A GIFT FROM BIL

 My blogger friend, Sharon, has a post today that gave me an idea for this post.

(You can see her post here.)

I, too, own an autographed Bil Keane cartoon.

And, by the way, he did spell his first name with only one "L".

It was when Judy and I owned and ran a bookstore here in Prescott Valley.

One day his cartoon "The Family Circus" rang especially true for us so I quickly wrote him a letter at the newspaper in Phoenix and asked him if I could have a copy of it for our store.

He kindly sent one up to me, personally signed in one corner and we displayed it in the store until it went out of business.

You don't have to squint - I cropped the signature portion and blew it up.

I had met Mr. Keane many years before at a party and knew him to be a sweet gentleman.

This proved it once again.

When we moved into our present home I was planning what pictures to hang on a wall in my room and ran across this and decided to give it a place of honor.

There's another piece hanging below it, which I'll show you tomorrow.

RAVENS

 In my tours around the blogosphere I often see murals displayed on various blogs and in various parts of the world.

I have not muralized (is that a word?), i.e. gotten into the weekly or monthly posting of pictures of murals on my blog.

Why?

Well, I live a pretty sedentary life so I don't have the opportunity to spot them.

And while I know there are some great ones in Prescott, I don't go there often (except to visit doctors) so I don't spot them either.

But surprise!

I did see one the other day at the end of a small strip mall on the wall of a tattoo parlor.

I'm not sure what it's meant to represent except that there are a lot of friendly ravens in our town and the mural seems to be illustrating how they're taking over the world.

Anyway, here it is.

Oh and I don't know who the artist is, either but the logo in the upper left refers to the name of the parlor: Avatar Tat2.

It's quite colorful.

THE TRICKSTER

 The BRD lives in nearby Prescott, about 12 miles from us.

She also has three cats living with her and they are quite observant.

They like to lie near one of the windows gazing out on the outer world and spotting birds and squirrels.

But this past week a different creature was spotted by one of them.

It was The Trickster!

Trickster is a name given by many Native American tribes to the coyote.

In their mythology he may have at one time been a human, or humans may become coyotes when they die.

He can represent either good or evil or both.

He is known for being a sly creature normally not seen in daylight.

But here was one calmly walking through a populated neighborhood in the middle of a city in BROAD DAYLIGHT!

Trickster, indeed.

APRIL FOOLS' DAY

 There, I've gotten that out of the way so I don't have to fool you.

The real April Fools' joke occurred a couple of days ago shortly after I took these photographs in my neighborhood.

The flowering plum trees breaking out, seemingly overnight, into beautiful blossoms would seem to mark the coming of Spring.

Springtime, that wonderful season of warmer temperatures, bursting flowerbuds, honeybees swarming and various varieties of birds filling the air with song.

But a couple of hours later as I was returning from the mailbox, it was snowing again!

It wasn't sticking at all and it was only tiny dry flakes but it was definitely snow.

Today The Weather Gods predict the mercury is due to rise into the upper 60's.

But I've been fooled before.

I'm not takin' nothin' for granted.

After all, as a meme I received from Crosstown Lori this morning clearly explains: it ain't over 'til it's over.

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

 I was out taking pictures of the flowering plum(?) trees yesterday.

Then a bit later I walked out to the mailbox and it was snowing.

I know I've picked on The Weather Gods several times in the past but I know they can take it because they have a sense of humor.

Do you have a sense of humor?

If you do, it's a good day for it.

Yup, those guys are still making us chuckle groan.

Now, all alliteration aside, please do your best to have a wonderful weekend.

And always remember to keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

(. . . oh, I know how he/she feels . . .)

GROWTH

 I was just reading this morning new figures from the U.S. Census Bureau and guess what was the fastest growing county in the entire country last year?

It was Mighty Maricopa!

Yes, Maricopa County in Arizona, which is dominated by the Metro Phoenix area, was the fasted growing county in the United States in the past year.

It added something over 50,000 people to it's population, which is now at about 4 and a half million people.

So then I did some more Googling around and found that the population of my little "town", Prescott Valley, is now estimated to be over 49 thousand souls and the "little city" to the southwest of us, Prescott, is estimated  to have about 15 hundred fewer people.

I can still remember the first time I laid eyes on Prescott Valley, in 1972 when we moved to Phoenix from Indianapolis, Indiana.

We drove through it on a reconaissance tour of a small part of our new state one weekend.

The standing joke though mostly reality was that Prescott Valley was just street signs and crooked land speculators.

Those guys were getting rich convincing folks back in our country's hinterlands that Prescott Valley was a retirement paradise.

It took a few decades for the place which still officially calls itself a "town" to take off but now it's growing at a rate of nearly 2 percent a year.

The county I live in, Yavapai, now has an estimated population of just below 244 thousand.

Which should answer SWMBO's frequent questions when we are out in the community "Where are all these people coming from and where are they going?"

Of course, with all of that additional traffic, there are inevitably scenes like this.

So enjoy the growth if you can, fellow Prescott Valley-ites, but for my and yours and everyone else's sake, learn to drive a little more slowly and a lot more carefully.

The city fathers and mothers can call it just a "town" but it's actually part of a metropolitan area of over 100 thousand people now.

The Old West is hard to find nowadays.

LIFE CYCLES

 As I have grown ancient older, I've found some differences in my life.

Oh there are the obvious things like doctor visits and eyeglasses and various other devices to prolong my span of years.

But I was thinking of my sleep cycle.

When I was younger I stayed awake until late at night, either carousing with friends or reading a book that kept me in thrall.

And I could sleep half the day if my schedule allowed it.

(It usually didn't, which accounts for the lines in my face.)

But now in my dotage Golden Years, I find the arms of Morpheus taking hold earlier and earlier.

Some times there is a wakeful period in the middle of the night and sometimes I sleep through the dark hours.

But frequently I find myself waking and rising for the day at around 6 a.m.

When this first started I found it unusual.

But I've grown accustomed to it and rather enjoy being awake for the dawning of the light.

There are other things that have changed in my life, too.

For example, The Imaginary Gods used to say coffee was bad for us.

Then it was good for us.

The same with red wine and chocolate and even red meat.

(I never went along with their affection for kale, by the way.)

So I've decided to just ignore all of their well-meaning advice and live out my years as I prefer.

Well I might heed the advice of an old-timer, Benjamin Franklin.

"Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise."

But other than that I'll ignore the punditry.

After all -