a smackerel of something

“The spring has sprung, the grass is rizz.

I wonder where them birdies is?”

-Winnie the Pooh

When the spring has sprung and the grass is riz, it's time for hippo birdie two ewes!

HAPPY

20th BIRTHDAY

KATE!!

with very much love from all your cacti and a Certain Admirer all of whom miss you dreadful.

"What would I do?" I said to Pooh,
"If it wasn't for you," and Pooh said: "True,
It isn't much fun for One, but Two,
Can stick together, says Pooh, says he.

"That's how it is," says Pooh.

If you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day, so I never have to live without you.

- Winnie the Pooh

shummerrr

I've been pondering two things lately. One is the indescribable beauty this world contains in things we don't much talk about. Light filtering through leaves and shampooed hair and that contented bubbledy feeling after you've wrung the last laugh out of the last corner of a joke at dinner and carry the dishes into the kitchen still giggling. And singing hymns from four differnet hymnals, the old creaky pages and everyone having a different number...and Mother's voice going deep where none save Dad can follow. Hah. And those 3 pounds of bacteria happily living in our intestines, churning out vitamin K. What a huge community it must be to make 3 whole pounds out of microscopic organisms. Ha. And laughs. I love how different they are person to person. Some people's kind of jump out suddenly, and other people's rumble around in their chests and you can predict the moment they'll hit the air. There's so much to notice when you're really trying to "live to the hilt" and "be all there" in every "situation you believe to be the will of God" that I barely have time for it. That's Jim Elliot. Or Elisabeth. Or Elisabeth quoting him. Either way...

And yet the second thing is that "these are our soldiering years". That's Carmichael. I'm reading her biography right now and am thoroughly inspired. She had an unflagging joyful soldiering spirit. And both are true...that our soldiership years in a place full of so much darkness can be dappled with light of different kinds of laughs and silly things like fuzzy weeds that filter the light. It's beautiful and somehow solemn too. Evil pervades but grace abounds--and reigns. Something to grab hold of!

old man and the sea.

Or not quite quite! haha

This is Istanbul, Turkey.

2008.

bikecycle pot.

among the very first piccas taken by the dear ould harold archimedes kodak.

and edited I think rather heavily in picasa?

This is Allentown, Pennsylvania.

2008.

panorami.

[View all panorami large - click click - if you please.]

Have a peep at that little stunner. Isn't it amazing? Look at the flare! The perspective!
Yes, this lil shot was taken by the ever fabulous Sarah. I love it [and her incidentally]. It's basically the view from the leftermost side of our balcony. Taken earlier this year -- the sun now comes round the other side of that building.

Following - some more panorami.

now 'tis sleepytime.
'night.

of card readers and other mischief

Card readers of title being the mechanical mechanism thingum and not the fortune tellers.

Mine is broke somethin awful.

We unscrewed its little body and glued the little mini usb thingum back in its place. Twice .Both times an insertion of usb cord resulted in said thingum coming loose again. So - till we get a new one: less recent photos, more talking. Which is a pity, since I got a smashing shot of our cucumbers earlier.

On the postive side, I'm reading Orwell's Homage to Catalonia in my spare time and stumbled across a most delightful little word:

pannikin.

How darling is that?? Pannikin! Hehehe - it makes me giggle every time. And especially when I imagine Orwell saying it. There he is, up in the mountains of Spain, whipped by the freezing wind, huddling in trenches, discussing ammunition and guard duty, politics and prep and the front lines, and then he nonchalantly drops this word. Pannikin. And I get the giggles again. Pannikin? Seriously? Hehe! I can just see them: the stalwart fellows speaking around their precious cigarettes, with their muddy knees pulled up to their chests hunched around the little olive oil lamp. "'Ey you, bloke in the corner. Toss me my pannikin, there's a lad." And all the Spaniards burst into fits of giggles.

It's definitely up there with others like ergo, defenestrate, and kabuki.

And because a post is always better with a few photos, some recent unposteds:

P.S. HAPPY FIFTIETH BLOG POST TO MEEEE!

haze

i'm tired.

but i figured out my aperture problem. i kept getting frustrated because it would only allow me to go down to 2.8 sometimes; other times no further than 4.0. Confusing. But it all came together the other day. . . it only allows me to go down to 2.8 when I am fully zoomed out. No wonder. The only question is why it automatically locks back to 4.0 when I start zooming in. Who wants small aperture with wide shots? Confusing.

snippets of the balcony, wot.

We bought a garden today!

All separately, and pieced it together into the blacony hanger thingum. Voiler!

Wooden clothespins are simply essential. The plastic ones fail utterly both

a) in terms of functionality and particularly

b) in terms of aesthetics.

Wooden clothespins make me feel comfy and homey and happy. Soha.

And now for our new garden!

Peeping in on the resident multitasker...

and in closing, fansies.

affectionately,

ellable

refractions

sooc excluding red tones.

intermission

listen
simon & garfunkel

b&w for edgar

yup.

finis.