Atwood Avenue, Madison.

On the East Side of Madison, not all of the buildings are beautiful:









But beauty is everywhere. Turn your head just to the left of that last sight and see this:




Down the block, there is the Jamaican Arts & Crafts Shop, where the sign will proudly show the colors of the Jamaican flag, even though yellow doesn't show up well and makes "crafts" look like "rats":



You can get a latte at Café Zoma (where I am right now, with WiFi). It looks like this inside:



Or you can sit out in bacK:



Have some cake, too:



Maybe Sugar Shack, the used records store across the street will be open. The sign in the window sets the opening time at 12, but adds, "Sometime soon I'll be changing the opening time to 11, or maybe even 10:30, but for now I probably won't be here til noon." Even if it's closed, the windows offer up an entertaining nostalgia experience. Note the thoughtful placement of the AC/DC box set at the feet of the AC/DC T-shirt-wearing Butthead:



The Platters, the Beatles, the Monkees--grouped together because of the "the"? Because of the smiles? Because of a musical affinity?



Let's put Nixon next to Clinton, perhaps only to show how long the old phoney money novelty business has been milking the same joke:



And here are Elvis and Ludwig (Beethoven's head is cracked, possibly from rolling over):




You can contemplate the significance of an inverted Star Trek mug poised in front of a reel-to-reel:



Remember the guy in college who stuffed his dorm bed full of dirty clothes and then put this album cover on the pillow, so it looked from a distance like there was an insane guy in his bed? That ranks very high on my list of the funniest things I've ever seen in my life. Here's the sublime cover opened up with the trees across the street reflected in the window: