A2Z Project - Letter P

Letter P for Pony Tail.

 

Letter P for Pony Tail, again. Just a doodle from my imagination to use up leftover paint.

 

Letter P for Pepper...bell pepper. I've displayed these bell peppers a few weeks ago so its a repeat.

 

Over the Weekend

 

A shot out of my bedroom window showing our dusting of snow at the end of March. If you look closely you can see the snow coming down. Shortly after this was taken it melted.

 

The boys playing nick jr. games. Actually, Darius (on right) was playing and Vyron was watching. Its my only entertainment tool to keep them out of trouble.

Now That's What I'm Talking About

Paul Cumes paints Matisse style... in an hour. What I noticed is the confidence in painting, the looseness and flow of it all. In an hour. (The video is not quite 3 minutes long.) You can find his web site here.

I just noticed that Cumes has 17 videos on youtube if you are interested in his work. He also has an etsy shop...oh that's not right, but I hope you know what I mean.

Bailing as Fast as I Can

Should they really let a blind man lead the parade?

My boat (my computer for sailing the Web) has been taking on water since the very beginning. (for those not familiar, my pc died and someone sent me one of their old ones. 'Since the beginning' means since I got it.) For a while I could bail the water out and continue on, but this morning I had to drag the boat out of the water completely. I had to reinstall Windows XP. The computer wouldn't even start. Well, it started enough to tell me something about not finding a DLL for the kernel... or something similar. Huh?

And why do they let ignorant users answer technical questions? That's so scary. But apparently I answered them well enough to get here. Its all so strange. I'm seeing an old display version of Windows. It has me feeling so odd. I'm hoping the next time there's an automatic Windows update that the display will change to what I'm use to seeing.

Anyhoo.... Once again I've lost all my bookmarks so if you know there's one that I would want, I sure would appreciate it if you email it/them to me. Thanks in advance.

update: I don't know if I've fixed anything or not but it was taking over 10 minutes to load a page. Actually, I don't know how long it would take... I always bailed out. I went to redo the XP load again thinking maybe I clicked the wrong thing but other instructions came up. Sigh. I got here in less than a minute. I hope things work okay from now on. If I disappear (again) know that everything is okay with me. I've just got a technical problem.

A2Z Project - Letter O

O is for Ocelot.

I'm not particularly pleased with the outcome but I was getting tired of it sitting there unfinished. Watercolor might not have been the best choice of medium, but its done. So there.

On to the letter P.

On The Fence..... NOT!!

Hillary just pushed me off the fence!! How embarrassing. But she has had a lot of experience with embarrassment. I was vacillating, but no longer. We've had enough lies.

'Bout Time I Posted Something.

Its been too long since I posted anything. Blank. I just get a blank.

Obama is in town and getting ready to speak. You'd think there was a HUGE rock star coming through. My goodness, he's sure got a following!

I have a friend who is having surgery today. I feel that all will go well, but there's still an undercurrent of waiting. I've heard that the aftermath is or can be very painful. Of course, I didn't mention that to her. She doesn't have a choice in the surgery so why say anything.

I've decided to go lo-tech and get a 'regular' house phone. You know, one with a cord. It will work even if/when the electricity is out.

Maybe I'll have something else to post later. I wanted to get something out here just to take the pressure off.

I Want One of These

A Self-Cleaning Room.


There are a lot of videos on youtube showing people cleaning their rooms. I was looking for some inspiration. Still looking.

On another note, I finally got my car back from my daughter. She's been "using it" for the past three months, but its back with me now. All mine. Also back with me is a filthy car both inside and out. A car with a slow leak in one of the tires. I've got to bite the bullet and take $20 from one of my budget categories and go get a used tire... otherwise I'll be putting air in the tire every other day or so. And I don't go anywhere that often. I could bitch at my daughter, but it wouldn't change anything and I need to pick my battles. (She's got her own hurdles to bare.)

A2Z Project - Letter N

The letter N is for Neighbors.



I don't have any idea how this is going to look on screen. I'll be revisiting it and try some more after I get some practice in so the brush moves with confidence.

Practice Time

I got a little time to myself and was able to play around with some watercolors. The real push to paint something was helped along by the bell peppers. They were getting too old and needed to be consumed. (as it was, part had to be discarded. Shame, shame. You know, all those starving children in the world.) That's when the light bulb went off.

"Well, DUH. Why don't I try to do a watercolor before I slice 'em up."

And that's what I did. (They were standing on a glass table.)

Then I got full of myself.

"Hey... I know what to do with the letter N."

Famous last words.

Things That Make You Go Hmmmmmmm

This could be used as evidence for those who believe our lives are pre-planned. From an article on msn:

"Fertility treatments can result in multiple embryos — and babies. So the couple decided to go with in vitro fertilization. And, instead of having several embryos implanted in her womb, she decided to have just one.

But nature had other plans, and the single embryo that was implanted in her uterus split once to produce twins, and one of the two split again to produce identical triplets."

I guess they were meant to have more than one child.

The full article can be read here.

Just one more little political opinion...

First and most important, not everyone believes or sees things the same way. Yay for divercity. This is my observations from my chair:

The media created a race/gender issue with regards to Obama and Clinton. They kept at it and at it until they finally got a few comments from people that they could use to increase readership. Before that, it was just two candidates going about their business. Shame on the media, thrill seekers that they are...

I've been very torn between Obama and Clinton. I'm still not personally committed to either one, but I'm leaning. My concerns were Obama's level of experience, considering the state of the Union, and that Clinton's a politician to the core. Being a politician to your core is not a good thing. Its about equal to a used car salesman wearing plaid pants. I don't trust them. And lately Clinton's camp and the people she has as supporters (politicians) seem to be playing their dirty little political tricks. Its dragging her down. (That and the Whitewater scandal)

And the sad part of all this is that my information is coming from the media so I could be totally blowing air out of my ass.

Did you see the Saturday Night Live skit where 'Clinton' was asked very difficult questions and not allowed to complete an answer while 'Obama' was fed the answers? Makes one wonder how far afield the skit really was in its truth. I'm just saying.

PS. In case you were wondering, I'm a registered Independent. I don't follow party lines. I'm glad McCain got the nod for the Republicans. But I don't think the nation can afford to have a Republican in office right now. We're already crumbling.

Simon's Cat

If you've ever lived with a cat, I'm sure you will be able to relate to this:

Simon Tofield has another cat cartoon on youtube if you're interested. (Use "Simon's Cat" to search). I discovered Simon's Cat on the ole grey poet's blog. His link is on my sidebar under Journal of a Writing Man.

Do It

2 minutes

Are we headed for yet another war invasion?

"The article credits Fallon with "brazenly challenging his commander in chief" over a possible war with Iran, which Fallon called an "ill-advised action," and implies Fallon would resign rather than go to war against Iran." Full msn article here.

Fallon is Commander Adm. William "Fox" Fallon, head of the U.S. Central Command, which oversees military matters in the Middle East. He has resigned, which he said he would do before going to war with Iran. Full msn article here.

What the hell is Bush doing to this country?

"It was the water, Your Honor. The water made me do it."

Will drinking water become the next defense stance? By now you've probably already heard about our tainted water across the nation. Residue from prescription drugs can be found in our drinking water. "They" say its leftover residue that is released in urine. (Lets not even think about various drugs (legal and illegal) being flushed down the toilet as the safest way of getting rid of it.) Perhaps atheletes can now claim it was the water I drank! as a defense for steroid charges.

What has me concerned is that if our so called purification processes cannot remove all traces of drugs.... what else can't it remove? I mean, if you think about all the kinds of things that get flushed...ohmygawd, what are we drinking?! Besides poop, we've got vomit, Draino, bleach, dead goldfish.... and I'm sure there's a lot of other things that I'm not think of or am not aware of. Crap oh dear! (you can't trust bottled water either. It usually comes from the same source.)

And now I'm changing subjects. It hypocrisy. Another politician gets caught with his pants down, in a manner of speaking. Governor Spitzer identified as a prostitution customer. Another case of Do as I say, not as I do. Another good ole boy from the republican party gets outed. However, I'm not naive enough to think democrates don't do the same thing. I mean, after all, we have Kennedy and Clinton in the history books. I just don't know how much they went around and hawked morales while jacking off in a phone booth.

And then there's good ole boy Bush... vetoing a bill to ban torture while the U.S. cites China for using torture (and other human rights violations). What the hell is wrong with this picture? Bush is supposedly a born-again Christian. Did he stop to ask "What Would Jesus Do?" Do ya really think Jesus would say 'torture that bastard!'

We're in bad shape, folks. The human species is in deep trouble. And we've only been at it for a minute. In earth history timeframes, the human species has only been here for a few minutes and look at what we've done.

Alex Beard, artist

I read a short blurb in a magazine about Alex Beard and I became curious about his work so I googled him. He has a video on his web site so I decided to check out youtube for more. Here's one of four:

His work is whimsical and flowing. Its very interesting to see how the piece grows from one stage to another... and the final version is often a surprise.

Damn, Just lost an entire post.

Doncha hate when that happens.

The Dog, the cat, and the rat (3 min. video)

The Missing Link

No, I don't mean my ex. The missing link is the one I just had to delete because the web page is no longer available. Natalie del Villar, I loved your art. If you ever create a new web page/site, I hope you let me know.

Home Makeover... After the cameras leave

We had an Oregon family receive an extreme home makeover. One of the daughters was struggling with reoccurring cancer and all the family resources were spent on medical care. Their home was falling down around their ears. It was in really bad shape. In comes Extreme Home Makeover and they did a fantastic job. However.....

The girl died a few months after the makeover. The family still owes on the $250k mortgage from the old house. But now their property taxes are much higher because their new home is so splendid. And they are facing foreclosure.

Sometimes you need to look a gift-horse in the mouth. Even with a gift you have to pay the government. No matter what.

Elaine Frenett, Watercolorist (1.5 minutes)

Thursday

I watched the boys yesterday while 'mom' went to an appointment. Gawd I wish I had half their energy.

Someone (Insert evil music here) tried to cut Vyron's hair and they ended up taking big ole plugs of hair out. Yesterday was the first time I saw it. It was bad, but I didn't make a big deal out of it, for Vyron's sake. Fortunately we don't have to worry about someone any more. He's been taken out of circulation. (No, he's not dead, but that would have been one of my top choices. He's a real jerk.)

It was warm and we spent an hour or so outside. They could run and yell and nothing happened. Well, gramma covered her ears, but other than that nothing happened.

Vyron (2 yrs) is such a little daredevil. Every time I turn around he's scaring me. ("Oh look... a 200 foot drop from the cliff! Lets see if we can fly!!") Yesterday he was sitting on a large plastic dump truck and taking a ride down the ramp.... never flinching when he headed into the fence. Dump is the key word here, too. The truck would dump Vyron's little butt onto the cement with almost every ride. Did this stop him? Nooooo.

Then they both became enthralled with rocks. ("Look gramma! A rock!!") Finding rocks. Breaking rocks. Dancing with rocks. Building a campfire with rocks, minus the fire of course. And then they moved their focus to barkdust. The afternoon ended with a bath to get the barkdust off them.

'Mom' has a couple of appointments today. I'm not sure if I will be watching the boys again or not.

Oh Look... Its Tuesday. Isn't it?

My goal for today is deep cleaning the bathroom. I've got just about everything out that is movable. Most of it comprised toys. A gazillion toys that share the tub with the boys, you know, when they are (cough, cough) bathing. "Hey, I know! Lets see who can make the biggest splash!"

My hidden agenda is to gather up and/or toss out most of the toys that I have not seen the boys play with lately. There's too many little odd pieces of crap and I doubt they will even miss them. Its not like I'm going to throw out everything all at once. After all... its a hidden agenda.

Exciting, huh.

"You was wrong, gramma" he said with a grin

"You was wrong, gramma" Darius said with a grin. A grin of self-satisfaction. And he was right. I was wrong.

I had the plastic garbage bin in the kitchen turned over so no one would use it because we were out of garbage bags. Darius turned it over so I explained why I wanted it upside down. He reached for the drawer where the bags are kept. "I'll get it, gramma."

"No, Darius. We don't have any garbage bags. That's why I have the bin turned over." And I closed the drawer.

That's when I had the idea to show him... to show him there were no garbage bags in the drawer. You know where this is going, right? I moved a couple of items and there was the box containing a couple of garbage bags.

I turned to Darius and said with wonder "Hey, you were right! And I was wrong!" His eyebrows went up just a bit and a sly grin slid across his face. He doesn't hear that often, cause you know, I'm seldom if ever wrong. Right? Never mind.

Anyway, it has pleased him beyond measure that I was wrong and he was right.

"Stick with me, kid. You'll be right a lot of times."

Awww... Look at that Face!

I've been surfing and came across a site dedicated to "Faces in Places" It has photos of objects that have a facial quality to them. (Sandy's bird feeder comes to mind.) Just a fun little spot to take a peek at if you don't have anything else to do.