Week 1 in Lakeside, 2019

It's chilly in Lakeside this week, and we brought mostly summer clothes with us. But, I didn't even have to go to a thrift store, and under the bed packed away I found a turtleneck cornflower blue long sleeve t-shirt about 20 years old, and am wearing it under one of my new purchases. I love it when a plan comes together.

The 10:30 lecture today is on F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald: A Literature of Romance and an Age of Jazz with Taylor Hagood, Professor of English and Director of the Study of the Americas Initiative at Florida Atlantic University.  This afternoon at 1:30 he’ll lecture on What makes American literature American.  https://taylorhagood.com/

Here’s a link to the entire summer series. https://www.lakesideohio.com/education/lecture-series
Bob is having breakfast today with the Guys’ Club at the Patio where his paintings for this season are displayed. This is a club whose motto is “We’ll get around to it,” and they have no agenda or plan, they just get together and enjoy each others company.

Tonight is a silent movies organist program by Clark Wilson at Hoover. http://www.clarkwilson.net/.  We might stop in.

This morning on my walk along the lakefront I stopped to look at some of the new improvements finished since we left last Labor Day.  The Steel Memorial Bandstand where so many have been married and where we have some evening concerts and vespers had a complete facelift, thanks to "Giving Tuesday of 2017" which raised about $450,000.  The seating area is no longer gravel, it's been graded and paved with pavers, and has all new "attached" benches, with some open space where I assume people who bring their own lawn chairs, baby strollers or wheel chairs can sit. The bandstand is a memorial to Fritz and Karlyn Steele, Lakesiders who were killed in an auto accident in August 1978, so the memorial is now 40 years old, and needed some renovation.

Then I went over and looked at the new basketball courts--maybe six of them.  Also sand volley ball courts.  This is primarily to serve the teen-agers, although you often see little ones and older adults playing too. The money for this was raised on "Giving Tuesday 2018," so you can see things move very quickly once the money is available.  I needed to take this detour because the main dock is closed again due to high water--even a little wave action and wind stirs up the lake and it has to be closed.  The two side docks, called L dock and I dock (due to shape) are under water even without wind.

I heard from the Barris'  https://www.idlewyldbb.com/ when we visited there last evening, that the pool was being used yesterday despite the cold and wind.  It is heated and has good handicapped access. It opened the summer of 2017, and is getting heavy use.  And we're so fortunate it's there--and I was one of the nay sayers who said, "Why do we need a pool when we have Lake Erie?"  But donors smarter and richer than I knew--in 2017 the swimming area of the lake couldn't be used for a few weeks due to bacteria and algae bloom http://lakeeriealgae.com/, and this year the lake is too high to be safe.