Lohbado's Halloween Costume

Lohbado nearly died while crossing the Plains of Radiation after being expelled from the Dome, six years after the end of the Apocalyptic War. He worked in the Dome as a PBE (push button expert). The Dome is located in the Cha Region of the Poh Valley in the Secret Desert. The DR (department of regulation) forced him into an early retirement. The conditions were secrecy... out of sight, out of mind. Be blind, deaf and dumb. These conditions were easy to meet, especially after the sickness resulting from exposure. His skin broke out in lesions. Worms oozed from the soft spot in his head. He had a perforated ulcer, hernia and experienced memory loss. Lohbado's children reminded him today is halloween. He decided instead of dressing up, he would undress, or at least, remove his shirt. His scarred, damaged and disfigured torso would make the perfect costume.

the peculiar name of Peter Stumps

A short video in which Lohbado says a few words about the name Peter Stumps, which was Lohbado's name before he became Peter. This is a fragment from a cycle of stories, the Stumps saga. Lohbado began the stories about thirty years ago, when he was still Peter Stumps, son of Rosemary Stumps and Reverend Stonehenge Stumps, Church of the Living Monument, a breakaway sect church founded by his grandfather, The Reverend Woodlot Stumps. It was great great Grandmother Isabella Stumps who established the Inner Sanctuary of the Temple nearly two hundred years ago when she wrote her Tiger-Lily Prophesies.

ride around and take photos

Decairie Service Road

Saint Augustine of Canterbury Parish Church

It's fun to ride around and take photos, especially in an interesting city like Montreal. There's the adventure of being on the bicycle. One has to pay attention to avoid running into a pothole or getting in an accident. Motor vehicles regularly cut too close to the cyclist. Often when approaching an intersection, drivers position the vehicle so there's no room between the curb and the vehicle for a cyclist to pass. In such cases, Lohbado often went up on the sidewalk and proceeded to the intersection, rather than being trapped behind a line of vehicles waiting to make a right turn.

warning fruit

pickle juice

fresh out of the package

As Lohbado contemplated each fruit of the earth, he noticed a third-eye type mould pattern in the middle of a red pepper. A red traffic light, a warning symbol, pay attention to details. Don't space out. Don't be dogmatic or opinionated. Don't take yourself too seriously. A little humour goes a long way. The earth produces a wonderful variety of unusual plants, vegetables, fruits and flowers. Even a fruit in decay has its charm.

persimmon off to the races

persimmon

Fruit navel gazing... Lohbado gazed into the middle of a red fruit from a nearby store. He wrote a few paragraphs then deleted it, because it was so much nonsense, a kind of verbal emotion, grammatical humming and hawing in wonderment as the imagination got carried off to the races. There's something amazing about the red and orange, the warm glow and the textured pattern of the leaves and stem. That's the advantage of getting older, one's body settles down. It's easy to sit for a long time and contemplate something, but then the mind can just as easily sink into a stupor or get agitated with chatter.

fruit of the earth

Autumn harvest, the fruit of the earth, leaves turn red and gold then fall on the ground. It's cold in the morning. Squirrels go berserk preparing for winter. A squirrel climbed on the roof of the building where Lohbado lived and ended up trapped in the alcove. Lohbado saw the squirrel on the window sill of the alcove window facing the hall to the exit. Only a pane of glass separated Lohbado from the animal. It gazed into his eyes, pleading for help. Lohbado made a trail of peanuts on the grey carpet of the hall, opened the door, then opened the alcove window for the squirrel to escape. The squirrel followed the peanuts out the door and was gone.

old man breakfast

Lohbado used to go for coffee every morning, until the price kept going up to a point where he couldn’t afford it. So instead of going for coffee, he went for a walk every morning. Often he walked past cafes and terraces. He saw people he’d been seeing for years, familiar faces from the neighbourhood. 

Church beside Parc Dante Montreal

After buying groceries at Jean Talon Market, Lohbado went to Parc Dante for a picnic of bread and cheese. Overlooking the park is the fabulous Church of the Madonna della Difesa inaugurated in 1919. Inside at the front is a fresco of Benito Mussolini, painted before World War Two. Years ago, Lohbado lived within a three minute walk of the church and the park. He spent hours relaxing and contemplating the brick work and the attractive structure of the building.

Montreal Bus Depot

The bus depot's official name is Gare d'autocars de Montréal. It's currently being renovated or expanded. It's across the street from the big library.

view from a reading room

One of Lohbado's favourite places to visit is the Grande Bibliothèque, a large library near metro Berri-Uquam in Montreal. There are many places within the library to read or study. Lohbado often gazed out the window of a reading area to see the buildings in the above photos. The bus depot is across the street, a Quality Inn plus a mix of other apartment towers, hotels and office buildings.

old smoke stacks

Lohbado noticed some birds flying around among the chimneys, maybe falcons. The old incinerator in Montreal closed in 1993. One suggestion is to turn the site into a gardens or a green cathedral.

the eternal triangle

After crossing the Plains of Radiation and settling in Yamaville, Lohbado studied the Book of Oogah, as well as books on the Moronovian Temple reading list. Lately he’d been reading Spinoza’s Ethics. It required more than one reading to fully appreciate the unique beauty and structure of definitions, explanations, axioms, demonstrations, scholia. If one did a diagram of connections, a triangle would appear. The eternal triangle, the angles always add up to 180 degrees.

thought and extension

Thought and extension are two modes of the infinite substance of nature, according to Spinoza. Extension means physical things have a shape, which takes up space. Thoughts are invisible. Within the mind, intellect organizes a coherent picture of reality. The understanding is able to sort out sense-illusions from scientific fact. An astronomer is better equipped to describe the sun than someone who holds their hand in the sky and notices that one’s hand appears to be the same size as the sun. The senses could be misleading, inaccurate or unreliable, even though they’re only doing their job. The intellect is able to discover abstract universal truth, for example, all sides of a triangle add up to 180 degrees. 

notice to valued customers

Lohbado dreamed about standing in front of an unusual grocery store many years ago. In the centre was a dangerous door, inviting him into a dark tunnel. At the end of the tunnel, a huge fire; Lohbado gazed in wonderment at the fire, the crackling tower of flame.

what exactly is your name?

Sparks fly if you hit a piece of cast steel with an iron hammer. Hit ego on the head with the hammer of awareness. Instead of sparks flying from the block of ego, little monsters leapt from Lohbado’s mind and hopped away like rabbits. Lohbado thought of this as he walked down the street on a cold rainy morning. The dark branches of leaves and the green and golden foliage reminded Lohbado of being under a cathedral dome. He thought of the warm gold and red earth tones and blue of the icons. Representations of saints and holy figures gazed into infinity. 

The branches of the trees made him aware of his ribs. Lohbado all his life was thin, not much more than a skeleton. His thin body often felt like a barrel full of guts... the digestive tract, respiratory system, nerves, blood vessels. The body is an expression of infinite nature. Rev. Woodlot Stumps proclaimed this from his pulpit on Sunday mornings in the Church of the Living Monument during the sixties, when Lohbado was Peter Stumps. When you feel bad, identify with the infinite.

The self is a necessary part of one’s being. It’s important to know your name, who you are, what day it is. Where are you? Where do you live? If you can’t answer these questions, you could be in trouble.

It’s important to keep self in perspective, how it relates to the larger picture. An exaggerated sense of self results in suffering, in so far as the bubble of self gets popped as one experiences change, accident, misfortune, sickness and death. It could lead to conflict.

decorated building

An old factory, looks like it was turned into art studios and workshops, or something like that, the whole area has been decorated with little paintings and graffiti. Lohbado turned on to the trail by Van Horne warehouse and followed it as far as the old incinerator before heading south towards Park La Fontaine.

writing with the camera

Just about everyone walks around with a picture-taking device. The romantic days of the lone photographer are over. Lohbado met with lots of people taking pictures, of similar subjects, as he went on a bike ride and took photos along the way. Lohbado viewed this as a positive state of affairs. The camera could be viewed as a pen. Picture taking is a way of writing. The story occurs as a sequence of images. Lohbado enjoyed abstract lines and shapes. It's strange how someone might react negatively to a Kandinsky or abstract painting and say: "What is it? I don't get it?" Whereas if you take photos of shapes and forms, those questions don't arise. The only difference is the photo has a label, ie, a picture of Van Horne Warehouse, whereas an abstract painting might dispense with the label and present the colors and forms as a visual composition.

sheep and goat memory

After he retired, Lohbado developed the routine of walking to the park every morning to relax. Ornamental fruit trees, some maple and various other trees were planted around the edges of the park to provide a bit of shade. A gravel path enclosed the playing field. Lohbado sat on a bench facing the track and gazed at an apartment building sticking up above the condos and trees. The building was on the far side of the Decairie Service Road. While sitting on the bench, Lohbado remembered a summer holiday from many years ago. He stopped at a camp site which had a petting zoo. The sheep and goats were friendly. He took a few pictures. For 25 cents you could obtain a handful of grain to feed the animals.

dinner next door

Lohbado enjoyed thanksgiving dinner next door to a depanneur and variety store. Across the street a billboard, inside friendliness and good cheer... Club Morono wishes everyone a pleasant week.

Portuguese Park

 Lohbado hadn't visited the plateau in Montreal for a while. Years ago, before gentrification took over, Lohbado lived there. He paused to relax at Portuguese Park on St. Laurent and Marianne and took a few photos. Depanneur means corner store. It's part of Montreal vocabulary. Depanneurs are major suppliers of beer and other items.