American Eateries: Waffle House

Waffle House on Yale Blvd.,  Albuquerque, 2013.

Here's a little bit of Americana. If my diner geography is accurate, Waffle House is found in the South, and Denny's is its Northern answer. And Village Inn seems to be in the West. They are not affiliated, as far as I know, but at any of these you can probably order American food like chicken-fried steak and drink bottomless cups of weak coffee.

I missed taking the photo of its famous sign with Scrabble-like letters spelling its name. Highway drivers in the Southern U.S. know to look for those glowing yellow letters. 

Here's the menu for your perusal. You've got Alice's Iced Tea, Bert's Best Bowl of Chili, and Walt's Soup to choose from. Save room for Bert's Chili Sausage Gravy (Bert was creative) and Papa Joe's Pork Chops! Some of the typos are amusing... like in the Ligher Choices section. See if you can find it. 

Let's go to Waffle House! 

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Photographer's note: this was shot with 100 speed film that was inadvertently set to ASA 800, then "pushed" in the developing process to allow enough light to hit the negative. Hence the tonal quality. I kind of like it.

Abandoned Used Car Lot, Albuquerque

I'm interested to see places where nature has begun to return to human-altered landscapes. I've blogged about it before, and probably will again -- it was a recurring theme in a family trip to Europe two summers ago, but I have yet to publish any of those photos here...for now. Anyhow, here is a glimpse into wild taking over a sliver of Albuquerque. Catey and I stumbled upon this old used car lot when we were giving ourselves a self-guided tour of the city over Thanksgiving. 

Nature returning, Albuquerque, November 2013.

We thought it was pretty cool. We were taken by the look of the asphalt fractured by strands of fine grass. We don't know what species it is, but we assume it's a non-native. I'm not sure why this matters, but given the nature of our work, it permeates most of our thoughts about plants and the human landscape. Somehow, I do like the idea that these grasses are native. I like the idea that they once grew in this very spot.

Broken skateboard in old used car lot, Albuquerque, November 2013.

Whatever grass it is, one has to wonder how it colonized. How do weeds do this? How do they get everywhere? Here, in Albuquerque, it's not hard to imagine that wind brought this seed here. Wind brought seed here to arrive the very day that a flaw first appeared in this parking lot. It may have blown from a sidewalk three feet away. It may have blown from the foothills of Sandia Mountain, 10 miles away.

Medical Arts Ave NE & Lomas Blvd NE, 1991-2012. Google Earth Imagery.

 

Things for Which San Francisco Isn't Known

Here are a few things for which San Francisco is known. 

These  first few images are here in hopes of attracting a few viewers doing image searches for the things below. I'm missing images of Fisherman's Wharf, Lombard Street, Alcatraz, Telegraph Hill/Coit Tower, and Levi's Jeans -- also anything about Earthquakes, Hippies, and the Gold Rush. (But at least I got the text in!)

Thanks for visiting, whether new or returning! Please read on.

746 Feet Tall, 8,981 Feet Across(looking a little rusty), November 2011.

More info Here

Beach, Dog, Sunset, Ocean Beach, 2010.

Cable Car in the Rain, November 2011.

Surfers, Ocean Beach, November 2011.

 What San Francisco isn't known for.

Francie, San Francisco, April 2011. (Photo credit: S. Estelle)

Franciscan Manzanita (Photo credit: S. Estelle). More info Here.

Raven's Manzanita, 2010.

More info Here.

Presidio Clarkia, 2010.

Presidio Clarkia. More info Here.

Lessingia doing very well and bird footprints, September 2013 (picture taken on Samsung Galaxy s3).

San Francisco Lessingia. More info Here.

(Then Nassella, now) Stipa pulchra/Purple Needle Grass, Sweeney Ridge, 2010.

Purple Needle Grass. More info Here.

For more indepth and colorful coverage of San Francisco natural history, follow this link to San Francisco historian Chris Carlsson's collection of essays on the topic. For any readers living in San Francisco, or anyone planning to visit, try to make it to one of Chris Carlsson's bicycle tours or public talks. Regardless of the topic, you will be enlightened and inspired to do your own delving into history. 

And, if you are lucky enough to hear of one, attend a Greg Gaar slideshow. It's a must for those interested in San Francisco natural history!

Woodland Plants near Blue Hole, Virginia

Two months ago, Catey and I were just finishing up a trip to Vermont, Virginia, and North Carolina, making stops along the way to visit special people and places. One of our adventures near Charlottesville was a hike with Rose to Blue Hole. Although we put our feet in the Moormans River, we did not swim at this well-known swimming spot. As Rose told us, there had been a renowned rope swing there until Summer 2012, when someone with a chainsaw, presumably worried about liability, took it upon themselves to cut the tree on which it hung. That story is here.

Those guys walked ahead and I stopped to find some old friends in the undergrowth -- woodland plants that I recognized from doing plant surveys in Illinois when I lived there.

I stopped to photo the heart-shaped, almost glisteny leaf of the wild ginger. I believe it has fine hairs on its surface to give it the texture it has. , which was lighted nicely, by the time I found it, by the tall forest above it.

The dappled appearance of a woodland floor in the summer can have a soothing effect on us. However, plants need light -- so leaves of woodland plants have to be ready to capture the few bursts of sunlight that filter through, even in the long days of summer. I don't know whether ginger or hepatica actually follow the sun as it moves throughout the sky, but they may. Plants do this, and it's called phototropism -- here's a link to a video showing it.

Asarum canadense (wild ginger), Shenandoah National Forest, August 2013.

Hepatica nobilis var. obtusa (liver leaf), Shenandoah National Forest, August 2013.

Orb in woods (I'll call it a Virginia Fly Trap), Shenandoah National Forest, August 2013.