Breaking news from Monday: I had time to kill at a grocery store. Here is the exciting setup.
1. We were going somewhere for Labor Day, and wife had made brownies. She thought ice cream would go nicely with warm fresh brownies.
2. We had been walking to meet the March that was going from the lake to Annunciation, but couldn’t connect - they’d changed the route, due to the logistics of getting so many people across busy intersections. We saw it turn, blocks away up the street, and snake towards Lynnhurst. Well. New plan: wife returns home, gets car, texts me when she’s leaving, at which point I buy the ice cream and we can get it to the gathering without too much meltage.
There, now you're aware of the conditions and situation, let us get to the tale.
It took her a while to walk home and secure the brownies, and that meant I had about 20 minutes to spend in a rather small grocery store. I’m sure I looked suspicious: man wanders from aisle to aisle without a basket, checks the ice cream, checks his watch, goes to another aisle, takes pictures, checks his watch. He seems to be spending a lot of time pretending to evaluate ice cream. Hold on, now he's just standing in the bar soap area, taking pictures. Can we zoom in on this guy?
(I've been shopping there for 31 years, so I don't think I'm completely unfamiliar.)
I’d never spent much time in the soap department, since I never bought soap here. You’d have to be desperate, because the price would be high. Maybe you had guests coming and you wanted an impressive bar in the guest bathroom. Nothing that they’d dare unwrap, of course.
They had Irish Spring, and they had Dial, and since it's an upscale grocery store, they had a small quantity of bespoke surfactants:
The one on the right has a certain cachet, I guess. Well-known to soap enthusiasts. The Chinese characters say “Choose Flowers and Sandalwood,” according to my built-in OS translator, and “Chinese-made flower brand soap” on the bottom.
Says this completely trustworthy site:
It not only possesses all the merits a sandalwood scented soap may have, but also does no harm whatever to your skin. Just try it, and you will see our sincere recommendation is rather convincing.
"Our product that is designed to be applied directly to all of your skin, and also, we would like to assert that it does not harm skin."
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Dead Sea Soap is noted for its number of minerals, which are absorbed into the skin, turning your blood to a sludge of stones you can hear clacking and clicking together in your eardrums. If you cut your wrist you bleed sand. Just kidding. I went to the Wikipedia page and found my favorite new Dead Sea fact of the day:
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Very attractive, to my eyes, in its reworking of what surely is an old, old label. In fact I’d bet (he said without googling) that the changes are few. |
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They have a website. But you can’t see it unless you log in. You might think, well, the domain expired and someone’s squatting, but if you whois the domain, the registrar info comes back to a small building in Hebron, Kentucky, that is indeed the company HQ. |
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Ah: yes, the 1930s version. I can see Dillinger lathering up with this stuff. | |
Oh boy, it’s the Crazy Soap.
Every guy at some point in his 20s dated a woman who had this stuff and swore by it.
About Dr. B, much has been written. His messianic, optimistic sermons printed on the back of the bottle or package have amused and confused many. Wikipedia:
In 1946, while promoting his "Moral ABC" at the University of Chicago, Bronner was arrested for refusing to leave the dean's office, despite the fact he was invited to the campus to lecture by a local student group, and then was committed to the Elgin Mental Health Center, a mental hospital in Elgin, Illinois, from which he escaped after shock treatments. Bronner believed those shock treatments brought about his eventual blindness.
Ding! Wife’s car is leaving the house. I grab the ice cream (Tillamook Vanilla, but the one with bean fragments, not the Old-Fashioned variety) and pay. On the way out I stuff my receipt in the box. There are slots for all the local schools, and the grocery store contributes to the schools based on some metric I do not know.
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Usually I do Daughter’s old grade school. Today this one was overflowing. |
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I looked at the newspaper rack. Biggest mystery in the world. |
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Five thousand souls. Founded by a farmer and businessman who'd go on to a career in politics and apple-growing and all the other usual 19th century pursuits. It's named after Richland County, which was so named because - well, figure it out. Good PR.
What the holy sam hell
His use of double-brick walls created a cold storage environment without mechanical refrigeration. The projected $30,000 warehouse began construction in 1917. By 1921, with over $125,000 spent, German was forced to halt work and eventually lost the building through bankruptcy proceedings.
The architect did the work in exchange for having his own bills forgiven.
Designed by a native son, a born-and-raised Richland man. Some guy named Frank Wright, if you’re curious.
I swear the buildinbg's owner added the top later, just to show everyone who’s who and what’s what
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TOMS. Bio: Capt. Henry Toms was a native of England and one of the pioneer businessmen of Richland Center, born on August 6, 1829. He resided in his native country till 1853, when at the age of twenty-four he emigrated to the United States. |
It was a furniture store and funeral parlor. The town’s historical page says the top was repaired at some point, which altered its appearance.
I’m sure the town’s historical page has something on this one, how it defied the trend towards the Commercial style, but it’s not organized by image, so I can’t tell you the history unless I click through every damned link on the page.
BAILEY:
Local historical page: "“Originally built for $15,000 to house Bailey’s dry goods store, as well as an Opera House and the Masonic Temple on the second floor, the Bailey Building housed the Clark and Elliott Store at the turn of the century, followed for many years by the Edward and Kelly Clothing Store and later by Brown’s.”
In a similar ornate style, the James Building, to the local historical society.
And I don’t doubt them, but . . . What’s this?
Enhance:
So Mr. James constructed a few buildings, I assume.
Wow:
These historical sites can be so damned dull, but I suppose it’s the text used for applying for historical status.
Characterized by a projecting metal cornice ornamented by large and small
brackets, medal medallions and a rectangular shaped pediment, this
Italianate brick (now painted) three-bay former produce store is further
characterized by ornamental iron pilasters flanking the four long, narrow
windows placed in a recessed panel on the upper story of the façade. A plain
cornice with end brackets extend across the remodeled storefront.
As dairying gained importance
Zzzzzz
Teats up in ’28:
The addition was inflicted upon the town in 1976. It had a two-story interior that looks lovely.
Looks like early AI tried to do the marquee
Of this famed auditorium let us sing:
Designed in a “modernized” Classical style by LaCrosse architect Percy Bentley, this red brick municipal building features an entablature comprised of a projecting cornice and modillion ornament placed on applied brick pilasters topped with Ionic capitals -
Zzzzz
Before it was mauled, did it have nice tall windows? OF COURSE it did.
Over time:
Nothing on the local historical page, and I’m glad, because we’d have to sit through a dry-as-particle-board recitation of its building materials.
Appears to have been a spec office block.
Had a pediment, but it was lopped off at some point. No great loss; it was undersized and a bit silly.
Looks as if the interesting parts were shaved off.
Well, that’s the town. Oh - one more.
They want a new marquee, and I wish them all the best.
That will do for today, except of course our weekly batch of matches. See you around, and thanks for your visit!
