October 13, 2007

WTF CF?

Chuck Foxtrot is an angry man. He’s angry at injustice and has a zero-tolerance policy towards ineptitude. This is not to say he’s dangerous or to be avoided. Chuck channels his rage into blogging, thus avoid the necessity to maim the miscreants who so enrage him. Perhaps because of the deprivations and hardships he endured as a child, Chuck has chosen to shine a spotlight on some of the most outrageously egregious behavior of humankind. His recent post about four young children being ripped from a loving home will probably make you angry, too. Their mother had done the right thing by her kids by placing them in a stable home while she entered drug rehabilitation. It turns out that she, despite her addiction, has more sense than the State of Utah. The irony is not lost on CF. I found myself nodding in agreement with his assessment of the situation, as I did with most of his ranting and raging posts. He’s angry about politics and the military and mass media too, but he conveys a message that will ring out with familiarity to most of us. He’s just saying the same things we’re all thinking, but he says them so much better.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though. Chuck is a renaissance man of sorts. I’ve never figured out why anyone would want to ruin a perfectly good taco by making it with fish, but if you’re into that sort of thing check out this recipe for talapia tacos. More tasty recipes are promised somewhere down the road. Chuck doesn’t find that it compromises his masculinity to admit that he watches The View and Kid Nation either, though I suspect that he has a blogging agenda in mind each time he turns on the TV. I think he’s planning on making a career out of being enraged - not that that’s a bad thing. He’s not out to change the world … much. He mostly just wants to name names and kick some butt. Take a stroll though WTF CF? and see if you agree that he’s targeting all of the right things. Chuck Foxtrot is intelligent, erudite and angry. He makes the combination look good.

Technorati Tags: anger, blogs, righteous indignation

October 12, 2007

New hidden object games

I’ve gotten bored with my online games lately so I dug into my jigsaw puzzle collection to keep myself occupied. I like jigsaw puzzles (I have twenty or so on hand, having given many away to the charity store in recent years) but I was ready for something new and different after I finished my picture of a sky filled with hot air balloons. Several new hidden object games have been released in recent weeks, fulfilling that need. Big Fish Games now has thirty hidden object games on their menu, if you count the “find the difference between these two pictures” games. (They do. I don’t.) The Scruffs and Forgotten Riddles - The Mayan Princess were released a few weeks ago and Pirateville was announced last week.

The Scruffs: This one would be fun to play with kids. The artwork is charming, the big-eyed characters reminiscent of a Charles Addams cartoon. The Scruffs are in danger of losing their home unless valuable treasures hidden amonst their clutter can be located. Mini-games offer a little decompression between object searches.

Forgotten Riddles - the Mayan Princess: The twist here is that clues are presented in the form of riddles instead of a list of objects. The complexity of the lovely artwork contributes to the challenge of fiding each item.

Pirateville: The hidden objects within the cluttered and colorful pictures are presented as silhouettes instead of words. Interim puzzles require you to find numerous similar items, such as twenty cups or eighteen bottles.

I didn’t find any of these puzzles as challenging as some of the older ones, but was pleased to have some new ones to waste time with anyway. If you’re a hidden object game junkie like me I think you’ll enjoy them, too.

Technorati Tags: Big FishGames, games, hidden object games, online games, puzzles

September 2, 2007

Self Portrait Sunday for September 2, 2007

I tried to upload a self portrait shortly after midnight last night, just before I went to bed. I had taken a mirror shot yesterday of me and Myrna after she finished cutting my hair. Looks like I either moved my hand while holding the camera, or maybe there was hairspray on the mirror. Both shots that I took were badly out of focus.

The plan today was to pick up my friend around noon, have some lunch, then go to the matinee performance of Ala Wai , the first play of the season at Kumu Kahua Theatre. Alas, plans sometimes go awry. My friend called this morning and said she couldn’t go. I had intended to take another shot at getting a self portrait after I was all dolled up for the theatre, but since I didn’t get dolled up I forgot about the picture. So here you have an “it’s afternoon and I just remembered” shot. It hasn’t been a wasted day. My floors have all been de-dog-haired, my kitchen is clean and both bathrooms are shining, except that I really need to work on the hard-water deposits on the sink and shower faucets. There are more chores that need doing, of course, but the boys and I are thinking a nap may be in order. Those are my “other” boys looking over my shoulder - my son and my two nephews, in a picture taken about ten years ago.

I’ll know if my friends stayed on plan today after I peek at all of their self-portraits at Digi-Cass.

Technorati Tags: meme, photos, self portraits

Posted by skeet @ 2:40 pm • Photos, Meme, Uncategorized • 11 comments  

August 26, 2007

Self Portrait Sunday for August 26, 2007

I wish I could grow old gracefully. I wish that clients would not judge my fitness for the physical rigors of my work by the absence or presence of gray hair. Neither of those things is happening. Today is root day. This time I’m trying Garnier. The superior gray coverage of the one I used last time was fine, but the color had no depth or life. It was very uniform and flat looking. If the Garnier turns out not to be a Sarah Jessica experience, I’ll probably go back to the gray coverage stuff, but in a lighter shade. We’ll see what works. Maybe I’ll get lucky this time and be hot enough to join the exclusive clientele at Orleans hotel Las Vegas. Right at the moment I’m hot and itchy of scalp, waiting for the last five minutes to run out on the timer. When I’m done I’ll go to Digi-Cass and see what my friends are gambling on today. You should do that, too, and you should join in on the Self Portrait Sunday fun so I can see your smiling face every week!



Edit: Early results are mixed. I can see red and gold highlights, even with my hair still wet. Alas, I can also see silver at temples and forehead. It appears that the color has depth but the gray coverage is not so good.









Technorati Tags: meme, photos, self portraits

Posted by skeet @ 11:37 am • Uncategorized • 29 comments  

August 10, 2007

Memory Walk

Being my father’s caregiver during his last year was a mixed blessing for both of us. When I first brought him here he was able to walk using a cane or a walker. He had multiple strokes over the following months and each robbed him of some mobility. He did not lose his speech until very near the end, though, so we spent our days talking. He told me about his boyhood in the cotton fields during the depression and talked about serving in the Pacific during World War II. Sometimes there was an air of melancholy because we both knew his time was running out, but I’m so grateful we had the opportunity for him to share the stories of his life. I’ve always thought that Alzheimer’s is the cruelest of diseases because it robs it’s victims and their families of those same precious moments that Dad and I shared.

Over five million people in the US have Alzheimer’s Disease. There is not yet a cure, but there is hope. The Alzheimer’s Association Memory Walk is the largest fundraising drive contributing to the support of people with Alzheimer’s and the search for a cure. People across America will participate in a two to three mile walk this fall to raise funds and generate awareness of this devastating disease. You can locate a group near you by going to the Alzheimer’s Association Fundraising website and putting in your zip code. If there’s a group near you, you’ll be given the information you’ll need in order to sign up. If your community isn’t yet involved, you can be the one to start the ball rolling. The website will talk you through becoming a Team Captain and provide you with all of the tools and information you’ll need to organize and manage your group. You’ll even be given a free website to use as your fundraising headquarters. If you can provide a little determination, they’ll help you with the rest!

Each of us can do our part. If you are unable to participate in a walk, I hope you’ll consider supporting Memory Walk with your generous donation. This is a disease that can be beaten in our lifetime.

Technorati Tags: Alzheimer’s, Alzheimer’s Association, fundraisers, Memory Walk

June 24, 2007

Plantin’ lettuce

This is the planter that I’ll grow my friend’s lettuce in. It’s got this nifty watering reservoir in the bottom. You can add water from the corners so as not to disturb your plantings. It seems I exaggerated earlier. It’s thirty inches long, not thirty-six as I estimated.

I’m worried that the soil will become compacted in the trough in the bottom, so I added some gravel. No too much - I want the water from the reservoir to contact the soil and travel upwards.

This is a really rich local potting mix. It’s full of mostly-rotted wood debris and has some stones in it, too. It smells like it was scooped from a forest floor, all loamy and fragrant with just a hint of decay.

The seeds are tiny & won’t show up well in a photo. I put them in nine shallow depressions staggered from end to end after I got the soil nice and damp. I have the planter sitting on my front lanai, against the wall of my carport shed. They’ll get direct sun during the middle of each day. If they don’t do well there I’ll try something else. I may put a few seeds in some damp paper towel and see if I can germinate them that way, inside with no direct sun. The tropical noonday sun can be pretty fierce. The seeds were developed for Hawaii, but maybe not for the Leeward Coast. We’ll see.

Technorati Tags: gardening, Hawaii, Hawaii gardening, lettuce, seeds, vegetables

Self Portrait Sunday for June 24, 2007

After















































Before












Go to Digi-Cass to see who else is letting it show.

Technorati Tags: self portrait, Self Portrait Sunday, photos

Posted by skeet @ 12:03 pm • Photos, Meme, Uncategorized • 18 comments  

June 23, 2007

Flight 29 Down

Look what I found, sitting out at the marina right here on my coast.

If you don’t watch kid programs on TV you won’t know why I recognized this wreck of a plane from across an acre of parking. Sure enough, when I got closer, my suspicions were verified.

If there’s any doubt in your mind, do a comparison with this photo from Discovery Kids. The windows and paint job are identical. You can even see a ladder-like configuration of rivets just to the right of the rear window in both pictures.

There’s a pirated video on YouTube that shows the plane, sans wings, in one shot. That shot also confirms that this is the same plane.

The inside of the plane has beeen gutted and the fuselage is ripped open in two areas. The larger opening is covered over with cardboard, and some electronics are exposed in two panels nearby. I was surprised to see a circuit board still intact and surprisingly clean. It almost looks like you could plug some network cables into the side of the plane and download its flight data.

By the way, if you haven’t discovered it yet, Flight 29 Down is a great kids show on Discovery. I first watched it because I enjoy seeing shows that are filmed locally. It’s a hoot to see scenery and recognize it as something familiar. I found the story interesting and kept watching. Kind of like Lost with a planeful of kids instead of adults, and with teen angst providing the drama in the place of diabolical corporate conspiracy. Quality programing you might enjoy, too. That’s skeet’s tip of the day.

Technorati Tags: airplane, flight 29 Down, photos, wrecked plane

May 29, 2007

Losers, weepers

I live in a duplex. My neighbor’s home sits further back from the road than mine, but we share a carport out front, divided down the middle by a galvanized fence. The same fencing extends across the back of his carport to separate it from my yard. There’s a narrow alley-like strip between his caport fence and my screened lanai. The alley opens onto my side yard, the one with the herb garden and the new lawn. I rarely go in there, but it’s a convenient spot to store some gardening supplies and my tiki torches. I’ve gone in a few times lately to take the photos of my spider friend. Today I went in there to rake up leaves. Found the interesting little zip bag pictured above. It took a moment for me to realize what I was seeing. My first thought was “Uh-oh, wonder if M & S know.” My duplex neighbors have three young adult kids at home & I figured the envelope had blown under the fence from their carport. I’m pretty sure my neighbors would not be happy to think that their kids had brought drugs home, even something as innocuous as this. You never can tell, of course but the kids don’t seem the type. Then I realized that the baggie was directly beneath the spot where my builder and his helper stepped off of the carport roof to access the lanai roof when they repaired it a few months ago. This would be the helper who used to leave every day for his lunchtime indulgence because he knew I didn’t want him smoking his stuff on my property. It makes perfect sense that this was probably his property and has been sitting for several months right where he dropped it. I think I won’t let him know I found it, since it’s been flushed away now. No, I didn’t care that he smoked a little weed, but I did ask him not to bring it to my home. Guess he forgot the rules. His loss.

Technorati Tags: just stuff

April 26, 2007

Heh! A little memory jolt

I went to the grocery store a little while ago. A car that was parked near me had a little statue of Mary on the dashboard. It made me realize that I haven’t seen that in a long time. People here dangle warrior helmets from their rearview mirrors and might have dried leis on the dash. They put memorial decals on their rear windows - RIP Sonny Boy, that kind of stuff - but not so much religious emblems. I see a lot of rear windows crammed with stuffed toys. I’ve never understood that. If your old enough to drive, why would you have a stuffed toy collection advertising your juvenile nature every time you take the car out? But anyway, back to the dashboard statue. Having grown up right outside of New Orleans, a very catholic part of the country, I guess I saw them as a normal thing that people do. That and catholic medals hanging from the rearview mirror. Usually St. Christopher, patron saint of travelers. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the medals here either. Is it a catholic thing or a regional thing? The Catholic Church has a strong presence here, but not nearly as strong as where I come from, so it could be that. But people in Hawaii have a whole different set of aesthetics from any place I’ve known well, so it could just as easily be cultural/regional. If I ever become a world traveler I’ll have to make it a point to notice personal car decor, because now this thing is stuck in my mind and there’s really no other way to answer it.

Technorati Tags: catholic, catholic medals, catholic statues, regional culture, Hawaii, cars, decor