{"id":17166,"date":"2017-04-30T22:15:32","date_gmt":"2017-05-01T02:15:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/?p=17166"},"modified":"2022-09-20T16:43:13","modified_gmt":"2022-09-20T20:43:13","slug":"2022-family-stuff-the-texas-contingent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/?p=17166","title":{"rendered":"2022 – Family Stuff: The Texas Contingent"},"content":{"rendered":"

……………………………………………<\/span>(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on September 20, 2022)<\/p>\n

\"\"I haven\u2019t seen my brother Ed (right) since last century, so I was pleasantly surprised when I got an email from him in early July stating that he and his second wife, Linda – whom I hadn\u2019t yet met – were coming east from San Antonio in mid-September.<\/span><\/p>\n

We met here last Saturday morning – September 17. It turns out that he had never been to the Great Falls in Paterson, so – like with the Colorado Contingent four years earlier – that was our destination.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But first, we decided to take a two-block walk to the church where we were baptized and the grammar school we had both attended for proper torturing by the nuns to make us the men we are today.<\/span><\/p>\n

I think he was surprised that the nuns no longer lived in the convent and the school had become a public charter school for the arts and sciences, yet still bore huge crosses carved into the exterior walls and \u201cHOLY TRINITY SCHOOL\u201d carved in large letters above the main entrance.<\/span><\/p>\n

Linda liked the look of the 90-year-old church, so we crossed the street for a closer inspection. The doors were locked, so we walked around the edifice. Toward the back and between the church and the rectory, we encountered a man named Joseph, who had something to do with taking care of the church.<\/span><\/p>\n

After speaking with him for a while, he let us into the church through a side door and basically became a tour guide of sorts, though Ed and I made him aware of our familiarity with the premises via Ed\u2019s experiences as an altar boy and my observations that the configuration of the confessionals was different and that the baptismal font – where Ed and I (and our sisters and Ed\u2019s kids) had Holy Water poured on our heads – was missing.<\/span><\/p>\n

As we were winding things up back near the altar, I started taking a couple of quick panoramic pictures of that front area. Since I didn\u2019t really spend the time to get what I wanted – and I really<\/em> should have backed up a bit – I decided to show the one that included Joseph\u2019s head, as he spoke with Ed and Linda. Click twice to fully enlarge and start scrolling:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Time to head to Paterson and the falls.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I used to try to make a point of visiting the falls after large rain deluges to get the best shots of the majestic falls, so it\u2019s unfortunate that this visit occurred during a drought. The falls were a bit puny, so I took very few pictures of them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, I looked for (and found) other things, like this algae bloom (click to enlarge):<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Or this fisherman in an area that I think is off-limits:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

What is that two-handed technique he\u2019s using? IS that fishing or something else entirely different?<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This all took place in the Overlook area where you first come in after parking your car.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

From there, we walked up about a hundred steps and around the corner to get to the entrance to the pedestrian bridge over the falls. I had told E&L that the bridge had been closed for over a year due to safety issues and wouldn\u2019t reopen until 2024, so we went as far as we could\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026first past the pre-falls:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u2026\u2026.and then right up to the bridge:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

That closure meant a 4 or 5-block hike around the park\u2019s periphery to a lookout point where you can barely make out the pedestrian bridge to the left of center and see the street bridge to the right that we just walked across:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

You can see a little mist in the air below the American flag. During much better Passaic River flow, you would see a lot<\/u> more.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We saw something else from this vantage point:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

Unfortunately, we also saw the package\u2019s contents nearby. Let\u2019s just say that it was not in new, unused condition.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Continuing on, I took a couple shots of Puny Falls:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\" \"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When we arrived at the other end of the closed bridge, we saw a guy sitting near it. We had seen him from the other side of the bridge a half-hour before and he was still in the same spot, seemingly concentrating on something.<\/span><\/p>\n

All of a sudden, he got all excited as a small mammal appeared out of the bushes. \u201cI got it! A beaver!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

It was a woodchuck\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026big difference.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, I took a closeup shot of the flag blocking the sun that had been blinding me until this moment:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So much for our visit to the Great Falls.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But there was a Part 2 bonus in this trip that was just across the street: Hinchliffe Stadium – one of two Negro Leagues stadia still in existence.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve featured this dilapidated stadium in previous posts when trees and bushes were growing out of its concrete bleacher-type seats. It\u2019s now undergoing a major renovation to make it a usable stadium once again. A minor league baseball team – the New Jersey Jackals – has left Yogi Berra Stadium in Montclair, NJ, and will be moving into Hinchliffe. And since the stadium is now part of the Great Falls National Park, this will become a side-by-side double-attraction\/major destination.<\/span><\/p>\n

We walked across the street. There have been a LOT of changes since I was last here a year ago. The murals on the outside walls are gone and new buildings have gone up: a parking garage, another residential building and a stadium museum.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the museum:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As usual, I really<\/em> wanted to get inside the stadium and document the progress, but everything was blocked off\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026..well, almost<\/em> everything. I found an opening and – not wanting to be detected – I decided to run in and take ONE picture and get out.<\/span><\/p>\n

There was no work being done on a Saturday morning, so the place was deserted, but I was not gonna press my luck – ONE picture and OUT!<\/span><\/p>\n

But what a picture it is! (Click twice to fully-enlarge):<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not a full 360-degree panoramic shot – I couldn\u2019t spin around fast enough to beat the moving camera arrow – but I think I got most of the important stuff. The yellowish residential building in the center has been there a while and further to the right, you can see the being-built, new residential building and the much closer new parking garage.<\/span><\/p>\n

You can also see that there\u2019s a lot more to be built behind my position, but I\u2019ve got my one shot and it\u2019s time to exit.<\/span><\/p>\n

We walked around to the opposite corner of the stadium where you can see the new residential building with the parking garage behind it.<\/span><\/p>\n

I told Ed that I was gonna take another panoramic shot and asked if he wanted to be in it. To my surprise, he accepted (double-click again):<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

As I started panning from left to right, I noticed that he started walking from right to left\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026..uh-oh.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve followed my photographic adventures this year, you know that I\u2019ve pretty much exhausted what happens when I take PANO shots when I\u2019m going in the same direction as my subject: elongation of the subject.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conversely, much stranger things happen when I pan in the opposite direction as my subject (is \u201cde-elongation\u201d a word? How about \u201csquooshed\u201d?).<\/span><\/p>\n

Ed\u2019s a smart guy who knows computers and cameras. As I started to ask him why he did that, he said, \u201cI know\u201d and mentioned something about becoming thinner.<\/span><\/p>\n

Well, he partially got his wish (along with a severely-dislocated left wrist\/hand).<\/span><\/p>\n

And I got this picture of my brother to last me until next century (good thing I took that opening selfie of the three of us):<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All kidding aside, we had a really nice time and Linda is a sweetheart.<\/span><\/p>\n

Welcome to the family.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

……………………………………………(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on September 20, 2022) I haven\u2019t seen my brother Ed (right) since last century, so I was pleasantly surprised when I got an email from him in early July stating that he and his second wife, Linda – whom I hadn\u2019t yet met – were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17166"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17193,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17166\/revisions\/17193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iaintjustmusic.bobleafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}