Sidetracked Charley

  First let me say the bear photo probably has nothing to do with this blog. It is just one of the photos I have taken recently that Windows 10 has allowed me access to. And it is a photo of which I am very proud of. And which scared my sister because she thought I was more intelligent then to get this close to something that large and unpredictable. I didn't admit it to here but I was scared shitless after I took my photos. Obviously sometimes my right brain gets in the way of rational thought. Like when the Hondo fire came over the crest within a half hour of my house in Questa and I took roll after roll of film with a 50 mm lens, not a telephoto, and was unaware of the sparks falling out out of the black clouds of smoke over my head until a week later I got the prints back.  But there are events and emergencies in our lives we cannot hold a camera as barrier between it and us. Real life which is not even recordable when it is happening. But sadly I am gifted or plagued with...

Sundog Dawn The holidays and me are a love/dread relationship. Heavy on the dread. I once wrote an article about Murphy's Laws for the Holidays. Number one was if it can go wrong it will go wrong on a holiday. Mom died on Thanksgiving. And I was hit by a drunk skier on Christmas Eve. Everyone wanted me to go away until after Christmas. When I was finally able to get an appointment with a neurologist he looked at my MRI scans and said, "Well, the good news is you didn't die." I start gritting my teeth before Thanksgiving which may be the reason I broke a tooth this morning. Dentist is out of the office but I will call Monday anyway and see if there is anything which can be done. I know don't chew on that side. And my guess is it a tooth with a root canal because it doesn't hurt. But my tongue plays with the gap, which has edges. Minor compared with some of the news which has been churning around me and those I care about deeply. And for those I don...

It is quite difficult to stay on track through guests, holiday events, and all the cooking and shopping that entails. And as I discovered yesterday after the last house guest had departed it is near impossible to get immediately back on track even when the guest in question cleans up after herself expertly. And helps you with things like unloading the van from the fair. I had set the goal of re-hanging all my paintings sitting in boxes in the studio and getting most of the decorating done on the fresh cut tree. I got two paintings hung and most of the decorations on before collapsing before the television and wasting the afternoon watching DVD's and making trips to the kitchen for left-overs to munch on. I could blame the fatigue on fibro which probably had something to do with it. But basically it was a rebellion over a week of "have-to-do's." I really did not want to do anything regardless of energy level. So I enjoyed doing nothing much yesterday, but that st...