SANTARCHY!

Lohr Barclay and my friends at Artica put on a wacky annual event called Santarchy. This merry group, wearing Santa suits or something suggesting it, met at 9:30 yesterday for breakfast and then went from bar to bar chanting ho, ho, ho until, theoretically, midnight. I take pictures all day, cumulating with the group shot at the City Museum around 6 PM. That's enough for me although the group heads off to other downtown venues. I had already put in an eight and a half hour shift and they would have to pay me overtime after that. Since I was a volunteer, it might be problematic.

 

Lots more pictures from this to come. And we are getting our first real snow of the season today, which should be worth a snap.                  

ALL YOU NEED IS

Someone is paying for a few billboards around the area that sell nothing. One says "I 🖤 STL" and another "😃 SMILE."  I'd like to get pictures of all of them but someone would have to drive me so I can shoot through the windshield. I took this one at the wheel on my way home from work last night. Maybe someone will be moved by it.

Running very low on material but there is an all-day event today that should get me a car load.        

SHE'S NO BETTER

Late post today. Just too much to do. This is the next statue over from the ones we saw yesterday. Why are they all so bleak? I think of theaters as places of entertainment although the works they perform can be very serious. So, unless the stage specializes in Euripides, Chekhov, Ibsen and Miller, how about a smile?          

BAD MOOD

Redevelopment in downtown St. Louis is very hit and miss. Lots of old commercial buildings have been rehabbed into apartments, even a couple into new hotels. There are plenty of restaurants and much new construction around the baseball stadium aimed at people with money to burn. On the other hand, there are lots of vacant storefronts. This is the facade of a theater that has been out of business a long time. There are lots of other venues along the central corridor of the city. No reason or money to do something with this one.

And so it sits there and erodes. No wonder the faces in this frieze are unhappy.         

HOLIDAYS AT THE SYMPHONY HALL

We are fortunate to have one of America's finest symphony orchestras. It is the second oldest in the country, behind only the New York Philharmonic (which once had Gustav Mahler as its conductor so how you gonna beat that). Our new music director,  Stéphane Denève, has brought the St. Louis Symphony to even greater artistic achievement. Mrs. C and I have been subscribers for 43 years.

Powell Symphony Hall is gorgeous at this time of year. This is how we were greeted last weekend when we attended a program of the music of Handel and Bach.