Ripping up pavement

Over the weekend a crew was chewing up the parking lot by Donaldsons. By the time you read this, there may be a new surface to the lot.

Have you noticed all the small white asters that are blooming this time of the year? They are everywhere. I took the picture below near Donaldsons. If left undisturbed, the plant will have hundreds of little flowers on it. However, if they are occasionally mowed, as this one was, they still will produce some flowers. Until a couple of years ago,  I had never noticed these flowers, but then they started growing around my house, and I noticed they are everywhere.

The sunflowers are mostly done blooming, and the asters will be among the last native flowers to bloom. Enjoy them.

More tree planting

There has been a lot of tree planting around Rensselaer this summer. Some was needed to replace trees that were knocked down, as this tree in Weston Cemetery was.

It is nice to see new trees, though I know that the people on the lawnmowers do not care for them.

A bunch of trees were planted by the high school. Below is a line of white pines that will someday be a prominent boundary between the hospital and the high school.

There are more new trees near the football practice field. The Rensselaer Urban Forestry Council has been encouraging some of these plantings.

You can tell that the pictures above were taken a while back--everything is so green. Do you prefer the bright green, or do you like the muted greens, the yellows, the browns, and the reds of fall?

Odds and Ends

The leaves are turning nicely and the sky it is a humidity-free blue. Enjoy the wonderful fall colors for the next few weeks.

Some leaves are dropping, as from the big cottonwood in Austin Park where the park people are putting up a fence.

Also going up last week was a store-front extension to fit the Strack & Van Til sign. The parking lot has recently been resurfaced, and I missed that.

Speaking of groceries, the Mexican grocery north of town is gone and the building is again for rent.

Feast of the Hunters' Moon 2010

I went the the Feast of the Hunter's Moon in West Lafayette on Sunday. I saw several fellow Rensselaerians there. Here are other things that I saw.

It is pretty much the same from year to year, but it is such a great festival that repeated visits are in order.

(Two years ago the transportation was awful. This year it was quite good. The weather was ideal. If you have never gone, you should go--it is the biggest and best of the area festivals.)
 

Roof roof

I noticed workers putting a new roof on the baseball building at SJC and felt compelled to take a picture.

The workers have been there for several weeks. They began by putting metal roofs on the dugout before they moved to the main building.

Baseball at SJC is its own little world. The baseball players are more into their sport than just about any other athletes. Maybe basketball competes with them on that, but few other do.

Roof repairs were also underway at Halleck Center. That roof was damaged by a storm this summer. There was supposed to be a crane on campus to lift the roofing supplies, but I missed it.

It is hard to see what the guys are doing up there.

Saint Joes is getting ready for Homecoming this weekend. And I was a bit too optimistic in my commentary about crab apple trees. All the trees that the students planted along the walk were crabs. Whoever does the landscaping has a real thing for crab apple trees.

Another roofing job is underway at the Building Trades house on Vine.

Since I missed the Halleck Center crane but I do have a picture of the crane that lifted the trusses for this house into place, I figured I should include it.