyone in the Melotte clan calls it when we are sitting around the supper table talking about it. 

Did you know that 8% of the population has Dermatophytic onychomycosis?  Perhaps one of the doctors that read the blog can pipe in this fascinating conversation.

As I was doing my deep research on this common problem . . . I just got grossed out.

For more information visit your local library.  The easiest way to get rid of toe fungus is to just rip out your toenail and be done with it.

Have a great day
Rod