Brass Bowl

As I strolled past this battered news truck, I couldn’t help by think that it has created some news, not just reported it.    Dents and dings everywhere, pushed in quarter panel, banged up bumpers, sprung doors, etc. etc.  It reads like a grocery list.

Like many days recently, it was raining during lunch yesterday.  I pondered going out, figuring the rain would put a damper on my ability to document flotsam.  I decided to go ahead, and give my new golf size umbrella a tryout.

It did a good job, providing nice coverage for me and the camera.  I wandered down to the river, not for any particular reason.  I stood on the Kennedy St bridge, in the little circular area and looked at the river.  That is when I noticed that the river, due to all the rain, has risen quite a bit.  In fact, it was laping at the edges of Plant Parks river wall.  It won’t take much more rain to raise the water up and over the wall, flooding portions of the park. 

(click on picture to see a 1200 x 900 image)

Vehicles are getting way too complicated these days.  Hard drives, automatic windshield wipers, swiveling headlamps, etc.  Perhaps the option shown below is fallout from the heated seats

Text of image follows.

Years of Removal

 The entire U.S. watched the Florida struggle, & the names of the war leaders became household words.  Today, towns, cities, & landmarks across the nation, for example, as well as numerous individuals, are named for Osceola (Asse yahóla) one of the young firebrands of the resistance.  But Micanopy (Mikkó anópí”, Philip, (Emáthla), Billy Bowlegs (Holata mikko), and Sam Jones (Abiáka), were among the more powerful official leaders of the wars.  Micanopy & Philip were captured & sent West in 1838, along with the family of Osceola, who had died in a prison at Fort Moultrie, SC.  Bowlegs, the last to give up, left Tampa bay on the steamer Grey Cloud, bound for New Orleans & on to Indian Territory in 1858.  Old Jumper (Oti emáthla), & the younger warrior Wildcat (Cowacochi) were sent West also.  Jumper died en route, at New Orleans Barracks, but Wildcat lived to increase his fame as a warrior.  Sam Jones, a powerful medicine man & the backbone of the resistance, told the U.S. that he would never give up, as long as he had “A single ball and charge of power.”  When he could no longer shoot, he declared, he would “live on fish” & when his lines were worn out, he would “make others of horse hair” & when his hooks were worn out, he would “cut up his old tin pans & make others.”  Sam Jones & his followers found safety in the Everglades & he died there, true to his word never to give up his fight.  To this day, the Florida Seminoles pass these names down among the warriors’ descendents, & name children with words from the old war-medicine songs.

This generated a double take, a snort and a picture.

Has anybody gotten any of these?   Flotsam enabled minds need to know!