Crazy Unicorns And Glowing Cubes

Today I have an odds and ends post. I was in the Sandy Hill area late one afternoon in September when I came across this house. It was the historical plaque out front that first caught my eye. Allan House was built in 1893 for businessman James Allan and has been designated a heritage property. It appears to continue to be a residence. Among those who have lived here is Cairine Wilson, the subject of the plaque. She was the first woman appointed to the Canadian Senate.

This sign was outside a pub in early October.

Later in the month it had a different remark.

This is the Thomas Flanagan Building, the central headquarters for the Ottawa Police Services, downtown on Elgin Street. It is named for a former police chief who served in that role from 1989-93. Policing runs in the family, though not all of them measure up to him. One son in particular, a former cop who I've heard works in customs down at the airport, seems to spend his free time writing letters to the editor for a local right wing rag of a newspaper four or five times a week, spouting his usual self righteous, sanctimonious, blowhard opinions. In the past, I've referred to that Flanagan as His Infernal Pompousness.

This cube stands outside the Rideau branch of the Ottawa Library. It is one of four such cubes, a collective art installation, along Rideau Street.

This storefront window is at the Rideau Centre mall, for a shop called Dream Weaver. It was the sign that caught my attention.

Here I have a view that won't possible for awhile before too long- the Peace Tower framed from within the main entrance at the East Block of Parliament Hill. Centre Block is due to be closed up for ongoing restoration work for some years when the fall session of Parliament comes to an end. The House of Commons will be moving into a space prepared in the West Block, while the Senate will occupy the Government Conference Centre. You can see scaffolding around part of the tower in this shot.

Two murals in the Glebe stand across the street from each other. This first one is a new one, painted on the wall of a jewel shop to replace one that had been there before.

The other one is on the side wall of a building that houses a small grocery shop and apartments upstairs, and is also new. Wild Read is the work of a collective group of street artists called Vertigo Graffiti. The group is from Columbia, having had already done large scale murals around the world, and the Columbian embassy arranged for them do this. It blends together the idea of biodiversity and the world of fantasy in reading, and is the first work of the group in Canada.

I finish with these three shots taken on an evening in October. I came up to Parliament Hill for a twilight view of the Ottawa River for my final post of 2018, and took some extras. I had a similar twilight shot of this statue earlier in the year. The grounds of Parliament Hill include a number of statues of political leaders. This one features Alexander Mackenzie, our second prime minister, dramatically backlit by the sky.

A nearby view of the river shows the Alexandra Bridge linking Ottawa to Gatineau on the other shore.

And this view across to Major's Hill Park includes the familiar landmarks of the National Gallery, Notre Dame, and the American embassy.