Fuzzy Buds

 We're just about three weeks into winter, yet the buds are here to remind us

that Spring is coming, there will be a brighter day.

The mob rioting in Washington yesterday were white people, primarily white men who, in the ordinary day-to-day scheme of things, can go where they like, can worship as they please, and have any job they qualify for without being judged solely by their skin color, religion, or gender. They are pissed off because the world is changing, is moving on without them. If these folks got/get left behind they mostly have no one but themselves and their own poor choices to blame.

Their "leader", tRump, is the ultimate enabler, a toxic criminal who has never been able to accept responsibility for his own actions. They see themselves in him - the prime example of always failing upward and always blaming others for their failures.

C'mon January 20th! C'mon Spring!  

Dimensional

 Dimensional lumber is wood that has been planed to a standardized width and height, yet comes in various lengths depending on what is to be made from it. These boards, which have been made into seating, had an additional, angled cut made, giving a bit of visual interest to the ends of the benches.

One might say dimension had been added.

Brown

 "Did you ever get the feeling that the world was a tuxedo and you were a pair of brown shoes?"

-- George Gobel

Last night I decided to make a post for another website about brown, my least favorite color. So this morning, I ambled slowly from the bus stop to the Natatorium for swim practice, and then strolled my way back afterwards, all the while looking for "brown." I found a lot of it, and boy is it pretty! Well, the browns that Nature makes are interesting, but Man mixes some fairly ugly shades. I think my post will be a very boring article illustrated with a bunch of pretty pictures.

 

Gettin' A Buzz On

 There's a butterfly in there. And a bee, of course, both of them feasting on the goodness and probably getting a bit snockered on their good fortune.  When I was in college, I became enamored of the work of Toulouse-Lautrec. In turn, he made me aware of Japanese art, work I've admired and wanted to emulate ever since. These grasses and flowers reminded me of those drawings - so simple in composition, yet so difficult to achieve.

The Flower That Wanted to Be Sputnik

 Whenever I see a flower like this, one that has long spikes growing from a central core, I think of Sputnik 1, the first of three artificial Earth satellites, launched by Russia in 1957. Sometime afterward, my school class made a field trip to Indianapolis that included a stop at the Allison Manufacturing plant. While there we saw an exhibit of items made by the company. I vaguely recall some engines, but I definitely remember seeing a bright, stainless steel globe hanging from the ceiling. One of the men told me it was a model of Sputnik. I don't know why Allison had it. I also remember thinking how small it was - about the size of an armor-clad grapefruit with long antennas sticking out. The real Sputnik, at 184 pounds, weighed about the same as a grown man, so the one I saw was definitely a mock-up of some sort. But of everything we saw that day, over sixty years ago, that little Sputnik is the thing I still recall. And since Sputnik's first appearance well over sixty years ago, it might be said that the satellites, now often launched in entire bouquets, have proliferated, well, like weeds.

Color on A Sunshiny Day

Another bright picture from an earlier visit to Newfields. While we are all happy to greet this New Year, the past two days of fog, rain, and ice seem somehow appropriate; perhaps to remind us of lessons learned, to view with a skeptic eye the promises of any politician, and to take a moment to mourn the, so far, nearly 400,000 victims of the pandemic on this country alone, many of whom might still be with us if the same politicians had taken their jobs as public servants seriously. Instead, we got serviced and so many folks are left to mourn.

 

New Year's Day: Picture of the Year

 Nuthin' special for this past year, except the pleasure in just being able to wander the grounds of Newfields, where I stood under giant banana leaves to check out their ribs and among the bees as I poked my nose into this agave-like plant. I was surprised to see tiny purple florets rising from the brightly-colored plant. And there was a little reservoir of water that served to quench the thirst

of both insects and the plant.