Tag: photoblog

Mamma Dove.

I see you.

This afternoon, before I heard or saw any signs of it outside, I noticed a red blob on the weather radar that I usually have running in the browser in the background.  We were due for a very brief blow of rain and wind any minute.

So I took a break and walked into the kitchen to look out the window.  Sure enough the wind was gusting and the sky was grey.   As I was looking out, I noticed this mourning dove sitting in the crook of a tree branch.   I realized it was a nest, and that was the mom (or dad?) sitting on a couple of babies, probably to keep them from falling out of the nest as the the branch bobbed in the wind.

The nest was pretty far away, and I had to use digital zoom — so, the the quality of this shot isn’t too good.  I wasn’t able to get a good shot of the babies, but in this one, you can make out the mom — looking right at me.  🙂

Robert Plant, age 25.

Born again – Dracaena marginata.

August 1987.  I had just flown across the country to attend graduate school, and moved into a small 1 bedroom apartment.  I bought myself a small 3″ potted plant – a dracaena.  I thought it would brighten up the place.  It didn’t even reach to the bottom of the power outlet when it was sitting on the floor.  I christened him Robert Plant.

As I moved from place to place, i dragged Robert along with me – 25 years, 6 moves, 3 states.

In the past few years Robert grew to tower 11 or 12 feet high, with three or four trunks.  But, this last winter, I left Robert out one night too many – and he experienced a hard freeze.  I thought it was the end for my green friend.  He sat in the garage untended all winter and most of the spring with brown leaves, showing no signs of life.

A couple of months ago, we hauled a dead Robert out into the backyard and cut off all his stalks.  Monte was thinking about reusing the pot.  But we didn’t dump out the pot; left it there for a while, and it was watered along with all the other plants nearby.

And, just a few weeks back, what to my wondering eyes did appear?  But a tiny green tuft of leaves growing bigger every day.  Robert lives!  Welcome back, buddy!

Shades of blue.

Glassybabies.

Rachel is back home.  Julie is studying.  Monte is at the lake.  And I’m getting ready for a Sunday afternoon full of work-work.

We went to brunch at Güero’s this morning, then I dropped Julie back at her apartment, before taking Rachel to the airport.  This is a shot of some of Julie’s many glassybaby pieces.   These blue ones are pretty.  I also like the taupe/beige/cream colored ones.  But I guess I’m feeling blue today.

We had a nice weekend.   But we all have a busy week ahead.

Tomorrow is Rachel’s first day as a surgical resident (u go girl!).  Julie has a test.  And I have a full slate of meetings and presentations.

Here’s to the next girls’ weekend.

And, Happy Father’s Day to all you dads out there!  My dad is gone – for several years now.  But he would be very proud of his progeny, especially the two very talented, determined and self-reliant granddaughters that I got to spent the weekend with.

Stumped.

Close to shore.

Today we headed out to the lake: Monte and I, Julie, Rachel and Rachel W.  We schlepped everything down, piled aboard, and sailed out of the cove.  We beached ashore in Arky South.  There were lots of boats out today.

The air and water temps are getting just right.  Whew, HOT!

We floated for quite awhile.  Long enough to watch the boats come in to tie up for the raft-up.

We made it back to the marina before sunset, and then home in time to fall asleep on the couch after dinner.

A good time was had by all!

Happy Friday.

TGIF.

I’m glad Friday is here.  It’s been a long one.

Rachel baked Julie a cake for her birthday.  We went to Musashino for dinner, and then had birthday cake for dessert.

Happy Birthday Julie!

Le pâtisserie.

Beautiful dessert.

Monte made a beautiful dessert tonight:  tarte aux pommes.  Right out of Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking.

Fantastique!

My niece, Rachel, arrived today for a few days visit.  We made cedar plank salmon and leek & mushroom risotto for dinner.  The apple tart topped off the evening.

Julie’s birthday is tomorrow, so we’ll have to celebrate in style.

18 carrot gold.

1st batch o carrots from the garden.

When I planted the carrot seeds, I put them way too close together.  They really need to be thinned out.  This is the first batch of carrots from the garden.  They are small, but this will hopefully help thin out the bed, allowing the others to grow bigger.

They’re small, but they’re tasty!

Salad and suds.

One of the two.

I was hankering for a salad for dinner.  Monte was too.  After a brief tactical evaluation, we decided on BB Rover’s.

This is a pic of the suds.  The salads disappeared pretty quickly.

Nite nite!

One more time.

My palette.

Tonight was my third foray into painting at Painting with a Twist, this time with Jen.  The shot above is the palette we used.

And…. VOILA!!  I give you…. Wildflowers at the Park:

The “after” photo.

Please hold your applause.

The one the teacher guided us through didn’t have any bluebonnets (!).   Well, i simply couldn’t paint a hill country scene without bluebonnets, so we improvised.

I’m just realizing that the clouds look a bit like hats.  Oh well.   I’m sure Picasso had to work at it a bit before he got the hang of it, too.  🙂

Happy National Marina Day!

B-dock @ 642.20′

Today is National Marina Day.  Coincidentally, we were headed to the lake anyway because our good friends Teri and Jim were in town for the weekend.  What a great day.  We had lunch at Shades, then went for a sail on Cupholder.  Then floated for the rest of the afternoon with friends off of B-Dock.  Dinner at Flore’s.  Then home before we turned into pumpkins.

It was great to see Teri & Jim.  We miss them and Island Time.  But….once a b-docker, always a b-docker!   We’re looking forward to seeing them again, whether by land or by sea.

Bye-bye Audi.

😦

This was one of the hardest weeks for me in a long time.  Very little sleep due to work.  Long days, very difficult projects and meetings.  And yet another critsit.

It was 7:00 tonight when I was finally able to get off the phone.  Then I drove down to pick up Julie to take her out to eat.  We had a lovely dinner at Zax.  Everything they have there is delicious!

Some of Julie’s friends from school were eating dinner at another restaurant, and she was supposed to meet up with them there.  So I drove her down to that restaurant, and just about as we got there…. Crash!

No one was hurt, neither us or the other guy.

I was a bit shaken from the accident.  Ever so thankful that my guardian angel is still on duty.  And sad to have to say good bye to my dear Audi companion of 15 years.

The perfect omni-tool.

The Tourist.

One of Monte’s vast array of swiss army knives is missing.  Probably in a bilge, or perhaps at the bottom of a cove.  So we ordered another, which arrived today.  Did you know that there are about 100 different models of swiss army knives, with different combos and numbers of gadgets attached?  This one is called The Tourist.  Upon opening the box, Monte declared it the “perfect” swiss army knife.  So, go get you one!

You have to check out this one though:  http://www.amazon.com/Wenger-16999-Giant-Swiss-Knife/dp/B001DZTJRQ    Monte doesn’t have *it* yet.  🙂

Plyboo?


Our friend John has been working in the shop all week on a desk for a client.  Monte’s been out there making tables.  It is a magnificent shop, if i must say so myself. 🙂

The material that John is using to make the desk sides and top is a plywood made out of bamboo, called plyboo.  Pretty cool looking.

The last transit of Venus of the 21st century.

While it was possible for us to see the transit by looking through our welder’s glass.  It really wasn’t useful for taking a picture – it was too small.  Monte mounted a pair of binoculars on a tripod and used that to focus an image of the sun and the transit of venus on a piece of paper.  That’s what these are images of.

The transit started right on time.  If you look just to the right of the top of this image, you can see Venus just starting to show up.  You can also see 4 or 5 sunspots in each image.

It begins.

A little while later, Venus is clearly visible on the face of the sun.

A little while later.

This was one of the last images, taken shortly before sunset.

Right before sunset.