Roger Ebert recently wrote on his wonderful blog that silent movies are more dreamlike than talkies for him because in his dreams he can understand people without hearing their voices. I’ve had the same experience of reaching a dreamlike state when watching silent movies – particularly lyrical ones like The Hunchback of Notre Dame or Sunrise.

Last night we went to see The Magician, Rex Ingram’s 1926 horror film, at Seattle’s original silent movie palace, the Paramount Theater. The Paramount has been offering a series of silent films every winter for 12 years, accompanied by Dennis James on the Paramount’s own mighty Wurlitzer organ.

The fabulous interior of the Paramount is certainly conducive to a dreamlike feeling.

The Wurlitzer keyboard and foot pedals control a phalanx of instruments that hide behind giant screens on either side of the theater.

The Magician is the story of a sculptress held under the irresistible hypnotic spell of a psychopath who keeps her sexually sequestered in order to preserve her “maiden heart’s blood” for his nefarious experimentation in the creation of life. It’s an obvious model for many later films, most notably James Whale’s Frankenstein.

Here is an original poster and some stills from The Magician.

Brought to you by The Chawed Rosin.

A walk through the park to a friend’s house to see their snow fort.

I’ve just been having a wonderful time looking at the University of Washington Libraries’ online Digital Collections. A person could spend hours and hours looking at the stuff they have there.

Like their collection of old menus from restaurants in Seattle and other parts of Washington State. There are menus from a lot of restaurants that I’ve eaten in, including beloved landmarks that are now closed, like the Cluod Room.

The Cloud Room was never overpriced, but what bargains they used to have in the 50s!

When I was a teeager and first exploring the city on my own, I used to love to sit with the old ladies at the lunch counters in department stores. There was a sort of smug luxuriousness about spending so much time shopping that you needed to take a rest and have a cup of coffee before continuing. Here’s a 1950 menu from the Crystal Tea Room at the Bon Marché.

This menu from the Dog House is from the mid-1950s, but they used the same graphics just before the place closed in the 1990s. Of course the prices had changed – into the 1990s version of dirt cheap.

Some restaurants that are tourist attractions in themselves had menus that were also little tourist brochures, like this guide to viewpoints from the top of the Space Needle, circa 1962.

Or the jokey orientation to pacific seafood on this 1950 menu at Ivar’s.

Rick and I went to see the Milk Carton Derby at Greenlake this weekend. It’s part of the Seafair festival in Seattle every summer. We enjoyed watching the parade of boats and a couple of the races. All of the boats use empty milk cartons for flotation.

Most competitors bring their boats to the race already built, but one of the competitions involves building the boat on the shore in one hour or less.

I assume this boat took more than an hour to build.

It’s hard to predict when would be the best time to visit the winter garden at the arboretum. We picked a good day. Everything in the garden was fragrant with blooms. I have no odorama, but here are some pictures.

Here are some photos Rick and I took on our annual Christmas trip to eastern Washington.

My mother’s back yard was sparkling with snow.

Snapped some pictures from the car as we drove west out of Spokane on the 27th.

Then we visited friends in Sprague.

There was the usual traffic jam on Snoqualmie pass, which gave me an opportunity to roll down the window and take some pictures of the snowy slopes.

Rick and I have been taking some photos in the misty, moisty autumn weather.

Here are some summertime photos, taken mostly by Rick, on Bainbridge Island and at home in Seattle.

More photos

Brought to you by The Chawed Rosin

A day spent paddling around the marshes and freeways of Lake Washington. Photos by Claire.

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

Brought to you by The Chawed Rosin

The arboretum was like a springtime paradise when Rick and I went there last week. Here are some pictures we took.

Brought to you by The Chawed Rosin