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Monday, July 30, 2007

Not Gonna Do It

I will not complain about the weather.
I will not complain about the weather.
I will not complain about the weather.

May I say, however, that if you like it rainy, hazy, hot and wicked freakin’ humid, then you will most likely be a very happy camper today.

I did not complain about the weather.
Not really...

And I brought you Black Eyed Susans.

Sunday, July 29, 2007

How Did I Get So Lucky?

This is a different sort of digitally scrapped page than what I have shared here previously. It has only five layers and uses one photo of Chuck as a young boy, in two different ways. (Wasn’t he cute as a button?) On the larger image I reduced the opacity so it could serve as the canvas. The journaling is heartfelt. In many ways, this page comes closest to what I have looked forward to creating digitally.

Layout by LMR/Pink Granite. Photo from family collection. Software: Apple iPhoto 5 & Adobe Photoshop Elements 4.0 for Mac. Frame: Jessica Sprague’s Grunge Frame 1 (available at her blog). Transparency: Street Grunge - Scratches Transparency by Brandy Hackman (available at Scrap Girls). Font: Courier New, bold

Saturday, July 28, 2007

Digi-Scrap Update

I wanted to give you an update on my PhotoShop Elements (PSE) and Digital Scrapbooking progress.

progress ( prŏg 'rěs' ) noun 1. a movement toward a goal...

If that’s how we agree to define progress, and since I am making movement toward a goal, then I am making progress! I do feel that things are starting to click when it comes to PSE. I’m still not creating layouts that make me completely happy, but layers and brushes are making sense! I recently picked up a special publication magazine from Creating Keepsakes called “Computer Tricks for Scrapbooking”. It shows what they call “hybrid” scrapbooking; digital scrapbooking which has been printed out and embellished with other paper scrap supplies. That’s not my goal, but it has lots of clear instructions for digital work.

Perhaps even more importantly, it led me to Jessica Sprague’s websites. This gal writes very clear instructions within PhotoShop, but they are generally applicable to PSE, and they all relate to digital scrapbooking. The blog she used to post at, devoted to “PhotoShop Friday” tips, is not currently active, but all the excellent information is still available here. Her original blog is also no longer active, but is available over here. And her newest and still active blog (which includes all the later “PhotoShop Friday” tips) is right over here!

Also, if you are at all interested in digital scrapbooking, do sign up for the Scrap Girls e-mail newsletter. Their products and information are excellent. Plus, in every newsletter they offer at least one free downloadable item. They even have an entire “Biggie Collection” of digital papers and elements you can download for free, just to see if you want to pursue this whole digi-scrap addiction - umm - hobby! Right now they are having another sale. It’s not as extremely fabulous as the one I heated up the credit card with a couple of months ago, but it’s a sale nonetheless! And the sale includes their downloadable QuickTime Instructional Videos, which really are worth the money.

Last week I brought my Mom 8” x 8” versions of the Mothers Day Collage and the Gagee and Mom pages I did. They made her cry - but in a good way. That clinched it for me. I will keep on digi-scrapping!

Friday, July 27, 2007

Which End Is Up?

It’s all a matter of perspective. When I took this photograph, I liked the diamond texture of the concrete and the way the weeds were creeping and fanning out. When I looked at it on the computer, I realized it looked as if the weeds were climbing up a wall. That’s what prompted me to post: “What Do You See?”. Because in fact, I was standing on the step above, photographing the step below. The bottom of the photo is a length of pressure treated lumber. The concrete is diamond gridded for traction. I thought perhaps the dark splotch of aged gum on the right, slightly obscured by the greenery might give it away! Because I gave it a double take, I was curious to see what you saw. Thanks for your comments!

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Not Exactly As Planned...

- Parking in Boston, even after validation, is still expensive.
- There is a staggering amount of pain and despair in an Emergency Room, even on a busy, but not completely chaotic, Thursday afternoon.
- Kind, intelligent, compassionate, well intentioned Health Care Workers must have a deluxe place in Heaven.
- Everyone should have access to excellent health care and excellent health insurance coverage.
- Truly delicious matzoh ball soup (with nice bits of tender chicken) is a mechaieh (a great joy).
- Air conditioning is also a mechaieh.
- My little folding fan does wonders in a pinch!

All is well now. There was a bit of a family hiccup today. I’m happy to be home after a long hot day, with everyone healthy and whole.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Oscar

I’ve lived with cats off and mostly on, for a quarter century. Each one has had their own unique personality. I’ve lived with independent, feisty, aloof cats and at least one I referred to as a “puppy-cat” because of the way she shadowed me and came when called. I’ve even been called “Mom” by a cat. Willow used to draw the vowel sound out to make it a plaintive wail that was unmistakable as "Mom". She was the only creature on this earth to ever call me by that name. Amanda used to know whenever I was in pain and would curl up on just the right spot to bring warmth and comfort to me. Cassie is our posable cat. She doesn’t mind being picked up and carried in any configuration and when the camera is out, she actually lets us move her into a better position. Abby, well, she’s one tough cookie, who has taken to being held in my arms while I rub her tummy. And she likes to walk all around the slippery, curved edge of the old clawfoot tub, in between the shower curtain and the liner, just to get a head rub while we are on the throne, as it were. She likes a captive audience! But when I get the camera out she is the black and gold blur just exiting the edge of the photo.

So while the headline startled me, I didn’t doubt it when I read: “Feline Intuition; Cat Can Sense When Nursing Home Patients Are About To Die”. It’s a wonderful story about a cat in Rhode Island, named Oscar, who lives in a nursing home. When patients are about to die, he goes to their bedside. He senses their imminent passing even when the medical staff is uncertain. Here’s a link to the Boston.com article, and another to the write up in The New England Journal of Medicine.

There’s so much we just don’t know...

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

What Do You See?


Please tell me what you see.
Or tell me what this is.
Or tell me what this image makes you think or feel.
Leave your answers in the comment section.
And if you’ve never left a comment before, do chime in!
Thanks!

Monday, July 23, 2007

Extra! Extra!

It took quite a long time, but here I am. Back in the late 1980s I had just gotten my first “modern” computer. By modern I mean it was an MS-DOS based Personal Computer (PC) - a significant upgrade from the Commodore where one had to type in exhausting strings of code in order to get a “Pong”-like game to run on it. (Heavens to Murgatroyd! How old am I???) Anyhoo, the new PC felt very slick and powerful. I found the possibilities dazzling and the realities frustrating. In some ways, it was little more than a dedicated word processor, which had it all over electric typewriters, but only hinted at what might be possible down the road.

Well, I wanted “it” now. I wasn’t completely sure what “it” was. I felt as if I were looking at a wheel before there was a barrow or a cart or a carriage or a car to go with it. But I craved something creative, something exciting with words and images. Printshop was wicked cool at the time, now of course stunningly primitive. Then I stumbled across a software program for creating newsletters. It was words and graphics combined. That was “it”! Mind you, I didn’t have a group to send a newsletter to. I didn’t belong to a club or a PTA or even a company that needed or wanted some sort of internal missive. I didn’t care. I bought it. I tried it. Really I did. If you are a regular reader you are probably beginning to get an inkling of how this turned out. Well, you’re right. The program was very complicated, very limited and narrowly designed to publish, well, a newsletter. Which was exactly what the box said it would do, but I was dreaming bigger dreams. I was looking at the first wheel and already feeling the wind in my face, my hair streaming out behind me, as I was driving a Porsche.

Those dreams didn’t come to fruition until about nine months ago when I discovered blogging. My words, my pictures and I didn’t have to belong to a club or have a mailing list. I just had to do it. Create something of my own, push a few buttons and Ta Da! - Pink Granite.

Aaaah... I love the feeling of the wind in my face! ;o)

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Bashert

Twenty-two years ago this month, two people met. To the untrained eye it was a simple introduction in a copy room. A veteran colleague welcoming the new gal he had read about in the “Welcome Memo”. But actually there was a chorus of angels singing Hallelujah and a great deal of angel high-fiving going on!

You see, this had not been an easy moment to arrange. He had been born in Illinois and raised in Missouri. She had been born and raised in Rhode Island. But a bigger challenge was the time difference. Not Eastern to Central Time zones, but a difference of fifteen years. He had arrived on the planet fifteen years early or perhaps she was fifteen years late. No matter, it was a problem. There were in fact plenty of complications existing and plenty more to come. But those angels know their business. So they were excited, delighted and perhaps more than a little relieved to be transferring the responsibility and next steps to the couple shaking hands, next to an enormous photocopy machine, in a fluorescent lit room, in Massachusetts.

Fortunately, somewhere deep in our hearts, Chuck and I felt a connection. It wasn’t enough to start high-fiving and joining in with the chorus, but a connection natheless! I remember feeling as if we had met before. Not in that lame pick-up-in-a-bar kind of way, more like old friends who were catching up after not having seen each other in ages. It was easy, relaxed, comfortable.

We were, in fact, Bashert: predestined, soulmates, meant to be. The angels had their work cut out for them and it turned out we did too. Twenty-two years later I wouldn’t change a thing. Well, perhaps just one; I would have tried to arrive much earlier...
;o)

Milestone

Happy Anniversary K & J!
25 Years and Still Going Strong!

Saturday, July 21, 2007

In Clover

I brought the camera along on our walk for some sky shots. The clouds were puffy and swirly as sunset approached and I hoped to capture something dazzling on film. (If it’s a digital camera, what is the correct phrase now for “on film”?) Instead of something broad and sweeping, I found this little vignette. It tugs at my heart - the decay of the manmade against plucky, guileless beauty.

Feel free to click on the photo to get the full effect.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Miss July

We spent a lovely day today down in Rhode Island with my Mom. The three of us also had the opportunity to join our niece Carrie, at a reception in her honor. She was named employee of the month! It was such fun to see her healthy, happy and very much in her element. Her colleagues clearly think she is the bee’s knees and we heartily agree!

This Daylily is for you Carrie, with our congratulations!

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

The Decision

I can only begin to imagine the conversations. He was 27. She was 26. Their youngest child, a fifth son, was still a babe in arms, the oldest only nine. Did they discuss it by candlelight at a kitchen table? Or was it so big a dream it could only be whispered about in bed before they fell asleep? Eventually the decision was made. Jacob would go to America. Leah would stay behind in Russia with the children. It was 1887. They were young and strong. Leah was the eldest of 16 children. Her mother had passed after delivering eight children into the world. Her father’s second wife had borne eight more. Leah was a capable woman. Jacob would work hard and send for them as soon as he was able.

The die was cast. Jacob went to Boston. He worked as a presser in a coat factory. He was paid by the piece. Year round he worked with the iron and the steam. Each coat became a coin. Each coin that could be saved above keeping body and soul together brought his wife and children closer. At last there was enough. It took four years. Four years of trusting that it would all work out, that every sacrifice was worth the distance and the time.

In 1891, Leah packed up their belongings and she and the boys traveled by horse and wagon, then by train, to the port of Hamburg, Germany. She had brought oven toasted bread and tea to keep them going. They boarded a steamship to Liverpool, England, then another ship from Liverpool to Boston. The two weeks in steerage meant potatoes and salt herring. But it was only two short weeks after four long years.

Think of the reunion! The relief, the joy and yes, the need to become reacquainted as a family. In this age of e-mails, telephones, digital photographs and truly instant messaging it’s difficult to wrap our minds around the sacrifices Jacob and Leah made as a couple, for their children to have a better life. But it turned out to be the right decision.

Jacob and Leah would have three more children in America, two girls and one last boy. Around 1902 they posed for a family portrait from which I extracted these images. They couldn’t know that Leah had only five more years on this earth. She would die at 46. Jacob would outlive Leah by 14 years. All eight of their children would reach adulthood. Between them there would be 18 grandchildren, then dozens of great-grandchildren, one of whom is my husband Chuck. And still more great-great-grandchildren and so on and so on.

It was the right decision. But just imagine those first conversations as the dream took shape.

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Uh Oh...

Quick note to let you know that I'm having a bear of a time with our DSL connection!
It has been intermittent all day long and completely out for the last few hours!
So in case I fall off the face of this virtual world, don't worry, it's just a tech thing!

: : UPDATE - Wednesday, July 18th:

The DSL still has a mind of its own!
The company is sending someone out to repair it tomorrow.
Fingers crossed...

Monday, July 16, 2007

Ahem...

I assume that they are broadcast only here in the States, but I - actually we - are smitten with a series of Liberty Mutual Insurance television advertisements. The ads depict a chain of good deeds flowing from one person to another in an intersection of The Golden Rule meets Pay It Forward. Even with the mute button on the ads are powerful, but the music puts them over the top. That music is by the group Hem.
Make a note of that: Hem!
Their sound is folk and country, but is richer and more sophisticated than those two categories imply.
Here are a ridiculous number of links so that you can all see - and more importantly hear - what has us both spellbound.

The Hem website
Hem’s MySpace page where you can easily (automatically) listen to their music.
The YouTube video of the first commercial with the song “Half Acre”.
The YouTube video of the second commercial with the song “The Part Where You Let Go”.
The Hem fan website where you can read the lyrics to Hem’s songs.

: : Enjoy!

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Summertime Movies

A gal over on another blog put out a call for some "lighter" movie recommendations. That got me thinking about some favorite films of ours, all of which leave me with positive feelings as the credits roll. Here’s a list:

- Mad Hot Ballroom (2005)
- Love Actually (2003)
- Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (1967)
- Notting Hill (1999)
- Dave (1993)
- It’s A Wonderful Life (1946)
- Wordplay (2006)
- Sleepless In Seattle (1993)
- The Natural (1984)
- South Pacific (1958)
- Field of Dreams (1989)
- The Queen (2006)
- Mr. Smith Goes To Washington (1939)
- Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
- That Thing You Do (1996)
- Ever After (1998)
- The American President (1995)
- Dirty Dancing (1987)
- Remember The Titans (2000)
- A League of Their Own (1992)

Learn more about any of these titles at IMDb, the Internet Movie Database.
What would you recommend we rent this summer to leave us feeling equally relaxed, upbeat and cheerful?


: : Red Sox Notes:

- The Boston Red Sox have been a delight to watch this year. Manager Terry Francona trusted his instincts and left Dustin Pedroia in through his meager streak all the way through to his getting hot! Likewise, Terry stuck with Julio Lugo (even after that strange attempt to steal third a few weeks ago) and he too is now heating up.
- Compliments to Lugo for adding the Ichiro Suzuki bat line-up and shoulder adjustment to his at-bat routine. Big improvement over earlier in the season!
- I still miss having Johnny Pesky in the dugout with the team during every game. Wake up MLB powers-that-be and reverse your ruling!
- Hideki Okajima - oh my goodness, he has been such an asset!
- The Red Sox have to keep third baseman Lowell. I know he’s up for free agency at the end of the season but he has been terrific. We still call him Mike “I only know how to hit doubles and home runs” Lowell!
- Speaking of Free Agents, every major league baseball player that makes it to free agency owes a debt of gratitude to Curt Flood. Sadly, center fielder Curt Flood passed away in 1997 at the age of 59. But it was the David vs. Goliath legal battle he began in 1969, to fight the Reserve Clause, that led to the increased freedom and tremendous salaries players now enjoy. Today’s players should be sending checks to all the guys who came before them and worked for peanuts.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Genealogical Thoughts

I’ve been wandering around U.S. Federal Census records again. Because the census is conducted every ten years, a great deal can happen between reports. But it never fails to surprise and sadden me when I find an ancestor has passed away in an intervening decade. It’s part of what causes me to do the genealogical research in fits and starts. Similarly, when I scan family photos into the computer I often begin with excitement, but grow melancholy at the artificially accelerated passage of time. One minute I’m scanning in the photo of a toddler and within a half an hour there they are; holding their own great-grandchild. So I’ve learned to pull back and step away for a little while.

Because of the records searches Chuck and I have been doing, we often look at death and burial records. It’s so interesting where we choose to be buried - or where our families choose to bury us. We start out being born into one nuclear and extended family. Then we grow up, move, marry and find ourselves sometimes very far away from where we started. Then we are sometimes laid to rest among an entirely different group of people than we were born to. It seems as if families are strictly structured genealogically, but factually fluid.

Another thing occurred to me as we were visiting the graves of some relatives. No one engraves their occupation on a headstone. Nor do they note their addresses, their annual salaries or net worth at time of death. All that matters are the relationships: son, daughter, beloved mother, beloved father. In the end, all that matters are the connections, the caring and the love.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Sharing

As you can see, the milkweed is popular around here. This afternoon, an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly was sharing the dining experience with a Honey Bee (top right)! The butterfly and the bees were all in motion in the warm sun, moving from one pom-pom of flowers to the next. But in this instant, it felt as if the butterfly posed briefly for the camera!

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Farewell Lady Bird...

Claudia Alta Taylor Johnson, forever to be remembered as Lady Bird Johnson, passed away today at the age of 94. The wife of President Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ), the 36th President of the United States, Lady Bird was a warm, strong, soft spoken woman. She supported her husband, raised a family, championed the Head Start Program, served this nation and brought environmental causes into the everyday conversations and activities of Americans. President and Mrs. Johnson led this nation during one of its most turbulent eras following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Mrs. Johnson’s legacy includes the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, which carries on and expands upon the work she began in the 1960s to preserve and enhance the native plants of North America.
She will be missed. She will be remembered.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Back To Normal




The Hostas, which were so battered by the hail storm in June, seem unfazed by their shredded, tattered leaves. Now that we are well into July, they are rapidly throwing their flower spikes up. Once the lavender trumpets fully open, the hummingbirds will begin feasting. I’ve never been able to capture those amazing little creatures on film, but I’ll keep trying!

Monday, July 9, 2007

Sweet!

These gorgeous raspberries are volunteers in our landscape. When we first moved here, we found the canes thriving in the spaces between the edges of the woods and the tamer portions of the property. We harvest our fair share, the birds take the rest. And by “harvest” I really mean very few ever make it into the house! Sweet!

The Road Home

I invite you to read the New York Times Editorial, published Sunday, July 8, 2007, entitled The Road Home. It is a thoughtful, unflinching prescription for how the United States can withdraw from Iraq.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

Bridal Wreath

In honor of yesterday’s post, may I present Bridal Wreath. I actually thought I had uploaded this a couple of weeks ago when it was in full bloom. It’s very long lived and incredibly hardy, in that it can handle some pretty tough growing conditions - hot summers, freezing winters. Hmmm... more in common with yesterday’s post than I first realized!

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Love, Romance, Fact, Fiction

We’ve all been sold a bill of goods. It started ages ago with fairy tales, books, television and movies. I’m referring to the “romantic grand gesture”. You know - the hero rides up on the white horse and sweeps the damsel off her feet. The engagement that takes place on the JumboTron at the 50,000 seat stadium. Jetting off from New York to Paris, just for dinner. The clock striking midnight, the pumpkin coach and the kingdom-wide search for the rightful owner of the glass slipper. OK. I’ll admit they’re fun to watch, but that’s not the bedrock foundation of romance.

Nope. It’s the small gesture. The routine, humdrum, ho-hum, daily grind of living a life together with the person you love. It’s putting the other person first in your thoughts, words and deeds. I’m not talking about subjugating yourself to someone else. Just exercising the reflexive thought that always thinks about the impact of your actions on your partner. Listening, holding hands, being there - choosing to be there with your partner - making each other laugh, holding each other through tears, taking out the trash. Seriously - taking out the trash, washing dishes, doing the laundry, cooking meals, paying bills, scooping the kitty litter, mowing the lawn - those are the household chores, which when completed, help peace reign in the home. Finding a way to take on those tasks with a cheerful spirit, or heck, just slogging through them knowing it’s for the good of your little family unit, well, that works too. And let’s not forget the social graces of please, thank you, excuse me and gesundheit. Saying I love you, saying it often. Saying I love you in the heat of an argument just to remind yourself and your partner of where it all sprang from. Saying yes to the one you love. Yes, you’ll attend the concert that you think sounds like fingernails on a blackboard, because your partner thinks it’s the sound of angels. Yes, you’ll attend the poetry reading or the Nascar race or the thimble convention or the woodworking show, because that’s what floats the love of your life’s boat. And you’ll do it with a willing smile or you’ll at least tour the convention floor and settle down in a corner with a good book until you have lunch together!

Not romantic enough for you? You really want to hire the horse and wriggle into the suit of armor? How about leaving a note in your partner’s briefcase or lunch box instead? Or jotting a quick “Thank you! I Love you!” on a Post-It-Note and sticking it in the checkbook just before they write the checks, to pay the bills, because you never have been able to balance the checkbook. Or call them in the middle of the day to say “Hi” and ask “How’s it going?” and actively listen to their answer. Remember their birthday, your anniversaries and pick a bunch of black-eyed-susans from the side of the road and bring them home.

It’s not the grand gesture. It’s the Golden Rule mentality that wins hearts. That’s real romance. That’s real love.

Friday, July 6, 2007

A Snowball For My Sisters

My eldest sister Karen lives in Arizona where it has been over 110 degrees (43 C) for many days and will be thus for many days to come. My sister Gail lives in Georgia where she is experiencing her first southern summer of 80s, 90s (32 C) and oppressive dewpoints, all punctuated with thunderstorms. So this big, beautiful hydrangea, which reminded me of a snowball, is for my intrepid sisters!
Hope you both have lovely weekends...
Sending you both cool thoughts...

Thursday, July 5, 2007

Independence Day

As a child, on the Fourth of July, I used to do a little pageant/musical presentation with our family friends T & E. T was a year older than me and E a year younger than me. At twilight, we would put patriotic, all-American music on the big console style Magnavox stereo and blast it out into the backyard from my parents’ living room. We three girls would sing and march around and then for the grand finale we would light sparklers. I don’t think sparklers were illegal back then. They were so darned exciting and magical - little handheld fireworks that lasted a surprisingly long time. We would write our names in the gathering darkness, while our appreciative audience of parents and grandparents would laugh, applaud and sing along.

One year, I set up an Independence Day display in the dining room. I remember I took a little black cast iron pot from the fireplace and had small flags from all over the world sticking out of it. It was supposed to represent the melting pot which was the United States. I also had informational cards with quotes from The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution and The Bill of Rights. I probably walked every adult through every detail of my American history project! Lord, they were patient and kind people!

I grew up believing in everything pertaining to the Revolutionary War, the founding of our nation and the brilliant fundamental beliefs that a group of intelligent, savvy and ever so wise men drew up. I believed that our country and our founding documents were quite miraculous. Not in a religious sense, but in an intense alchemy of time and place and persons. I felt blessed, lucky, fortunate to be who I was, living where I was and in the time I lived. Vietnam and Civil Rights and Nixon swirled about my childhood and were discussed in my religion class five days a week, in my post Vatican II parochial school. But the ethics of that newly modern religion were inextricably linked to the ethics of the United States founding fathers and informed my moral compass forever.

I may not have had a history display set up yesterday, nor did we have any of those delightful sparklers in hand. But I cried watching dozens of brand new United States Citizens being sworn in. I applauded the fireworks and the cannons of the 1812 overture and my heart still beat faster at the sight of the American flag, at full staff, rippling in the muggy July air. Those who read Pink Granite regularly know my anger and sadness over the current state of affairs in this country. Now you know a little more about how I came to feel so passionately about such things.

Image of The Declaration of Independence courtesy of The National Archives.

Tuesday, July 3, 2007

Freedom!

Wonderful news came across the wires this evening that BBC Correspondent Alan Johnston has been released! He was taken hostage back in March and was being held by a group called the Army of Islam. As the details of the escalating political machinations in Gaza were reported this afternoon, we grew concerned that Mr. Johnston would come to harm. We are grateful his horrible ordeal is over. We wish him well. We wish him peace.

Monday, July 2, 2007

Another Insult

I am both angry and astonished simultaneously. I never thought that President Bush would insult the American people, as well as the judicial system, by commuting the prison sentence component for Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby. I figured Bush would do something for Libby in the eleventh hour of his presidency, just before a new administration took office. At that point Libby would have served better than half of his 30 month sentence for his conviction on four out of five counts of felony obstruction of justice and I assumed Bush would free him. But Bush only waited for a few hours after Libby was told by a Federal appeals court that he would have to report to prison, before Bush declared Libby’s sentence “excessive”.

President Bush has been disconnected from the American people for a very long time. He and his cronies, have been riding roughshod over the Constitution and federal laws for a devastatingly long time. Bush seems determined to leave a legacy of destruction both abroad and at home. Back in 1974 President Gerald Ford pardoned former President Richard Nixon. It was an outrageous, audacious act. But I believe Gerald Ford was well intentioned, in that he wanted the nation to move forward. Bush is not well intentioned. He seems determined to undo the immeasurable greatness that is the Constitution of the United States of America. And he has the nerve, the gall to casually add this insulting act to the pile of his misdeeds just two days before the Fourth of July. Adams, Jefferson, Washington et al must be rolling over in their graves.

Sunday, July 1, 2007

Somewhere Is Here



We spent the weekend mostly around home. The weather was cool, dry and generally clear. That was a great incentive to get outside and do some yard work. We had just finished this afternoon’s round of trimming and raking. I was about to start making dinner, when we noticed it was beginning to rain lightly. At the same time we noticed that the sun was lighting up the tops of the trees in the field across the street. That’s when we saw the rainbow! I made a dash for the camera and ran outside to snap some pictures. The rain was heavy enough that I opened the barn door to get out of the weather and took the photos from there. I believe the last photo is where you can see the shadow or double rainbow the best. It was a great way to finish off the weekend!