My desk doesn't really have the best window view in the world. For almost five years now (since January 2008), this is the view I've seen out my window:
The big contraptions are a pair of Strobic Air exhausts for our building's fume hoods. As I recall, they were installed during the summer of 2007. The only reason I remember it is because it was quite a large production; half of the parking lot had to be closed to make way for the crane, and nobody was allowed in the half of our building above where these units would be installed. Maybe there were some safety concerns about the roof buckling or the crane flipping over or something. Either way, they installed fine and they've been decorating my view at work ever since.
As the picture indicates, my window is extremely filthy. There is an AC window unit above me, so even if it were somehow possible to get to the outside of my window to clean it (I'm on the second floor), the AC prevents the window from sliding up all the way and there's a good two feet of overlap that can never be washed. Look at the window and AC unit across the way in the photo to see what I mean. The dirty windows probably never bothered my predecessors, as before I joined the group as a graduate student, there were opaque window blinds that were always pulled down, leaving the whole room to be lit solely by artificial light. The blinds had been down for so long that they were black with the dirt that blew up from the heating elements below all the windows.
Also, speaking of big companies nobody's ever heard of, here is an Elgin street sweeper.
We usually have the smaller ones around campus, but I came upon this one driving to work this morning. It wasn't sweeping.
Elgin must be a pretty large company, because I'm not sure I've ever seen a sweeper that didn't have their name on the side of the truck. I have, however, seen several Elgin watches. Unfortunately that company is long out of business.