Cleveland Design Competition 2008 Registration Deadline - 11/28 (12/05 late)

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Regular registration - November 28th, 2008
Late registration - December 5th, 2008
Submission Deadline - December 12, 2008

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Thanksgiving - and the unfortunate preparation for 'Black Friday'

As Thanksgiving has finally arrived the early morning of typical weekday is interrupted by a noticable absence of vehicles on the roadways. Most take the holiday break to grab a couple extra hours of sleep, hug their loved ones extra long in the brisk November mornings, before attempting to rouse themselves in bracing for regular holiday fanfare.

For some reason Thanksgiving has managed to maintain most of its original celebratory luster. The theme of giving thanks for a bountiful fall harvest (and surviving the previous year) allows families to celebrate togetherness with a veritable feast of good fortune mostly revolving around an over laden dining room table. And while most celebrate as best they can (relative to personal fortunes, etc) the massive commercialization of the holiday hasn't surpassed mostly cardboard decorations, a small selection of cards (really, what could they say anyway?) and a food centric media (albeit small) blitz. Most of the attention has been paid to how many travelers will be heading off to see far off relatives in the current economic state even with gas at such low prices.

Regardless, now is not the time to lament good fortune. For those of us able to, now is the time to spend a nice meal with friends and family, enjoying each others company (if we can) and overindulging in copious and sometimes painful ways. We must eat our fill and rest up for the next day, tomorrow, the day after Thanksgiving, is when the bulk of commercial marketing ratchets up, the drone of Christmas music from every corner, red and green garish confections hung from every bough and bright 'for sale' signs as far as the eye can see.

I am thankful for my family and friends and extremely thankful that I am given the chance everyday to do something better for something bigger then myself and so with this in mind I will again be partaking in the infamous buy nothing day of November 28th and will do my holiday shopping locally, from local artisans (if I can, it does get hard to do but food is one of my favorite gifts to give and recieve).

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Thanksgiving Help - Local Meal Sites

MAYOR JACKSON ANNOUNCES THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY MEAL SITE LOCATIONS TO AID AREA NEEDY

CLEVELAND – Mayor Frank G. Jackson, Honorary Co-Chair of Greater Cleveland’s annual “Harvest for Hunger” Food Drive, has asked the City’s Food Drive Chairman to work with the local hunger agencies to prepare a list of meal site locations for Cleveland’s print, radio, and television media. This effort will help ensure that Cleveland families who are working hard to survive the tough economic climate can receive a Thanksgiving meal.

Program hours and locations may change. For complete information, call United Way’s 211-First Call for Help at 216/436-2000. This line is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, including Christmas.

The Thanksgiving Holiday meal site locations follow below.

Location List Google Document

Sunflowers in Cleveland

I don't really have much of a reason for putting this up except I suppose I miss the ideals that planting sunflowers along a road encompass. It was a difficult decision, I am sure. Weighing whether the introduction of the plants would cause an imbalance in the local ecosystem (would impurities in the soil mean that a poisoned food source for birds was created?). I heard somewhere that sunflower seeds from a packet (you know, the ones you buy for a dollar at the drug store) have been genetically altered making their seeds sterile meaning the possibility of plant proliferation along the lakeside and into Wendy Park didn't seem much of an issue. The only suspected danger was the ground keepers scythe, of which no bother was needed.

It was too late in the year when these seeds were sowed for the "Mammoth Sunflowers" to attain their advertised height, a grandiose 15' that would have easily been spied from the Shoreway on those quiet commutes home in the evening, the sun setting the sky on fire as it sinks into the lake. Regardless they were planted on the sly. An act of subversion that would hopefully blossom into beauty. It would become a joke, to see the flowers and say to myself "I know who did that" when really, the humans responsible could truthfully hardly take any credit. They poked some holes in the dirt, shoved a ripe striped seed in the hole, hastily covered it over and moved onto to the next planting, mindful of passing traffic and prying eyes. Nature just ran its course and the plants grew. They may have been located there by humans (and cultivated and packaged as seeds) but honestly it would be akin to a museum curator taking credit for the pieces on the walls of the museum, this ownership the passing agrarians had.

Regardless, it was a topic of discussion, this planting of the sunflowers. An act of design (some would say attrition) to beautify the gray city on the gray lake. Larger plans were made, sites were scouted, ideas of hidden messages tossed aside as quickly as derived. Why not plant a food garden on Scranton Peninsula? Most likely the toxins in the soil would deter any use of that. How about a garden billboard on a hillside? Too quickly overgrown with brush and weeds. Our poor plants would be choked out in days. How about large sunflowers on a freshly finished roadside protected by a fence and curb? Perfect.

And so the season wound down. Like most Cleveland dreams the sunflowers never achieved the proportions they aspired to. They grew what they could (perhaps it was too dry, perhaps the soils had too much clay) and eventually succumbed to the fauna and the seasons. I am sure the last flurries have buried the trunks of the plants. Another ideal quickly and completely covered by lake effect snow.

Perhaps next year the sunflowers will be planted earlier in the season. Perhaps they will spring up in a few more locations, waving in the wind at passersby (aren't Clevelanders constantly being reminded how friendly we are, how we smile at everyone?) and watching the world pass them by. Maybe next year they will grow big and strong, a quiet marvel to behold, planted from heirloom seeds that will survive the seasons, spreading themselves to become native, passed on by birds and squirrels, eventually becoming strong enough to then survive on their own.

Then a new flower will have to be cultivated. Another annual that would embody the trials of my city. Another example of struggle, hope and failure to study and watch, to shrug our shoulders at and wonder who would attempt such as thing in such a locale anyway.