Who is this?

Eileen and Martin and I were walking near the Lake Harriet Rose Garden yesterday and came upon this mysterious piece of pavement graffitti. Anybody know what it represents? Is it supposed to be Obama?

Mysterious graffitti image Pavement graffitti on Lightning Hill overlooking Lake Harriet Rose Garden

Catchup Post#1 - Excelsior to Victoria (Sept 6)

I got so carried away with political posts and complaining about traffic snarls that I haven't posted anything about what I've been doing for the past two months. I don't remember anything I did that I didn't take pictures of, which mostly seems to be bike trips. This one was just a little afternoon trip with my friend Trisha. I had ridden a the entire eastern portion of the stupidly named "Southwest LRT Corridor," which actually comprises two or three different trails traversing several western suburbs. However, I have never ridden on either of the segments west of Hopkins. The 6-mile stretch from Excelsior to Victoria was one I wanted to try. I rode with my friend Trisha.

We put our bikes in the van and drove to Excelsior, unfortunately arriving in the middle of a festive local event called "Apple Days." We were still able to find street parking, picked our way through the bacchanalian throngs to the trail, and rode west to the little town of Victoria. The trail is quite pleasant, mostly shaded and flat. Crushed limestone rather than asphalt, but in good condition. Most of the trail runs through a posh region of lakeside exurb, with a little open prairie as it approaches Victoria. At the point where the trail hits Carver Park there is a choice of not one but TWO taverns. Whee! We picked the more upscale Victoria House and had beer and burgers on the terrace with a view of Steiger Lake. We considered riding on into the park, but the weather was looking threatening so we headed back, arriving at our car shortly after it started to drizzle.

This is part of a series of bike trips documented by phone-camera, as my regular camera had gone missing. ( Pictures here. )

West Winging it through the final weeks of the campaign

For the past year or two I've been doggedly working my way through all 7 seasons of West Wing on Netflix. Just as the 2008 presidential campaign screeches to a climax I've arrived at the midpoint of Season 6, where the Santos/Vinnick presidential race kicks off. This is quite a stroke of serendipity, as there is quite a bit of overlap between reality and fiction.

Watching the fictional Santos give his acceptance speech about the Politics of Hope was almost spooky. I've been told that the parallels between Santos and Obama are far from accidental; apparently the writers have admitted that the Santos character was inspired by Obama. Considering that the episodes I'm watching now were written in 2004, that was pretty darned prescient.

But Santos isn't Obama - he's an individual in his own right. Watching the early episodes of the Santos campaign I was finding it hard to believe that any brand-new candidate would be so headstrong as to simply disregard the advice of his seasoned campaign advisers. Then I read this.

Oooookayyyy. Apparently Santos is an even MORE prescient conglomeration of Obama and Palin.