Politics, pranks, and flamingos

Even though it’s the second week of April, it’s still colder than usual. We even awoke to snow one morning this week. A late April Fool’s joke. Definitely not flamingo weather! And it seems to have brought out the "best" of some of our residents:

The day after the local paper became a finalist for a Pulitzer for its story about Senator Craig’s bathroom antics, the senator released a statement saying that his decision not to run for another term of office "pre-dated" the bathroom sting.

Right. As Groucho Marx once said: Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.

There is a property in the Boise foothills where a mansion sits on a large hill. It was owned by one of Idaho’s richest residents, who donated it to the city last year. This year, as the spring grass began to grow, a huge phallic symbol gradually appeared on the hillside. Landscapers tried to cosmetically repair it – but instead accidentally emphasized its shape even more. This evening, the local paper ran this item under breaking news: "Obscene Prank Erased from Boise’s S____ Hill," and the article goes on to say that the area has now been replanted and is covered with a bed of straw.

Next thing you know, it’ll be covered with mating flamingos…

Chasing the wind

When the wind blows, this is one busy cat. I’m not sure if this is a windmill or a lawn ornament. When I researched online I found pictures of "mole chaser windmills" that are built similarly to this one. Mole chasers are supposed to create vibrations in the ground when the wind blows and the vibrations are supposed to make moles crazy and drive them away. But the ones I saw were plain vanilla; not built with character like this one.

When I think about it, I’ve never seen a mole "tunnel" in any Idaho yard. They may not be suited to a high desert climate. So this is probably a "decorative windmill", along the lines of spinners, and wooden ducks with wings that circle in the wind. But if I were buying one of these, I’d choose the cat, of course.

In other news, the daily paper here has been named a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in journalism for their stories on our infamous toe-tapping Senator Craig – who is still in office and still fighting to have his guilty plea rescinded. Maybe we need a "mole chaser" after all…

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The conscience is the most flexible material in the world. Today you cannot stretch it over a mole hill; while tomorrow it can hide a mountain.
- Edward Bulwer-Lytton

If animals could speak the dog would be a blundering outspoken fellow, but the cat would have the rare grace of never saying a word too much.
- Mark Twain

Animal art and reflection

I was originally going to write about an AP article I saw today about zoo animals that paint. [Painting, along with other activities, helps ease boredom and provides a stimulating "task" for animals to do.]

And I was going to write about the Asian Elephant Art & Conservation Project in Thailand [they train the elephants they care for to paint, then they sell the paintings to help fund conservation efforts].

But then I was thinking about C’s excellent presentation tonight at the county library about Mambo and Oscar Hijuelos, who wrote "The Mambo Kings."

And got lost in deep of reflection…

Watching a Sunday

A weekend flashes by too quickly – in the blink of a cat’s eye.

But we visited D and heard her story about running out of gas on the freeway and the valiant stranger who stopped to help. And we had afternoon coffee at the local coffee place. Took walks between the rain showers and household chores, had a bit of brie and apple slices during dinner. And now the piano calls, before I call it a day.

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A Sunday well-spent brings a week of content. [one can always hope]
- Proverb

The cat is above all things, a dramatist.
- Margaret Benson

Ready to burst?

More signs of spring; finally warmer after being sooo cold all week.

Shopping at the art supply store (think: candy store), watching storyteller nonpareil Ben K perform at a bookstore, walking with C in the sunshine and taking photos, drawing and blending luscious colors together on smooth bristol to jazz dee-jayed by C, looking up art cards on the internet, reading a great email from my 10 y/o niece and a touching one from a friend.

A superb Saturday.

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One day I shall burst my buds of calm and blossom into hysteria.
~ Barbara Johnson

Golden moment

On a golden spring day…

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Every moment is a golden one for him [or her] who has the vision to recognize it as such.
~ Henry Miller

A box without hinges, key, or lid, yet golden treasure inside is hid.
~ JRR Tolkien

To improve the golden moment of opportunity, and catch the good that is within our reach, is the great art of life.
~ Samuel Johnson

Water

While visiting the Paris Daily Photo site, I saw that the theme for April 1st for the Daily Photo group blogs is water. So, I’ll join in the fun – add my interpretation of H2O. If you look closely, you may find a fish in there somewhere. Check out the PDP for an amazing photo, and for links to all the other Daily Photo blogs.
http://www.parisdailyphoto.com/

A few meditations about water…

His laughter, which was never far below the surface of his conversation, now sparkled like a splash of water in sunlight.
~ Joseph Lelyveld

Don't you realize that the sea is the home of water? All water is off on a journey unless it's in the sea, and it's homesick, and bound to make its way home someday.
~ Zora Neale Hurston

In Amsterdam the water is the mistress and the land the vassal. Throughout the city there are as many canals and drawbridges as bracelets on a Gypsy's bronzed arms.
~ Felix Marti-Ibanez

If American English could develop a vocabulary and way of thinking like Hopi, there would be one word meaning: "A stone is skimming across the water’s surface, it is approaching dematerialization, there is no longer stone or water, the mind where the stone & water skim dissolves in sunlight, there is only the skimming movement when you’re breathing."
Such a word remains timelessly current.
~ Norman Weinstein

Richly colored

Color – spent part of the weekend with colored pencils and experimenting with dark, light, transparency. Like stained glass on paper. I love color – and always have.

The Museum of Modern Art currently has an exhibition, "Reinventing Color," which shows how modern artists have dealt with color. Some have dealt with it more successfully than others, IMHO. Still, check out the online exhibition – fascinating ideas and work.
http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/2008/colorchart/

And some other views about color:

Orange is the happiest color.
-Frank Sinatra

Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises.
-Pedro Calderon de la Barca

Pink is the color of romance and a friend tells me that the girl with the pink dress at the party is the one who is selected for each dance.
-Alfred Carl Hottes

I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day.
-Vincent Van Gogh

Color possesses me. I don't have to pursue it. It will possess me always, I know it. That is the meaning of this happy hour: Color and I are one. I am a painter.
-Paul Klee

Geese and gaggle

These two were part of a gaggle of geese sunning themselves in a local park. They fly in by the river; some have learned to beg for treats from passers-by. Though some people complain about goose poop, it’s good the geese have made their place here. I love watching the goslings at the Nature Center in spring and hearing their poignant calls as they fly overhead in the fall.

"Gaggle" is an interesting-sounding word. It refers to a group of geese on the ground. A "skein" of geese refers to those in flight. Skein reminds me of yarn, as if they are connected by strands of colorful yarn "knitting" their V in the sky. I wonder why they aren’t called a "Vee" of geese when in flight?

I think gaggle would be an excellent word to describe a group of legislators arguing. Perhaps it could be expanded to include lobbyists, too. Maybe we should introduce a bill to expand the definition of gaggle. But then perhaps it would just be another wild goose chase…

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If you feel the urge, don't be afraid to go on a wild goose chase. What do you think wild geese are for anyway?
-Will Rogers

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself.
-Lao Tzu

Best intentions and gardening

People are coming out of their houses now, digging around in their yards, raking, pulling weeds and brush, trimming bushes and trees.

Gardening can be a good thing - do it enough and you'll develop arms of steel... :-)

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You can bury a lot of troubles digging in the dirt.
~Author Unknown

Despite the gardener's best intentions, Nature will improvise.
~Michael P. Garafalo

When weeding, the best way to make sure you are removing a weed and not a valuable plant is to pull on it. If it comes out of the ground easily, it is a valuable plant.
~Author Unknown

An exceptional trout

My "catch" at the Nature Center yesterday…

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I never forget a face, but in your case I'll make an exception.
-Groucho Marx

Listen to the sound of the river and you will get a trout.
-Irish Proverb

Taking a walk

On a Saturday afternoon…

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People create their own questions because they are afraid to look straight. All you have to do is look straight and see the road, and when you see it, don't sit looking at it -- walk.
~ Ayn Rand

A person often meets his destiny on the road he took to avoid it.
~ Jean de la Fontaine

Fun with the sun

A fun sun illuminated by sunlight…

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The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, thanks to their art and intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun.
~ Pablo Picasso

Tribute

A salute to Arthur C. Clarke, innovative thinker, inventor, and writer; the author of "2001: A Space Odyssey." He transcended into the greater cosmos this week at the age of 90.

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The only way of finding the limits of the possible is by going beyond them into the impossible.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Politicians should read science fiction, not westerns and detective stories.

If we have learned one thing from the history of invention and discovery, it is that, in the long run - and often in the short one - the most daring prophecies seem laughably conservative.

--Arthur C. Clarke

Zesty weather

Zesty weather lately; wind, rain, sunshine. Storm clouds hovering in the background behind Camel’s Back. All of it, good for the soul…

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It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.
~Charles Dickens

In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours.
~Mark Twain

Through a cat's eye

Double-take
double vision
but no Doppelgänger

just a reflection
through a cat’s eye

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Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?
-Groucho Marx

In a cat's eye, all things belong to cats.
-English Proverb

Catching a rainbow

Dramatic weather today with rain showers, sleet, wind, and sunshine. And a rainbow…

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And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.
~G.K. Chesterton

The work will wait while you show the child the rainbow, but the rainbow won't wait while you do the work.
~Patricia Clafford

The true harvest of my life is intangible - a little star dust caught, a portion of the rainbow I have clutched.
~Henry David Thoreau

Ready for spring

Ready for a new couple and their family. Ready for birdsong. Ready for spring.

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A bird does not sing because it has an answer. It sings because it has a song.
-Chinese proverb

I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment, while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance that I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn.
-Henry David Thoreau

The value of shadows

Another scene on a sunny afternoon…

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I look out the window sometimes to seek the color of the shadows and the different greens in the trees, but when I get ready to paint I just close my eyes and imagine a scene.
~Grandma Moses

If only the sun-drenched celebrities are being noticed and worshiped, then our children are going to have a tough time seeing the value in the shadows, where the thinkers, probers and scientists are keeping society together.
~Rita Dove

Spring fever

Today is one of the warmest we’ve had so far. People are doing yard work, riding bikes, walking dogs, sitting outside in the sun. Starved for sunlight after an unusually snowy January and a cold, windy February. Crocus are blooming and spring fever has broken out in bird song.

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If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.
~Anne Bradstreet

It's spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you've got it, you want - oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!
~Mark Twain

Little red wagon

We had a red wagon much larger than this one. But we didn’t dare-devil down hills with it. We used it to haul gardening supplies, like fertilizer, tools, and rust-red ceramic "tubes" to put over young tomato plants.

All work; no play.
And it eventually rusted away…

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Hitch your wagon to a star.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

A person without mirth is like a wagon without springs.
-Proverb

Seeing what is invisible

Something to start the new week…

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When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.
- Tuli Kupferberg

Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others.
-Jonathan Swift

Ahoy, matey!

A curious window decoration - perhaps they are celebrating several holidays at once.

Or maybe they are pirates…

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If you can't get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you'd best teach it to dance.
-George Bernard Shaw

Now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates.
-Mark Twain

Tangles

A week of tangles it has been, finally winding its way around to Friday.

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The human mind is so complex and things are so tangled up with each other that, to explain a blade of straw, one would have to take to pieces an entire universe. A definition is a sack of flour compressed into a thimble.
~ Remy de Gourmont

I love writing. I love the swirl and swing of words as they tangle with human emotions.
~ James A Michener

So many tangles in life are ultimately hopeless that we have no appropriate sword other than laughter.
~ Gordon Allport

Surreal Monday

Between a screaming refrigerator, odd tech problems, and bizarre phone calls at work, it was a surreal Monday…

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Sometimes it pays to stay in bed in Monday, rather than spending the rest of the week debugging Monday's code.
-Dan Salomon

Shadowing pine

A view during a saffron sunset…

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I remember a hundred lovely lakes, and recall the fragrant breath of pine and fir and cedar and poplar trees. The trail has strung upon it, as upon a thread of silk, opalescent dawns and saffron sunsets.
~ Hamlin Garland

You can live for years next door to a big pine tree, honored to have so venerable a neighbor, even when it sheds needles all over your flowers or wakes you, dropping big cones onto your deck at still of night.
~ Denise Levertov

True West

Last night’s lunar adventure reminded me of a photo I took during a different phase of the moon, as seen over Camel’s Back. This photo is sooo West; I half expect a cowboy to ride over the crest of the hill.

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Talk low, talk slow, and don't say too much.

~ An acting tip from John Wayne to fellow actor Michael Caine

Well, art is art, isn't it? Still, on the other hand, water is water! And east is east and west is west and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does. Now you tell me what you know.
~ Groucho Marx

Eclipse

Out on the sidewalk after dinner, gazing into the eastern sky. The moon looked as though the lower left corner had crumbled. Dark, shadowy, hazy. Walked the sidewalk to keep warm while keeping an eye on the moon. Gradually more and more of it disappeared until it was only a sliver and a faint circular glow within shadow.

And that phased into total eclipse, and the moon became a dimly lit globe set in the sky, like a pearl tinged pale orange. As it became totally obscured, nearby stars and planets shone brightly.

Some neighbors stopped briefly during their evening errands to glance up before going inside. Others walked to the corner, looked upward, pointed it out to their children. A couple walking their dogs cracked jokes about "lun-a-cy".

Now, a sliver of silver has appeared on the right, continuing its journey across the sky, glowing brighter and brighter as each minute passes.

Tried to take photos, but too much city light, wrong location, and not the right camera equipment. This will have to be remembered in mind’s eye, and through the photos of others (one of which I borrowed from the website below, taken by Andy Steere).

http://www.opencourse.info/astronomy/introduction/04.motion_moon/

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Nations, like stars, are entitled to eclipse. All is well, provided the light returns and the eclipse does not become endless night. Dawn and resurrection are synonymous. The reappearance of the light is the same as the survival of the soul.
~ Victor Hugo

A colorful view

It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window.
-Raymond Chandler

I don’t know if a bishop damaged this window, but we found it hanging on the side of a porch of a house in the neighborhood. And the light glowing through it was truly beautiful.

People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.
-Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Three

To brighten a brown winter’s day…

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There are three classes of people: those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.
-Leonardo da Vinci

They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.
-Tom Bodett

Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.
-Henry James

A fire-breather?

Look closely; do you see what's lurking in the shadows?

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O to be a dragon, a symbol of the power of Heaven - of silkworm size or immense; at times invisible.

- Marianne Moore, "O To Be A Dragon"

Challenge is a dragon with a gift in its mouth... Tame the dragon and the gift is yours.

- Noela Evans

A green bough

If I keep a green bough in my heart, then the singing bird will come.
-Chinese proverb

A wise falcon

A kestrel (small falcon) at the MK Nature Center. Because his wing was injured and permanently damaged, he’s not able to survive in the wild. So, he lives in a large, roomy home at the Center. He responds to gentle conversation, sometimes nods his head as you talk. A wise bird, indeed.

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A wise falcon hides his talons.
-Proverb

Ripples on a pond

Like the ripples on a pond, the work of one person can spread out and touch the lives of many.
~ Author Unknown

The river flows on...

And now a scene that could be on a postcard…the Boise River, that runs through the city.

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How could drops of water know themselves to be a river? Yet the river flows on.
-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it.
-Norman Maclean

Swimming with a "porpoise"

Reminds me of Aquarium from The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns.

Saint-Saëns originally composed Carnival for private performance only. Because many of the movements are "musical jokes", jabbing at critics, he felt he wouldn’t be taken seriously as a composer if it was made public. So, it was performed once during his life for a small group of friends. But he made provisions for Carnival to be published and performed publicly after his death. And now, it’s his most popular work...

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No good fish goes anywhere without a porpoise.
- Lewis Carroll

One man's fish is another man's "poisson".
-Anon-French

An un resist able windmill...

Even in the wind, hope sparkles…

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[When] building my dome in my chapel, I had a vision - I've worked on perpetual motion and I haven't never give it up yet. I still think it could be done, perpetual motion. I had a vision of a un resist able windmill.

~ Howard Finster

A little warped...

Shades of the infamous snowmen of Calvin & Hobbes…

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Almost snowbound

More snow this morning for the "banana belt" of Idaho…

According to local news, from 1971 through 2000 the Boise area received an average of five inches of snow in January. But in January 2008, the National Weather Service recorded 13.6 inches of snowfall -- 272 % above average.

And there is light snow possible for tonight. Maybe soon we’ll have to ski to work…

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There is nothing in the world more beautiful than the forest clothed to its very hollows in snow. It is the still ecstasy of nature, wherein every spray, every blade of grass, every spire of reed, every intricacy of twig, is clad with radiance.
~ Fiona MacLeod

Legends of the falls

Multnomah Falls in winter – photo taken by our friend, PQ.

According to one Native American legend, the falls were created by Coyote to win the hand of a chief’s daughter. The chief demanded that Coyote give his daughter the gift that would make her the most happy. She asked for a pool where she might bathe in private. So Coyote built the pool and the waterfalls and she consented to become his wife.

In another legend, there was a terrible disease killing the people. So the daughter of the chief climbed to the top of a cliff and prayed to Great Spirit to stop the epidemic. Great Spirit demanded she sacrifice herself by leaping from the cliff. To save her people, she did so. The next day, her father found her body at the bottom of the cliff. He wept bitterly and cried out to Great Spirit that her death not be in vain. At that moment, water began to fall from the top of the cliff, forming Multnomah Falls. And under the right conditions, you can see the daughter’s face in the waterfall.

Sledding

Fun in the snow in Camel’s Back Park…

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Winter wonders
Sweet delights
Snowy days
And frost-filled nights;

Memories are
Made of this
Childhood times
Of snowy bliss.
~ From "Sledding," by Joanna M. Phillips

The design is in the cards

One of C’s newest creations using House of Cards, designed by Charles and Ray Eames.

Many cards; many choices, many designs, many possibilities…

http://www.eamesgallery.com/

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All we are given are possibilities – to make ourselves one thing or another.
~ Jose Ortega y Gasset

Predictions

Snow and more snow. A series of storms sweeping through. They are predicting up to 5 inches tonight. And it’s snowing again now. Unusual weather pattern for Boise; the "banana belt" folks aren't used to it. We’ll see how many places open late tomorrow -- or are closed...

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The trouble with weather forecasting is that it's right too often for us to ignore it and wrong too often for us to rely on it.
~Patrick Young

There's one good thing about snow, it makes your lawn look as nice as your neighbor's.
~Clyde Moore

Alley art

On the side of a neighborhood garage…

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The artist does not see things as they are, but as he is.
~Alfred Tonnelle

The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.
~Francis Bacon

Of the sacred

While listening to "Sacred Cloud Music" on "Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon," by the Silk Road Ensemble, the sky gradually became shades of rose and violet...

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We live in a world of increasing awareness and interdependence, and I believe that music can act as a magnet to draw people together. Music is an expressive art that can reach to the very core of one's identity. …as we interact with unfamiliar musical traditions we encounter voices that are not exclusive to one community. We discover transnational voices that belong to one world.
~ Yo Yo Ma ** Artistic Director of the Silk Road Project

http://www.silkroadproject.org/index.html

R-a-g-g-m-o-p-p

Perhaps the weather affects people in odd ways…

@#@# @#@# @#@# @#@# @#@# @#@#

M
I say M-O
M-O-P
M-O-P-P
Mop
M-O-P-P
Mop Mop Mop Mop

R
I say R-A
R-A-G
R-A-G-G
Rag
R-A-G-G M-O-P-P
Rag Mop

Doo-doo-doo-DAH-dee-ah-dah
Rag Mop
Doo-doo-doo-DAH-dee-ah-dah
Rag Mop
Doo-doo-doo-DAH-dee-ah-dah
Rag Mop
Doo-doo-doo-DAH-dee-ah-dah
Rag Mop
Doo-doo-doo-DAH-dee-ah-dah
R-A-G-G M-O-P-P
Rag Mop!
(D. Anderson / J.L. Wills)

I got in a fight one time with a really big guy, and he said, "I'm going to mop the floor with your face." I said, "You'll be sorry." He said, "Oh, yeah? Why?" I said, "Well, you won't be able to get into the corners very well."
-Emo Phillips

A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.
-Carl Reiner

Wind, chime, and time

Music on a windy day...

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We have heard the chimes at midnight.
~William Shakespeare

Wisdom sails with wind and time
~John Florio

If you reveal your secrets to the wind you should not blame the wind for revealing them to the trees.
~Khalil Gibran

Absence diminishes little passions and increases great ones, as wind extinguishes candles and fans a fire.
~ Francois de la Rochefoucauld

Lighter side of snow

One of the results of yesterday’s snowfall…

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Snowmen fall from Heaven unassembled.
~ Unknown

It snowed last year too: I made a snowman and my brother knocked it down and I knocked my brother down and then we had tea.
~ Dylan Thomas

Where did Frosty the Snowman meet his wife?
At the snowball.

Fire tree

Taken at sunset the other night...

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Love is the Fire of Life; it either consumes or purifies.
~ Unknown