Please read this...Signs of autumn falling all around us...

Folks, we'll be straight up and direct with you: this week's colyum might be a little bit weird. Even weirder than what you read and see here sometimes.

Before we get to the weird stuff, allow me to once again visit some local connections which yours truly came across while reading some new books. You may recall the topic of local connections in books was visited a couple of weeks ago.

Local Connection 1.0 A mention of Southern Illinois University (as in Carbondale, and its famed "Strip") in the John Grisham novel "Camino Island."

Local Connection 2.0: A mention of Anna, as in the home of The Paragraph Factory, in Ron Chernow's new biography, "Grant," which is about Ulysses S. Grant. Maybe you've heard of Mr. Grant. Chernow's biography is about 12,000 pages long and weight about 20 pounds, so it makes for some heavy reading. Sorry.

Local Connection 2.1: Another mention related to SIU, as in the Southern Illinois University Press, which appears in Chernow's biography. The author of "Grant" voices his appreciation to the late John Y. Simon, "the editorial genius behind The Papers of Ulysses S. Grant, published by the Southern Illinois University Press." As a footnote: seems like I had an opportunity to meet Mr. Simon, many years ago.

You're going to have to read the books, or at least look at them, to find the local connections. Anyway, both books are available at Stinson Memorial Library.  Enough about my reading adventures...

...early last Sunday afternoon, I set out on a mission. Sunday, after all, seemed like a good day for such an endeavor. This particular mission did not begin with the intention of being spiritual in any way, shape or form. 

Mostly, it was a meat mission, which, as it turned out, did not pan out. Sometimes, that's just the way it is.

Completion of the mission was part of my plan to get in a daily walkabout. Normally, I do such things late in the afternoon on a Sunday, but the weather was looking a little bit iffy, as in there was a chance for severe storms by that time of the day.

So, I headed out into the world early Sunday afternoon. At the time the adventure began, I did not know that a misty rain was falling. It was. But the temperature was pretty mild for the fifth day of November.

Not many steps away from the porch, I happened to notice an interesting pattern on a yellow leaf, which, I assumed, had fallen from the sweet gum tree in our front yard. 

I snapped a picture of the leaf, 'cause I happened to be carrying my camera around. At that point, a fascinating idea popped into my simple little mind (all journalists have simple little minds).

Maybe, while I'm on a walk on a drizzly Sunday afternoon in early November, I'll keep an eye out for some of the interesting patterns and shapes of autumn, especially the thousands of leaves which have fallen from the trees. We'll call this masterpiece "Autumn falls." Get it? Autumn falls...as in the leaves which have fallen in autumn? Sorry. Again.

You are in luck, because some of the photographs which I took on my wet walkabout last Sunday are included on this very page. Hope you enjoy them. Even if they might be a little weird.