[MEDIA=12]
July 2007
Art.
I’ve never been good at art. My cousin’s daughter can look at a photograph and draw an incredible portrait that would take your breath away, but me, I can’t even paint by numbers. In Sociology class last semester I was asked to draw a person and I drew a stick figure. My fellow students made fun of me, though they refrained from yelling “neener, neener, neener” and pointing. I think the mustache scared them.
For my father’s 60th birthday party (which went very well, despite Mother Nature being quite feisty with the weather at times this afternoon), I made a photo collage of various pictures from over the years. I tried to select photos that would mean something to him and stick to the family theme, incorporating many elements of his life experience. Now this is something that I enjoyed doing very much. I can handle grabbing photos, scanning them, printing them out and arranging them in an interesting manner.
Rosie O’Donnell often takes photos and does artful things with them and then makes a video to share with the world. I’m thinking of taking a stab at doing the same. Even though I mix up the concepts behind decoupage, papier mache and fondu, I should think that with today’s technology I should be able to make up something that’s interesting and expressive.
And isn’t that what art is all about?
Excuses.
Earl and I, along with my sister and my stepmother, are hosting a big birthday bash for my father tomorrow. We are expecting around 30 people or so. It should be a really good time.
One of the amazing things about hosting a party here at the house is the sudden realization that we have some projects that need attending to. I find it quite humorous that when we are doing the daily routine bit we don’t really give a flip that the downstairs toilet has a slight leak or that the siding is hanging precariously off the back of the house as a result of a recent thunderstorm. But have a few people over and bam, there’s Earl and I grabbing the toilet like a bunch of thugs, yanking it off the floor, expertly replacing the wax seal and cramming the toilet back in place. It was a 20 minute job that we should have done when we first discovered the leak but who really has the motivation to do it. That’s what makes having a party so much fun. It gives you the extra boost needed to scrape gunk off the bathroom floor.
I guess it’s kind of startling to see what we’ve done to make the house presentable for the party. I’ve repotted plants, I’ve stored the garden hoses away (I don’t even do that for winter), hell, I even swept out the camper in case someone wants to use it for an afternoon delight (o.k., since it’s all relatives come to the party that last thought just kind of creeped me out). Tomorrow morning I might go absolutely insane and change the cat’s litter on a non-garbage day.
Such a walk on the wild side.
Friday Night Jams: 16 Years Ago.
16 years ago tonight I was spinning for the first time in a small bar in Jamestown, New York called “The Nite Spot.” Adjacent to a set of railroad tracks, whenever a train was heard in the distance I had to switch from vinyl to cassette single while the train passed by, because the vibrations would occasionally make the record skip.
I remembering playing this song that night. At the top of the dance chart 16 years ago today, here’s the video to “Got A Love For You” by Jomanda.
Everybody Relax.
I would like everyone to take a moment and just relax with me. Take a deep breath. Clear your mind. Listen to the stillness. Yearn for the calm.
Why the tranquility? My dance with “Intermediate Algebra” has come to an end. It is now summer vacation for this college boy. The big guy says I should find a temp job for the next couple of weeks. I agree with him, as I will lose my mind if all I have to do for the next seven weeks is partake in the bon bon brigade.
By the way – I asked the teacher to score my final exam while I waited. I did very well. I only missed the question involving the hectare on the 747.
Independence Day.
Earl snapped my picture as I got ready for my Independence Day bike ride. As of today I have ridden more this year than I have ridden in the past two years combined. Since the summer is really just getting underway and I plan on riding until Thanksgiving, I’d say that’s a good thing.
My body is thanking me for the exercise. I feel wonderful.
Mother Nature is giving us her own version of fireworks for Independence Day in the way of severe thunderstorms. It looks like no picnic today. Perhaps we’ll catch a movie or something.
Oh, as a public service I made a video of me making a left turn at a busy intersection. I’m trying to spread the word that cyclists should ride their bikes like their riding cars and follow the rules of the road. I’ll have a longer post about this soon.
[MEDIA=10]Oops I Did It Again.
I had a blog software upgrade go bad, so all my data is here but my pictures, videos and display themes are a little wonky at the moment. Please bear with me, but I’ll continue blogging with this temporary setup.
You’d think after 25 years of doing this computer thing I’d get it right by now.
Update 2007-07-03 23:50 – I’ve restored 3/4 of the videos and pictures from the past week. I’ve also restored the look of the page. Hopefully, my webhost will be able to restore it all tomorrow but I’m not banking on it. I’ll just keep working on restoring pictures but a couple of videos might be lost.
Dab of CNY: NH&W Rail Trail.
I mentioned a couple of days ago that the NYSDOT has made great strides in working recreational trails and such into their latest highway projects. A couple of years ago a new expressway was opened in our area, and with it came the “NH&W Rail Trail”, a five mile cycling/walking/rollerblading path along an old railroad bed in the towns of New Hartford and Whitestown. Eventually it will connect to the Canalway Trail I mention in that previous post.
One of the beautiful things about the Rail Trail is that it goes right through the middle of the woods. On one side you’ll find plenty of wetlands, on the other side you’ll find trees, fields and other woodsy things.
NYSDOT built a couple of lookout points over the wetlands when they built the trail. There’s also a couple places where people fish in the ponds. In fact, when I was taking one of my photos tonight, I was startled by a small bird that began flapping wildly and making lots and lots of noise. There was one small problem, it was trying to fly and couldn’t get anywhere as it was tangled up in some discarded fishing line. I couldn’t stand the sight of the bird hanging there and struggling so I tried to set it free. Whenever I went near the bird to try to untangle it, it panicked and started flapping and darting around, so I did my best to keep some distance as to keep the bird calm and tried to break the line as close to the bird as possible. As soon as I broke the line, the bird took off like a shot with a small trail of fishing line behind it. I’m hoping that the rest eventually falls off so it doesn’t get tangled again.
Earl and I walked about 2 1/2 miles tonight along the trail. It was good to get the exercise and enjoy nature a little bit. I’ve never biked along this trail, but I’ve put it on my list of priorities. There’s more pictures available by clicking on the picture above.
Off Kilter.
Today has been an odd sort of day. Earl had a doctor’s appointment at 10:30, a stress test where you run on the treadmill until you’re in pain, so he came home around 9:45 to change his clothes so he was dressed more appropriately. I think he wanted to show a little chest to Dave, the bearish technician. So his popping in threw me off my game a little bit while I was getting ready to leave for school.
The master clock that runs my collection of school clocks did not survive the last round of thunderstorms we had, so the clocks throughout the house are running on this makeshift setup I have while the clock is getting repaired. I know this is going to sound strange, but with the regular setup the clocks make a click at the 58th second then at the :00 of every minute. I couldn’t manage that with the makeshift setup, which causes the clocks to click at the 56th second then at the :00 of every minute. So the clicks are spaced further apart which is confusing my internal rhythm. It is sort of like Chinese Water Torture.
When I got to class only five of the twenty or so showed up for our final class before the Final Exam on Thursday. This threw me off a little bit, as did the fact that the professor came in clean shaven, where he usually has a goatee.
When I got home from school, ready to make a sandwich and settle down for “The Addams Family”, I found Earl at home surfing on his computer. While he survived the stress test just fine, he has no heart trouble at all, he didn’t feel in the mood to go back to work so he took the afternoon off. I’m glad that he’s home, but I didn’t feel as close to John Astin and Carolyn Jones as I usually do.
By the way, is it mysterious and spooky and all together ooky that I find myself rather attracted to John Astin as Gomez Addams?
Challenges.
This is the last week of the summer semester at school. By this time Thursday night I will have completed my Intermediate Algebra final and bagged a pretty good buzz from a couple of brewskis in celebration, because I am naturally a two beer queer.
This class has been an interesting one. Populated with mostly older folks taking their time at the finishing their degree, there has been one woman near my age who has consistently barked out the wrong answer to every question posed while the professor has been squeaking the chalk on the board the entire semester. He could ask “what’s 2 plus 2?” and she’d yap out “5”. I’d then say “4” in a slightly irritated voice, resisting the urge to throw on a Thurston Howell III accent while correcting her. I don’t think of her as Lovey.
The professor likes to give us extra credit tasks with what I call “speed trials”. For example, he’ll write an endless sea of variables, lines, operators and operands and tell us that the first five people to answer the given problem will get three extra points on the next exam. While I can normally answer the question, I must say that I’m not good in the role of Speedy Gonzales. I’ve purposely slowed myself down for this round of college so that I’m sure of what I’m doing and making sure I do it correctly. Give me time, I’ll figure it out. Last Thursday he wrote an equation with several real and imaginary numbers involved and announced, “The first person to answer this question will 5 points added to their semester grade.”
Holy crap.
Of course I froze. I don’t care, I’m already hovering near the top of the “A”‘s so I figured “let them eat cake” and slammed my pencil down, not in the mood to get all imaginary with numbers. Naturally, Ms. Yap was the only one to answer the question correctly. She sure picked a doozy for her grand debut.
So the challenge this week is to enjoy Independence Day AND study for the final the following day.
