Wet Wednesday

Last night in a restaurant parking lot in the pouring rain.

Our back door, snow shovel and broom on guard.  It’s hard to take pictures of falling rain, especially in the dark.  This morning there’s sheets of ice everywhere.

We slid along water reds and greens, the changing lights captured in the canvas of wet tar.”
― Ruth Reichl, Delicious!

Odd

One Liner Wednesday:  It’s Not What You Think

“You don’t get explanations in real life. You just get moments that are absolutely, utterly, inexplicably odd.”
― Neil Gaiman

Three Quotes: The End

“The sky both exists and doesn’t exist. It has substance and at the same time doesn’t. And we merely accept that vast expanse and drink it in.”
― Haruki Murakami

Please feel free to take up the challenge of Three Quotes in Three Days.  Thanks again to Laura Bruno Lilly for passing this challenge along to me.

How do you like the blues in that sky?  Is that not a vast expanse worth drinking in?  This is a phone photo taken in the spring through the front window of my car (don’t worry, I was parked).  At first I couldn’t figure out why the top of the sky was such a vivid blue until I remembered with a forehead smack and an eye roll that there’s a blue tint at the top of my windshield.  So there you go, a secret filter photo.  If great photographers are not supposed to reveal their secrets, that’s why I’m not one of them.

Our weather has been up and down and all over the place this week.  The sunny cheery blue sky suddenly grows menacing and dark, the wind comes up and the thunder grumbles and rolls.  Rain falls in buckets or fine mists, but in such short bursts that if you turn away you might miss it.  Then the sun comes back out to say “just kidding” until it’s warm enough again to turn the fans back on.  Rewind and repeat.  About four times a day.

I’ve been using this unpredictable weather as an excuse for not walking to the grocery store which is only a couple of blocks from my house because I would not like to get caught in the rain and struck by lightning.  Even though I am out of coffee cream, which is pretty strong motivation.  And driving there would be the height of slothful lackadaisicalness.  Yes, that is a real word.  It means unwillingness to get off your butt.  Or out of your car to take a normal photo.

Hope your Wednesday is wonderful in a lackadaisical laid back way.  I’ve had fun matching pictures to quotes!  You should try it.

Art du Jour 60

For the big six-O I am calling this Adventures in Watercolour.  Whether I will ever revisit this place is up in the air for now. This is what I accomplished by paying attention to a little watercolour tutorial and using the wet on wet technique. Up to a point, of course and then did too many embellishments, but over all I think it’s not bad. The crooked border was an impulsive afterthought. And this one I’m happy with simply because it is recognizable as an elephant. So, Happy Middle of the Week Wednesday! I’m drinking that midnight eclipse coffee again and planning on getting many, many things done. Just have to decide what. Perhaps some pseudo LSD hallucination-like wet on wet abstract watercolour blended creations. Whoa. Brace yourself.

Act Like Summer and Walk Like Rain

Ever have one of those days when you come across several bits of  inspirational blather that surprisingly doesn’t annoy the hell out of you, with one little gem tucked in the middle which makes absolutely no sense so you love it best of all?

Well I’m having one of those days.

What the heck is a heart print?  Is it like a foot print or a finger print but messier?  Okay that one was mildly annoying.

Happy First Wednesday in March everybody.  Dream like sunshine and dance like Spring.  I know, not the same, but I gave it a shot.

Word Saturated Wednesday

Boo!  It’s another blustery snowy day!  Going to work, although staying at home has a lot more appeal.  My advice from the stars today is to avoid going out in public.  Ha, they could give me that advice every day and most days I would be very happy to take it.

“It could be a tough day for dealing with other people.  They will be contrary and hypercritical and you don’t have the patience for dealing with quirky, childish behaviour.  If you can avoid being in public or in large group situations, that might ease your feeling of tension.” 

Well, really, where’s the challenge in that?  Bring it on, all you childish quirky people.  I’m getting rather good at doing the deep breathing thing and letting things go.  It doesn’t always work the way I want it to though.  I had a bout of insomnia a couple of nights ago and took so many deep breaths I thought I might hyperventilate.  Obviously my technique needs a bit of work.

Our street was scraped and plowed and the snow carted away yesterday!  Snow removal is a lot like housework.  You can stop removing snow when spring arrives.  And you can stop doing housework…..when the house burns down.  The ruts were deep and frozen solid, and scraping the bottom of the car halfway down the street was probably not all that good for it.  The good news is, although my car looks like I drove it through some sort of wet dust storm, it’s too cold to wash it.  When it wasn’t too cold, it was too sloppy and dirty out to be bothered.  I don’t have to concern myself with the locks freezing if they don’t get wet until April.

Yesterday I spent most of the day reading The Bird House, by Kelly Simmons.  It skips around from present to past, but I’ll forgive it for that because reading  it that way made it easier to understand why Ann, as a grandma, did the things she did with her daughter-in-law, her son, her long ago departed daughter, her granddaughter and the great love of her life.  It’s a good story about family, and how everyone has their secrets and their flaws and their own interpretation of how and why things happened.  And keep on happening, for that matter.  And how the things we believe to be true influence everything we do.  Well – just read it for yourself I guess, and see if you can explain it any better than that.  It’s a good book.

What a perfect picture of an Adirondack chair and green grass and flowers and summer related things.  And now I’m off to battle the blizzard and deal with the freakish mob.

No wordless Wednesday for me.  Although I do promise to bite my tongue from here on in and if I can’t think of something nice to say I vow to say nothing at all.  There could be a lot of deep breathing involved in that.

A Wet and Windy Working Wednesday

Happy 4th of July to my American friends.  There will be no picnics in our immediate vicinity today with wind and rain and generally nasty summer weather which had me closing all the windows last night.  How gloomy and grim.  And cold!  July is not supposed to be this cold.  It will all blow east as it always does and we’ll be sitting in the sunshine again tomorrow.

Only people who know the words to America the Beautiful will get this silly cartoon.  It turned up on my calendar today and made me laugh out loud.  Nope, some days it doesn’t take much at all.

Inspiration comes from mysterious sources.

Today I think I will remember to take my umbrella from the front seat of the car.  The short walk in the parking lot to get to it last night was a drizzly and dripping one.  Not drenching, but close enough.  A windshield wipers full on drive home.  A two blanket sleep with the windows closed.  Mother Nature is messing with our heads.  When the temperature shoots back up to the mid thirties and I’m comatose in the heat I will try to remember this damp and dewy day.