Do you remember this song from Sesame Street?

"One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn't belong,
Can you tell which one is not like the others,
By the time I finish my song?"

(There are two more verses, but I wouldn't want to appear to be a total geek by knowing them.)

We used to sing this song, in direct violation of federal law, I assume, as a part of a game we used to play in school. It involved a felt board (weren't those the coolest?) divided into 4 sections where Mrs. Ping would place all kinds of things for us to compare and analyze...3 even numbers, 1 odd....3 types of motorized equipment, 1 shovel...3 foreign countries, 1 state...etc.

I LOVED this everytime we would do it. I imagine that it was a very effective developmental tool for all of us...growing our analytical skills, etc. I wonder though if it also taught us that things that are different "don't belong." Still, I seem fairly comfortable these days with a lot of issues, things, people and ideas that others say "don't belong," so perhaps I over analyze.

Anyway, (Geez, I can get long-winded sometimes...)

Lately, I've been encountering many visual non-sequiturs, things in places they don't "belong." Maybe it's all that time at the felt board, but this phenonmenon fascinates me and makes me want to know what the story is....how these things got to be where they are....or at the very least they inspire me to make up stories in my head to explain why they are they way they are...

Some of them I have seen lately...

A discarded pair of black men's briefs in the parking lot of a 24 hour pancake house.

A "W '04" bumper sticker on a Prius with a rainbow triangle window cling thingie.

A decked out leather daddy buying produce at the Jewel/Osco. (not the one in my neighborhood...that REALLY would be a non-sequitur...and dangerous for the daddy)

A lone white azalea blossom on a bush full of pink blooms. (How is that possible?)

A man, clearly of means, with a sound mind and no foot injuries, wearing shoes that don't match.

A small pile of snow in a shady area by a parking garage on a warm, sunny early April morning in Oak Park, more than a month after any snow fall that accumulated.

A five year old (estimated) in rapt attention half way through a concert of Rachmaninov's Symphony No. 2...which is about a hour long.