Monday, August 4, 2008

Tennessee Capitol at Night

The Tennessee State Capitol is a beautiful building, especially at night.  I showed you a photo of it earlier (Click here to see the original post and to read a little more of the history.), and thought you might enjoy seeing it at night.  Completed in 1853, the capitol is fashioned after a Greek temple.  This is the back of the capitol (same view as the original), and it overlooks Bicentennial Mall.

In 1996, the United States Postal Service celebrated Tennessee's bicentennial by issuing a 32-cent stamp that featured the capitol.  One of the guys who works the counter at our local post office told me that Tennessee residents were able to buy stamps that had a photo of the capitol on it, but that other stamps with a drawing of the capitol went to other states.  Since I live in Tennessee, I'm not sure if that's true or not.

A note about yesterday's post and tax-free weekend:  I forgot to mention this, but Tennessee is having a lot of financial difficulties, as are other states, of course.  About 2400 state employees have been offered buy-outs to help alleviate the budget shortfall.  As of Friday, only about 1600 have accepted, and that is causing quite a bit of concern.

The governor is a bit concerned, of course, and he mentioned that having a tax-free weekend is going to hurt the state.  The state legislature has made the August tax-free weekend a law, so they cannot do away with it, but the April one exists at the discretion of the legislature, so I figure we'll have only one tax-free weekend in 2009.

5 comments:

GMG said...

Olá Chris! Finally I found some time to enjoy your excellent blog…
First, congratulations on your first year!! Now, let's see the rest!
Beautiful picture of the CApitol; furthermore a night scene, my picture nightmare... ;))
Sales tax at 9.75% and you get a tax free weekend; just imagine how interesting it would be with an average rate of 20%... ;))
Those huge metal guitars are stunning! Much larger than the one used by John Zorn, whom I saw on concert yesterday night (with Fred Frith - avant, avant-garde jazz)... ;))
Also loved the Sunlight photo. Great colours!!
Many thanks for your comments on Blogtrotter, now with the second and last post on the MoMA! Hope you enjoy and wish you a great week and a nice holiday, in case you have the chance to profit from it! ;))

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed reading this post mostly because the governor is upset at the tax free thing. I like the idea of being tax free and the country got along just fine without an income tax for many years. I would vote for anybody willing to do away with that.

Jim Klenke said...

Thats a beautiful building, the lighting is great.

Ken Mac said...

Chris, can't recall the name of the store, but it has been there forever it seems!

USelaine said...

In California, the Governator is calling for state employees to all have their wages reduced to the federal minimum wage until the legislature passes a budget. Interesting times.