Steep Learning Curve

Very steep!

Still stumbling around in camera menus.

I'm gonna learn this if it kills me! (Look for the obituary soon! LOL)

Today's lesson: more macro settings.

Taking close ups of a page in my sketch book, in low light without using the flash (and trying to keep it in focus!)

Backyard Hibiscus

Remember When

My family used to reminisce a lot.

We called it “playing remember when” because that’s how the sentence always started.

“Hey, remember when so and so did such and such?”

Or “Remember when we went on vacation here?”

Or “Remember that time…..”

And my mother would chuckle and say “What lifetime was THAT?”

Now I know what she meant.

Husband and I play the game now, and it feels like we’ve been alive forever.

When we reminisce about our life BC (before children) we always chuckle and say “what lifetime was that?”

Were we really ever this young?

To: Son1

It is a requirement, on this your birthday, to listen to the WHOLE song (at maximum volume) or I will come up there and embarrass you and your entire building by blasting it at 5 AM from the super speakers of my car!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Have a GREAT day :0)

(Surprised ya' didn't I? LOL)

The Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity
to accept that the to do list never ends

The courage to attempt to complete it

and the wisdom to know when to give up.

‘Lest You Think BigBrother….’

Episode Four: BigBrother, Bobby Neeley and the Pillow Fight

As I understand it, ‘way back when’ women had certain days for certain chores. Monday was washday; Tuesday was for dusting….. Etc.

One day my mother was helping Mrs. Neeley with her housework.

They took all her down pillows and emptied the feathers into open ended pillowcases for temporary safe keeping while they laundered the inner cases.

Their mistake was leaving them unguarded.

By the time they returned, my mother said the living room looked like a blizzard had struck. 

Feathers were flying everywhere!

There were feathers on the furniture, feathers on the pictures, feathers on the lamps. Every surface was covered!

 And two little boys squealing with laughter in the middle.

Scrap Journals

I just put up a few more journals in my Etsy shop. Have a look.
(I will ship internationally if you think the postage isn't astronomical!)

Thanks for looking!

The Anti-Muse

Some days, this guy shows up whispering in my ear, “You can’t.”

And because I’m stubborn, I show him just how wrong he is.

So there!

To: Son2

It is a requirement, on this your birthday, to listen to the WHOLE song (at maximum volume) or I will come up there and embarrass you and your entire building by blasting it at 5 AM from the super speakers of my car!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Have a GREAT day :0)

(PS Don't tell your brother--I want him to be sufficiently embarrassed/surprised next week!) LOL

To everyone who isn’t Son1 and Son2,
Explanation:
Very early, on the morning of their birthdays, I would play the Beatles Birthday Song so loud that the pictures on the walls in the house would vibrate.
Our speaker system also plays outside so I would blast the neighborhood too!
(That was an added bonus! LOL) 
They used to act annoyed but they can’t fool me, I knew they liked it!
Now that I’m not living within physical annoying range I must find other ways.
It’s important to keep up family traditions!
Bwhahahahahaha!

Mellow Fellow

Melvin was a mellow fellow

Didn’t shout and didn’t bellow

Went to play with friends one day

And found that they had run away

(Torn magazine pages with Elmer’s white glue over crumpled newspaper and masking tape for an armature, paint and sealer, twisted imagination and a lot of spare time!)

Shameful Self Promotion

Just a little aside post:
I put up some magazines on Ebay, have a look.

I will ship overseas if you're willing to pay the postage. (But I'm only offering this to my blog friends because you're special!)

The Hero @ Dinner

My mother used to play a game with me at the dinner table when I was small.

I guess it was out of boredom (or maybe so she wouldn’t kill me because I was such a picky eater!)

Anyway, it went like this:

She would take a paper napkin, scrunch it up in the middle to make it look like a bow (or mustache) put it to her upper lip and in a gruff voice say, “You MUST pay the rent!”

Then she would switch the napkin to her head, as if it was a bow in her hair, and in a high squeaky voice say, “But I can’t pay the rent!”

She went on this way, back and forth between the two characters,

“You MUST pay the rent!”

“But I can’t pay the rent!”

“You MUST pay the rent!”

“But I can’t pay the rent!”  as I would squeal with laughter.

She reached the climax of the game when she put the napkin to her throat, as if it were a bow tie, and in a heroic voice said, “I’LL pay the rent!”

Then the napkin went back to her hair and she would sigh and say, “My hero!”

Sometimes, if I was lucky, she’d throw in one last line as the villain, with the napkin to her lip she’d cry out, “Foiled again!”

It still makes me laugh!

Imaginary Inner City

Bought myself a cheap fountain pen.

I thought maybe it wouldn’t skip, like some of the Micron pens do on me. (It’s a left-handed thing, lol.)

It doesn’t skip, but it’s not waterproof.

As it turns out, that works to my advantage for shading.

Lemonade from lemons!

Another entry for the Sketchbook Challenge.

I’ve also finally found the courage to work in an actual BOUND journal. (Although, take note, its spiral bound so if I really hate something I can tear it out! LOL)

I still don’t like it.

Being left handed it makes me feel ‘cramped’ when I work on a page.

I’ve tried turning it around and working in it backwards, so that the spiral is on the right, but that totally goes against the very grain of my being!

I just can’t do it!

(It’s hard to be me!)

‘Boy Bits’

When BigBrother and I were just tiny tots our mother would bathe us together.

I was absolutely fascinated with his ‘boy bits’.

No matter how much my parents explained to me that I was a girl and he was a boy and that’s just the way it was, I still wanted one!

One day in frustration I said, “Can’t you just Scotch-Tape one on me?”

My father thought this was hysterical and wanted to send the quote into 3M for use in their advertising.

My mother dissuaded him (thank goodness!)

But to his dying day he said it would have made a hilarious ad campaign!

Kitty Thoughts

I cut my foot the other day.

Nothing serious, but I didn’t notice until I saw the spots of blood on the tile floor.

Before I had a chance to clean it up the cat noticed.

And I noticed her noticing.

She was sauntering down the hall when she must have smelled it.

She stopped, crouched down and sniffed around.

Then she looked up at me with such a look of horror on her face I actually burst out laughing!

I could just imagine what thoughts were going through her mind.

“BLOOD!

Am I cut?

No, it’s not my blood.

OMG, it’s her! She’s bleeding/maimed/dying!

Who’s going to feed me/pet me/clean my litter box/spray my mousie with catnip?!

OMG!”

She ran and hid for the rest of the day, proving once again that loyalty is a canine trait!

Father was a Pacifist

I’m from the generation that grew up hearing, “Wait till your Father gets home!”

Not that my mother was any stranger to discipline.

But when she reached the end of her rope, my father was her weapon.

My mother spanked. And grounded, and took away privileges.

My father didn’t believe in physical violence. He said it only proved you were bigger, not right.

He lectured.

It was all very logical. 

And by the time he was done lecturing you felt about ‘this big’.

Guilt was a very good lesson!

Big Brother and I used to BEG our mother “PLEEEEASE, ground us, take away the TV, the phone, anything! But don’t let Dad lecture us!”

Ah, fond memories……….LOL

12 Step Method to Bad Photography

1. Buy new camera

2. Take camera out of box in excited anticipation only to find out you must charge the battery first

3. Charge battery

4.  Point and shoot at everything in sight until you’ve loaded the memory card with a deluge of over/underexposed and out of focus pictures

5. Break down and read the PDF manual

6. Eyes glaze over while reading the PDF manual

7. Take aspirin for headache you got while reading PDF manual

8.  Give up on PDF manual and look for YouTube videos instead

9. Watch numerous YouTube videos until eyes glaze over

10. Decide to forget the how to videos and manual and just go the ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ method

11. Push numerous buttons and get lost in menu after menu until you have no idea how you got to where you are or how to get out

12. Feel like a total idiot because you can’t figure out how to use the damn camera

I haven’t felt this stupid since ninth grade algebra class!

Best Advice I've Ever Heard

"When there's shooting in the street, don't go near the window."

What other advice do you need in life after you've learned this lesson? LOL

A Love Story

(I know it's not good form to enjoy one's own joke so much, but this just tickles me every time! LOL)

Bug Guilt

Our next door neighbor recently spayed his yard for bugs.

Which means they have all raced over to our house for an extended vacation.

This means I have doing more battle with creepy-crawlies than I really prefer.

It occurs to me to let Husband do it, and I do.

I call out “Bwana!” and he knows to grab a shoe and a paper towel and come running.

It’s not that I’m particularly squeamish, but in certain areas I still believe in gender specific roles and duties.

Bug extermination is one such venue.

But there are times when Husband is not available and I am forced into doing the dirty deed myself.

As I do the act I often think what is this doing to my Karma?

And this is the image that pops into my head.

When I die there will be an endless number of insects, arachnids and various bugs, waiting for me, seeking their revenge in the afterlife.

The only reason I keep on killing them is because I fear the thought of them lurking somewhere in the house waiting to pounce on me more than I fear eternal damnation! LOL

The Sketchbook Challenge ‘June’

This month’s theme over at The Sketchbook Challenge is ‘Urban Sketching’.

I think I might like this one. It pushes me out of my comfort zone a little and that’s a good thing.

So here is my first try.

While sitting in the parking lot of a local grocery store I was eyeing the high tension wires and the massive poles they are on.

They’ve been slowly replacing and updating the electrical grid in our fair city, but I question the safety of their work.

Not that I know anything about electricity or high tension wires but to me the poles look extremely overloaded and they snap crackle and pop as well as ‘sing’!

Does that seem right to you? LOL

(Down with a cheap mechanical pencil I had in the car at the time on computer paper.)

I Flunked ‘Girl’

This is a statement that husband started years ago.

It’s a compliment (believe it or not! LOL)

He is fond of saying that the best thing about me is that I have both my feet planted firmly on the ground.

Romantic, huh? LOL

Actually, I like it.

But I definitely flunked all the ‘girly’ attributes usually associated with being female.

I don’t like or wear jewelry. I like the idea of jewelry, but I don’t like how it feels on me.

I don’t have or lust after furs.

I don’t like to shop.

I’m not a clothes horse.

I don’t have fancy nails.

I cut my own hair.

I don’t go shopping just for the sake of shopping.

When it comes to receiving gifts my favorite was my stand mixer (and my Dyson vacuum is a close second!)

I get annoyed when I see women who think just because they possess a certain piece of anatomy they are entitled to being worshipped like a queen. (They give us all a bad rap!)

Don’t feel too bad for Husband though.

He flunked ‘boy’ as well! Maybe that is why we are so suited for one another!

He doesn’t like sports. To watch or participate.

He doesn’t like to hang out in bars.

He practices polite toilet etiquette (he NEVER leaves the seat up! LOL)

He doesn’t think ‘woman’s work’ is beneath him.

He cooks and he cleans.

I guess we really are a match made in heaven! LOL