Chalk Art

Prescott, Arizona, is a place of festivals throughout the summer months.  Today there were a couple of them.  First the Summit Bank chalk art gathering, in which artists of all ages and talents are invited to use the parking lot for their creations.

As noted, the talent runs the gamut here.  But everyone has a good time.

This artist, Lysa Ashley from Corona, California, is in a professional division.

The subject matter runs from realistic to cartoon characters.

This fellow has the right idea, stretched out on a chaise to work on his art.

Another one of the professionals from California, Lori Escalera from Vista.

The festival is in its second or third year and continues to gain in popularity, for the artists and for the onlookers.

Tomorrow, I'll show you some scenes from a European motorcar stopover.

Sedona

SWMBO and I drove over to Sedona today to celebrate our 40th anniversary.  8 days late but at this age, we wait for the weather to cooperate.


First stop: Tlaquepaque.

It's a touristy arts and crafts center but it's done so well, it's always been a favorite place of ours.  It was modeled after the town of Tlaquepaque, Jalisco just outside of Guadalajara in Mexico.

Lots of Spanish/Mexican style architecture.  Beautiful big sycamore trees dominate some of the plazas.

Most of the art is Southwestern-oriented but Sedona being what it is, you can find plenty of Asian influences as well.

There's also a touch of whimsy afoot, as in this sculpture of a big pig.  A nearby placard says the name of it is "Eat More Beef."

Inside El Rincon, a Mexican restaurant and tavern . . .

There's a group of "guardians" . . .

Though this member of the group looks about as tired as I felt after awhile.

One shop features treasures from the sea . . .

This sleepy fellow appeared to be related to the pig.  He was standing watch over a parking lot, next to a sculptured Saguaro cactus.

It's a very pictureresque place, tempting to the camera . . .

But after a period of walking around, staring at the goods in the shops, one grows weary.  And thirsty.  So . . .

Our visit to Sedona ended with martinis and a great lunch at Shugrue's Hillside . . . and then the drive home.

Who are those guys? Or gals?

I was just looking at the stats on my blog.  Pretty interesting.  For example, there have been 265 page views in the past week.  I expect a bunch of them have been mine.  219 of them were from the United States.  But also represented were Australia, Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Canada.  I can understand that because I frequently read bloggers in all of those countries.  So they read me.

But what I find interesting is the other countries represented.  Iran, Malaysia, Egypt and South Korea.  Iran is my second highest number of page views with 18.  I don't think I've ever had a comment by anyone from Iran, not to mention anyone from Egypt or South Korea, so that has me curious.  I think I have heard from someone in Malaysia once but it's been a long time ago.

In a line made famous by a movie in which either Butch Cassidy (Paul Newman) or the Sundance Kid (Robert Redford) said it over and over as they were being pursued by a Pinkerton man . . "who are those guys?"

http://youtu.be/ZIie9OosnEM

Comfort

Jazz is happy.  He got a larger box.

Meanwhile, Blackwell has found a new snoozy place on a ledge of the cat tree.

Hmmm.  I think I'll go take a nap, too.

Lazy Bones

Today was just one of those lazy days.

About the only thing I got done today was to re-shape my beard.

Hoagy Carmichael wrote the song for the day but Leon Redbone does a great job of singing it.

No snow, sun back

Ah, winter is gone.  Again.  There was snow on the ground this emorning but the sun was out today and the temperature climbd to 51 degrees.  Tomorrow the high is predicted to be 64.

Meantime, Jazz was pouting last night.

I'm not sure if it was because of the cold, snowy weather . . . or because her box was too small.

April in Arizona!

The "wooly worm" was right!

This is what I woke up to this morning after a late winter storm blew through.

Of course Blackwell slipped past me and went out to explore.

Over in Prescott snow had fallen overnight, too.  The BRD snapped this photo in her back yard this morning.

Now just to warm you up, here's a picture of some cloverleaf rolls I baked a couple of days ago.



Here's hoping you have a warm weekend.

Wooly worm weather predictions

Yesterday, I saw a wooly worm hurrying across my yard.

Well, now, I thought, that's unusual.

Wooly worms are supposed to show up in the fall, aren't they?  To predict winter?

By the way, that picture above is just to show you the relative size of the wooly worm.

Turns out the wooly worm was right.  A winter storm is blowing into the state as I write, bringing more snow.  We may not get much here but the weather wizards are predicting up to 10 or more inches up around Flagstaff.  That's 80 miles away and about 2,000 feet higher than here.

Oh and one more thing.  That "wooly worm" is actually a caterpillar.  But I like to call them wooly worms.

40 and counting!

Take a look at this young clear-eyed couple.

Straight out of the Old West.

Or at least out of the Old West Picture Gallery. 

The (rather costumed and posed) photo was taken nearly 40 years ago of my wife and myself.  Yes, that is truly SWMBO (She Who Must Be Obeyed) . . the love of my life.

Let's take a closer look.

They look to be filled with hope and confidence as they head into the future. 

Today it is exactly 40 years since we were married.  We don't look much like that anymore.  And, as the oft-told story goes, "...man, what a ride!"  We've covered a lot of territory in the past 40 years, had some great and some not-so-great times.  Amazingly, we're still together and content to stay that way until the trip is over.

Some of my long-ago friends have said in the recent past "my God, I'm amazed you're still alive."  Considering some of my adventures I'm a little surprised at that myself.

But older age has brought less adventures, less risk-taking and perhaps even some common sense.  Most of that I owe to the beautiful gal who has stayed at my side all of these years.

Whaddaya say, girl?  Let's go for 50!

Home is where you like the weather!

I was reading my home town newspaper, the Mountrail County Promoter from Stanley, North Dakota, this morning.  The editor's column told of how they'd had some fresh snowfall up there on a couple of days this past week.  She said she loved the four seasons they experience, even with the severity of the winters, and she couldn't imagine how anyone could live where it was always the same year around.

Well, I left North Dakota back in 1969 and, other than a few visits, I've never been back.  I have lived in South Dakota, Indiana, Arizona, deep into Mexico, Texas and back to Arizona.  I note that I have lived since 1972 in either the Southwest or further south in Mexico.  (That allows for people who insist Texas is in the Southwest when, if you look on a map, it's actually in the South.)  But that's 39 years, compared with the 29 I lived in North Dakota.  And the three years when I lived in Indiana were, I have come to find out, unusually warm, mild winters.

And I love it.  I loved being able to take a swim on Christmas Day.  Here in Arizona, which has been my home for 33 years, the temperature never gets down to "North Dakota winter" cold.  I can remember 30 and 40 below.  I can remember snowstorms that covered cars parked in the streets and even one that buried a train.  I can remember, as a kid, ice-skating on the streets in my home town.  But not anymore.

And that time I lived in Texas we got out after less than two years, done in by year-round humidity.  And that wasn't even on the coast!

Guadalajara, Mexico and environs was our home for nearly five years and we loved the climate there.  Year-round temperatures averaged around 70 to 75 degrees.  When the rainy season came it frequently rained only at night and the days were sunny again.

The part of Arizona we live in now doesn't get the ultra-high temperatures of the low desert around Phoenix.  So we get a seasonal change, just not the severe changes I was used to in North Dakota.

But, that's just me.  I have heard people who live all over this country brag about their climate and say they wouldn't live anywhere else.  I guess it's just whatever you like.

War

I've been sort of watching the Ken Burns special "The Civil War" on PBS tonight.  Americans versus Americans.  Thousands, no, tens of thousands killed on both sides.  For what?  145 years later we are still inflamed in this country over the same issues.  No, not slavery.  State's rights.  The disagreement over whether the individual or the city or the state shall determine one's destiny or whether that destiny shall be decided by a federal government.  It is, apparently, a disagreement that shall never be settled.  The sides are about evenly divided and therefore there shall mathematically never be agreement.  Both sides are sure of their way, of their mind.  How can a nation, a people be so divided?  After decades of observing this indecision, I cannot understand it.  And I mourn  the separation of people and their minds.   It is the same in every country, it seems. 

No agreement. 

No peace.

No hope.

Just war.

Why I don't brag much about my cookin'

My wife, the famed SWMBO (She Who Must Be Obeyed, for you newcomers), has left the cooking to me for several weeks.  I've had some successes, more than a few failures but I have learned to make whole wheat bread (in the bread machine) pretty good.

But.

And that's a pretty big "but".  SWMBO has been cooking for 60 years and she does it instinctually, which is to say she doesn't look at recipes very often, she just cooks.  And it turns out fantastic, without any of that beauty queen business I have to go through in the kitchen.  I watch in amazement and think "how does she know how to do that?"  But as she says, she's been doing it for 60 years and things just stick after you've done them a trillion dozen times.

So she cooked tonight.  A pork roast, mashed sweet potatoes, sauteed apples, a salad.  Pretty basic.  Except what she tossed together in an hour or so would have taken me until the middle of next week.  And it still wouldn't have been as good.

So, I can brag a bit about my delicious meals.  But if I really want one, nothing is better than Mama's home cooking.  Thank you, dear one, for many, many, many good meals.

(Now if I could just get rid of this spare tire around my middle . . .)

One more game, one more time

The Butler Bulldogs once again will play Monday night for the N.C.A.A. basketball men's national championship.  Butler is the first team from Indiana to reach the Final Four in consecutive years and today they defeated this year's Cinderella team, Virginia Commonwealth University.  So, after a heartbreaking loss last year, Butler will try again.


This is Blue Two II, the mascot bulldog of the team.  He looks ready.

Black and White

My "all" black cat has a surprise for me when she likes to warm my bed for me at night.  As she turns onto her side, she reveals a bit of white underneath!

Color is everything!

How to make sure no one can miss your business.

A word of wisdom about cats

My friend, Tom, has blogged today about an incidence of vicious, bloodthirsty, killer cats.  You can read about it on his blog by clicking here.  Just scroll down past his commentary on elephant seals.  Or, better yet, read about the much larger and more threatening seals to get to a link about the sweet little house cat.  Then come back here.


Okay.  Done now?  Then to lead further credence to his story, I'll relate one of my own which occurred only yesterday.  I was sitting in an easy chair, watching a basketball game on television, when a large black cat landed in my lap.  My beloved Blackwell.  But he's gotten pretty fat and pretty heavy and a surprise is a surprise.  So, to tease him a bit, I picked him up and suspended him for a moment or two upside down.  Now, I can tell you, cats don't like to be upside down.  I don't know why.  Perhaps it is uncertainty about whether they will remain suspended or be dropped.  At any rate, he lashed out.  Not viciously.  Just looking for some element of "purchase", as my wife's father used to say.  He found it.  Here's the proof.


So it goes.  Never tease a creature that is much faster and has longer sharper claws than you do.

Jus' Lookin'

When the back door is opened to the outer world, Blackwell is the first to arrive . . to look and listen, to ponder on this world of chirping birds and barking dogs.

But like any good watch-cat, he is also aware of sounds behind him.  Take a look at these next two photos to see one of his ears turned on it's 180 degree axis to detect what may be creeping up on him from his rear.


Ah, that we could do the same.

A sick day

I have had a lousy 24 hours.  I don't know why.  It started last night with a pain in my chest.  Now, don't worry.  It wasn't "chest pain" as my cardiologist asks me about.  Though early in the morning, I began to wonder about that.  No, it was heartburn, I think.  Nothing I tried seemed to do anything to relieve it and I was awake most of the night.  SWMBO finally convinced me to drink a cup of tea this afternoon and that seemed to start my recovery.  I slept most of the day, off and on, but I still feel weak and weary tonight.  But definitely on the mend.  My loving and worrying wife also convinced me to dine on some egg drop soup and a fruit salad this evening and that, plus a shower I took a couple of hours ago, has me feeling much better.  The chest pain has gone away but my "love handles" are a bit sore from straining on the toilet.  (Yeah, I knew you'd want to know that.)  As Scarlett O'Hara said "tomorrow is another day" and I expect I shall be back in the pink by then.

Now then.  To a matter of some concern.  And I shall excuse you non-sports loving people at this time if you wish.  To the rest of you a report on my reaction to today's results in the NCAA basketball tournament.  I was amazed and thrilled once again at the success of the Butler University basketball team.  It was an exciting game today that ended with their victory over Florida in overtime.  And for the second year in a row this team, which last year was called "the Cinderella team" as it made it to the Championship game only to be finally defeated by Duke University, has won its way into the Final Four.  When tomorrow's games are done, there will be only four teams left in the tournament and Butler will be one of them.  The school is located in Indianapolis, Indiana, where I lived and worked for three years back in the late 1960's and early 1970's.  That explains my support of the team.

On the other hand, the Arizona Wildcats from the University of Arizona in Tucson went down to defeat a little while ago to the University of Connecticut.  Arizona had knocked Duke out of this year's tournament the other night so there was considerable hope that they, too, might advance to the Final Four.  But it was not be as they missed two shots in the closing seconds.  Either one of them would have resulted in a victory.  But that's basketball.  More to the point, it is truly March Madness.

So long, Liz

Elizabeth Taylor died today.  She was 79.  In her final years, she was often confined to a wheelchair and her beauty had faded.

But that happens to all of us.  Let us remember her instead for the ravishing beauty she was most of her life.

And let me put one other lie to rest.  Despite my claims over many decades, she was neither my sister nor my cousin.  But I'll still miss her.

Just a hint, weatherman!!!!!

The late, great Carl Perkins (with George Harrison alongside) doing some picking on The World is Waiting for the Sunrise (Sunshine!!!).