Poverty Point

Hubby, Mr. Hotdog and I took a road trip down to the steamy Mississippi Delta territory of southern Arkansas and Northern Louisiana. We feel compelled to take at least one educational roadtrip to a historic site each summer.

Most are just interesting for the day then quickly forgotten. Not so with Poverty Point. It gave me a *lot* of brain candy to chew on. They have lots of interesting puzzle pieces out there and not a lot of answers. It's like the culture developed time travel but forgot to invent the wheel. Yep, lots of questions still remain.

Journaling:

Poverty Point in Epps, Louisiana is a massive pre-historic earthworks site dating to around 1500 BC. The advanced society who lived here were primarily hunter-gatherers. No evidence of domesticated crops have been found. That's amazing since it is estimated that over 1,000 people occupied this site at any given time.

Highly decorated clay objects have been found as well as intricate stone carvings, yet no trace of pottery has been uncovered.

It seems that a people with the engineering skills to design and build this site would figure out to put a thumbprint into a clay ball and keep going, turning it into a bowl...doncha think?

Cane Creek, Part 3 of 3

Once upon a time we owned seven beach towels. When we were packing to go to the lake last week we couldn't find a single one. They've been used for cat nests, packing cushioning and just simply lost during an outing.

Told Cindy Lou to keep her eye out for some cheap ones since they will surely be lost or destroyed too. She said the cheapest she's ever found were $10 and that was at the end of the season.

Found these fabulously bright and fun ones at Big Lots for $5.50 each! Woot! (Click on the image to embiggen to see the detail.)

The one with the flip-flops will be mine since it matches my bathing suit color.

(And with that dear readers, we end the bargain shopping portion of this day's adventures.)

After a brief stop at Staples to look around and exclaim, "HEY! THAT'S A HIGH PRICE!" like they do in their commercials, we left Pine Bluff and headed back to Star City. The temperature on the bank sign as we were leaving was 106°.

Stopped at Piggly Wiggly in Star City to buy steaks and other stuff for supper. When we got back to the campsite Mr. Hotdog went into Mosquito Warrior mode.

1) Spray Raid Yard Guard Fogger all around campsite including under the picnic table.

2) Light 5 mosquito coils at corners of pad (plus one for Cindy Lou's hammock.)

3) Light 3 lanterns of citronella oil.

4) Light 4 citronella candles for the corners of the picnic table.

5) Spray everybody all over with Deep Woods Off, including bottoms of feet.


Even with all that the mosquitoes were getting tangled in my eyelashes, the only place I didn't spray. These things were vicious and huge!

Just before dusk a mosquito fogger truck came through the campground. I thought Mr. Hotdog was gonna wet his pants with joy.


Thankfully we were just going inside to eat supper when it came by. Glad the steaks weren't still cooking on the grill.

When we came out after supper the campsite was blissfully mosquito-free. Mr. Hotdog kept walking around with a big grin repeating, "Mosquito truck, mosquito truck" in kind of a sing-song voice. He was very happy.

Unfortunately the mosquito truck also killed the lightning bugs. They were belly up on the ground still glowing. It was eerie.

THE END.

Phew! I thought I was never gonna get finished!

Fly Swatter & Sketcher Business Card

Journaling:

A lazy Saturday with zero productivity. Spent a lot of time on the porch swatting flies. Started contemplating the lowly fly swatter and realized fly swatter technology probably hasn't changed much over the last century. Googled "History of the Fly Swatter." Yeah, I was that bored. It was too damned hot and muggy to do much else. Heat index was 105°.

Conversation between Hubby and I sitting on the porch this evening:
(long silence)

Hubby: "Sure is hot out here tonight."

(long silence)

SWAT!

(long silence)

Me: "Yep. Sure is."

TRIVIA:
The fly swatter was invented by Dr. Samuel Crumbine in the summer of 1905 after Kansas was plagued with flies. He was inspired by a chant at a local softball game to "Swat the ball." He exhorted Kansans to "Swat the fly."

---

When we were sketching yesterday I told Dee I hoped if we sketched in public enough someone would notice us and want to join us. She said we ought to have cards we could hand out. Well, I've got the stuff to get that done.

Made the first version with my name and phone number but decided I'd still rather be Speck, even in person. Also changed the title from "Crazy Sketching Lady" to the more mundane "South Arkansas Sketcher." Don't really want to frighten anyone off with my eccentricity right off the bat. I'll spring that on them on the second sketching outing.

The back of the card has this quote:
"I believe that what truly matters in the making of art is not what the final piece looks like or sounds like, not what it is worth or not worth but what newness gets added to the universe in the process of the piece itself becoming."

Excerpt from "The Artist's Creed" by Jan Phillips

---

Was reading the Project Runway blog and somehow got lost over on Wikipedia reading the tragic life history of Corey Haim, child star. There's an hour of my life I'll never get back.

Stumbled upon the Flickr account of a young guy and his bride-to-be from New York. In the past three years they have vacationed in Rome, Florence, Berlin, Paris and Turkey, plus San Francisco, Seattle, Vermont and Disney World. Crap, don't these people have jobs? Well yes, he's an engineer who can't spell at NBC @ 30 Rock in NYC and she's a high school teacher of inner city yutes. She looks to be in her early 20s but dresses like a 94-year-old spinster school marm. Wanted to scream at her, "Buy something turquoise for God's sake and ditch all that frumpy brown crap!"

You know I'm crazy when I scream at some stranger's Flickr account. I've gotta get out of the house more often.

Nana's Attic - Day 1

Journaling:

Nana finally got the new roof she's been wanting for so long. Gone is the buggy cedar shake, replaced with new decking and architectural shingles.

Lots of buggy cedar bits fell into the attic so cleaning and vacuuming was first up on the work order today. We also replaced several flooring panels that were rickety or missing.

Progress was slow today due to the unexpected repairs to the floor, but we should be able to finish up tomorrow. The left side doesn't seem to be as nasty as the right side.

I dread lugging the dozen or so big Christmas tubs back in here. Makes my back hurt just looking at them.

Nana culled about 8 big tubs to be donated or to go to the storage unit. That will make it much easier to find what she needs in here without having to move a bunch of stuff first. Yay!

Pointy arrow notes:

<--This side (left side) still icky. Start here tomorrow.

<--Ancient suitcase containing Daddy's scrapbooks

<--More cooking stuff

(middle back) X-mas stuff goes along the back; now in upstairs bedroom.

(middle) Cooking stuff to go on new shelves plus lots more in bedroom.

-->(right side) Cleaned and organized

--> 45 years (or more) of memories all neatly boxed & labelled.

--> two bags of trash

Lime Green Bug & World's Ugliest Lamp

Off for a week-long visit to Nana and Poppy's house to help Nana with her home improvement projects. Arrived Friday and we were soon off on Friday night "missions."

I'm breaking this day up into several posts because we did a lot of livin' between 5:00 and 10:00.

First stop was a meeting at the community center. Neat old building with lot of interesting things to draw. I didn't make it inside because this lime green bug caught my eye. Had to draw.

Journaling:

Cutest little car you ever did see. What attracted my attention was the huge sunflower attached to the steering wheel.

Also liked the way the shadow of the building fell along the curves on one side and the sunlight fell along the curves on the other side. The front bumper actually had a boo-boo and part of it was being held together with a bungie cord. I opted not to draw that part.

Went inside to escape the bugs. All new furniture since the last time I was here. All the furnishings in the lobby are donated and are ever-changing. This time a pair of the world's ugliest lamps caught my eye.

Journaling:

This was donated to the community center, one of a matching pair. I would have been 'shamed to donate them because then somebody would know I had paid good money for them. Ack!

I would have tossed them in the dumpster instead of donating them to hide my unfortunate lapse in judgement in home furnishings.

After that we went cruising around and found the Duggar's temporary digs while little Josie is in the hospital. No signs of life there, just a limo in the driveway.

Poppy loaned me his cell phone to take a photo for Uncle Buck, the Dugger's biggest fan in Chicago. Haven't gotten it yet but it should be coming.

Pssst! Nana! Send me that, will ya?

Off to oogle art supplies.

---

UPDATE: 6-10-2010

Here's the pic of the Duggar digs; thanks Nana!:

Lunch Bucket - EDM #20 - Draw Something "Dad"

Journaling:

I love this old school photo of Daddy, circa 1934. He's so cute with his big, innocent eyes and faded overalls. I'm guessing he probably doesn't have on shoes.

I have Daddy's eyes, a babypoop brownish-green color.

Daddy always signed cards and emails like this--> DaD; big D, little A, big D.

Daddy's Lunch Bucket, 1950-1982

Daddy carried this lunchbox with him every day for 30+ years. The finish on the top and around the latches was worn shiny from use.

The black plastic handle broke so he milled a new one from a strip of aluminum.

His ID badge was riveted to the end. It was lime green with his ID# engraved in red numbers.

The lunch bucket lived on the dryer by the back door for my entire lifetime.

Daddy always called this his lunch bucket, not lunchbox. That's probably a throwback to his childhood when he took his lunch to school in an actual bucket.

World Wide Sketchcrawl #27

Today was World Wide SketchCrawl #27 where sketchers across the globe get together and sketch their little piece of the world. This sketchcrawl I didn't have to fly solo and drag poor Hubby along. I had the pleasure of the company of the intrepid Miz Dee, my new-found sketching buddy. Yippeeeee!!!!

We met at the Museum of Natural Resources in Smackover, Arkansas. It is part of the Arkansas State Parks system and is dedicated to the history of oil, brine and bromine production in southern Arkansas. We didn't get to wander about on the grounds because it was drizzling rain. We both decided we weren't that intrepid.

First sketch was the circus carriage of the Goat Woman of Smackover.

All the journaling down the right-hand side of the page is the story of The Goat Woman copied from the museum's website. You can read that here.

Journaling:

Dee and I spent two hours sketching this. She's as much a detail addict as I am. That was way too long. After two hours we just quit and went in search of lunch.

Journaling:

Smackover, Arkansas is out in the middle of nowhere. We asked at the front desk if there was anywhere we could go for lunch. The only three places were truck stops with day-old fried chicken. We didn't think we could handle that so we made do with stuff from the snack rack in the gift shop. Vienna Sausage is a second cousin to fried bologna, but I was desperate.

I had hoped to get four sketches done today for the sketchcrawl, but it was 1:00 pm, I was fading fast, and I only had one sketch in the book. I took a few minutes to warm up on some speed sketching with the brush pen and sketched the remains of our meager lunch.

I have *got* to quit getting so zenned out on details. My brain is happy but my back screams that I've been sitting in one spot too long!

Journaling:

Miz Dee spied this old telephone in the Horseshoe Cafe exhibit that she wanted to draw. There were actually two phones but I opted for just one and other stuff on the shelves. There was a table and chairs in there so we settled in to draw.

Part of the exhibit was an audio tape of the sounds of a cafe: low murmuring voices, the clink and rattle of dishes being cleared from a table, and a guy coughing. Cough, cough, cough, cough, cough.

After a while I felt like I was sketching in a TB ward. The tape looped about every two to three minutes and the cough started to drive me nuts. "Get that man a Ricola!"

This is one of those instances where taking the time to sketch an event will permanently imprint it on my brain. Had I merely taken a photo and continued on, I wouldn't have experienced the dreadful repetitive TB cough. Yep, I'll remember that and this day for a long time.

The lighting in the museum was dark and moody and after squinting through the gloom for four hours my eyes were beginning to ache. My spirit was willing but my body wasn't able. It's hell getting old.

At 3:00 pm I closed the sketchbook and told Miz Dee I was done for the day.

EDM # 9 - Organized Chaos

Journaling:

Computer Nest - Art Space - Business Office - Supply Closet

When you live in a little bitty house, all spaces must be multi-functional, and they must be organized.

This is the most chaotic spot in the house. Everywhere else is spartan by comparison.

There was so much stuff in there I got tired of drawing and left things out. Then I got tired of painting and just called it done. Sheesh!

EDM #2 - Draw a Lamp

Journaling:

This is the lamp beside my end of the couch that is my TV watching nest. It is "wrought iron" with a "leather hide" shade.

The shade came in a box only one-inch thick. The structure of it was a top and bottom ring and folding metal ribs. The ribs are hinged on the bottom ring and snap into brackets on the top ring. When all snapped in place the shade is pulled taut. I thought it was a really cool design.

The itty bitty table the lamp is on is too itty bitty for all my nesting clutter: phone, tissues, coaster, glasses, magazines, sketchbook, various pens and pencils, palette, and remote control (when I can get it away from Hubby.) Now it has crocheting tchochke on there too.

I need a larger table.

Sunday Stuff

Note: There's a little bit of overlap here from the last post. I should have waited until the day was over and my daily journal page complete before posting on the blog. Sorry 'bout that.


Journaling:

Tried sketching Hubby but he wiggles too much. He was trying to sew up the rotten boat seats. Gave him a pinhead again, and pin feet. Did OK on the body because I did it as a blind contour, but then I looked down at the drawing for the head and feet. That's where I messed up. (Original in Black n' Red - Staedtler 0.3)

Our CPA called to tell me my deductions are not actually deductible. Gaaahhhh!!! This was after I had called her to make sure they were.

Income tax returns make me crazy! Why are they called returns anyway? If I calculate things correctly, I shouldn't return anything to the IRS, they should be returning things to me.

Something blew up or fell down in China over the weekend. TV news reports showed ambulances responding to the scene. Why does a Chinese ambulance have the word AMBULANCE written on the side in English? Why not Russian or some other language? Seems odd.

Hoarding: Buried Alive is my new favorite TV show. Not quite the trauma dramas as the original Hoarders but it will do. Makes me want to clean my house after watching an episode.

I think it would be fun to be a professional organizer, but maybe not for a hoarder. I don't know if I could handle finding a sailcat in the middle of the living room.

Drawing Class

Journaling:

Took two of my favorite things to draw in class tonight. It's easier to draw something that's interesting to me.

I didn't want to do another copy-cut-paste of the pencil drawings in my journal because it's getting too fat.

Wanted to come up with a new and interesting way to redraw the geegaws from class.

Quite a departure from the usual, eh? I like it.

Art Supplies & Pencil Ponderings

Journaling:

Momma got Blicked! It's always a happy day when the postman delivers a box of art supplies.

Sharpened up the pencils to take them for a test drive. Discovered the Derwents were too big to fit in my electric pencil sharpener. Pfft! Bought the Derwents on a recommendation by Roz Stendahl. Wanted a pencil that would lay down a very black line and scan well. These are "pigmented" (with carbon maybe?), not graphite, so the shine doesn't confuse the scanner.

Got the Design Ebonys because they are the pencil Rick Tulka uses to do his Le Select Cafe drawings. I've long admired his clean black lines and hoped it would be the miracle pencil I was searching for.

Did a little test with the four blackest drawing pencils I now own using the Big White Marble from drawing class as the subject.

The Derwent was the winner hands down in the qualities I wanted. It has the blackest black of lines and a matte finish that plays well with the scanner. It is waxier and somewhat stickier to draw with over the graphites, and has a rougher, looser line. It also has a very soft lead and is a booger to keep sharp.

Don't think this would be a good pencil for fine detail work but would be great fun for guerilla sketching. Add a bit of water and it makes a dandy wash for shading and shadows. Woot! Great fun!

Had an epiphany doing this little test. *This* is the kind of sketch the drawing class teacher wanted us to do...general shapes with shading for contour, not the details of the cut glass. OH! Of course! These were easy - whipped them out in a few minutes. I should have done something similar in class. Doh! I have a new perspective going into Class #3.

Decided to put down the pencils and check up on the arty bloggers. First one I hit was Karen Blados who had posted a macro photo of a housefly. Ewwww! Had to draw.

(From photo by Karen Blados, used by permission)

This is just the head of course. Didn't have the gumption to draw the whole body or his sticky tongue lolling onto Miz Karen's sofa. Ewwww!

Now you know why I seldom leave comments on blogs. My ADD kicks in and I'm off on a new tangent. Never did leave a comment. Must go back and do that.

I used Rick Tulka's favored Sanford Design Ebony for the fly. There's no way on God's Green Earth Tulka managed the black lines I see on his drawings with just this pencil. Or maybe I should say there's no way on God's Green Earth that I can get the lines I see on his drawings with just this pencil. Frustration, disappointment. There must be something I'm missing. Must ponder on that.

While pondering I was staring at my happy little manikin sitting on my desk. He suddenly struck me as wonderful and needing to be drawn. Picked up the black Derwent.
Manny's been in this pose for quite some time. I don't remember why I posed him like this, but I remember it's supposed to be a vaudeville high kick with a cane and top hat. (Hear the music "If I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere, It's up to you New York, New York!")

That thing curving around his upper arm is a paperclip for the cane. Never could figure out a top hat for him.

One more doodle and I'm off to bed....



Realized if I keep drawing with pencils I should be drawing in a sketchbook, not on loose pieces of copy paper. The sketchbooks I own are too rough for drawing in pencil (in my opinion) and I don't want pencil drawings smudging around in my daily journal anyway.

Must see Dick Blick about a sketchbook with slick paper.

Yay! More art supplies!

You Can Draw! - Class #2

Bob, the teacher, started out tonight's class explaining about different kinds of papers: hot press, cold press and rough, and why to use each of them.

Then he showed the trick about getting scale and proportion correct by measuring down the pencil with the thumb at arm's length. That part I knew already. But what he added I had not thought of before. It was a Doh! moment for me.

If you eyeball out the thing to draw and it's only an inch or so of pencil length, but you want it to be four inches tall on the paper, make four equal marks to arrive at the top and bottom of the thing. Then any other measurement you take multiply by four lengths also.

That's a big ol' Duh! but I would have never come up with it on my own. That's why I wanted to take a class with real people...to learn practical applications of art theory.

Then we start on our first drawing. Lighting conditions weren't ideal because the fluorescent lights washed out all the shading and shadows from the spotlight he brought. And the things we are drawing are sitting on a desk at eye level. It's tough to get perspective going at that angle. If there were any shadows we wouldn't be able to see them.

So what did he choose? Cut glass. Grrr.... Glass is probably one of the hardest things to draw. And it was a little bitty cut glass candlestick thingy I could barely see from so far away. On the candlestick was a white marble ball. Behind it was a rough Mexican blanket. He let us cheat on the ball and trace around a styrofoam cup so we all at least got the ball part correct.

I worked mainly on the candlestick and had just started putting shading on the ball when he started around the room doing show-n-tell. Since I'm on the back row I'd be the last one. The first drawing he held up had darkness all around the ball to make it pop. Ohhh! Good idea!

I cheated and whipped out The Magic That Is The Pentel Pocket Brush Pen and scrubbed in a little black around the candlestick before he got to me. Yes, I cheated in class. I filled in the rest of the blackness with pencil after I got home.

I have no idea what that candlestick actually looked like. I drew the dark spots and saved the light spots and kinda just let the rest be what it wanted to be. I don't think it really had fluting around the top and it looks a little weird around the base. Not cut glass-y at all. Oh well.

The next thing we drew was this old guitar. I struggled and struggled getting the proportions correct even using the measuring down the pencil trick. Everyone else moved right along and was finished by the time I started shading. This is as far as I got:



I had to keep fighting the urge to whip out a PITT pen and do a five-minute sketch like I would do in my daily journal. But no, no, I'm here to learn to draw in a new way.

My frustration level is building.

After one more class I may not be able to draw anything at all.

le Sigh.

You Can Draw! - Class #1

Started out with an overview of materials: pencils, erasers, blending stumps. I had a blending stump and threw it out not six months ago thinking I would never need it. Made one after class out of a rolled up bit of drawing paper. Sanded and softened the tip with an emery board. Yes, I'm a tightwad.

Tips and tricks:

-Cut slits in a white block eraser leaving thin ridges to pull out highlights in hair. Cool!

-Don't blow on a drawing to remove eraser crumbles. Turn it vertically and tap it instead. Blowing leaves moisture on the surface and can mess up a drawing.

On to values, white to black and how to apply them to what you see. Excellent!

Next was shading on curved objects to make them appear curved, and shadows on the table surface so things wouldn't look like they're floating. Clipping right along.

The first thing we drew was a coffee box thingy that happened to be sitting in the room.



As with every box-like thing I try to draw, it turned into the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Slanted decidedly to the right. Tried to fix it but didn't quite get it all plumb. I was sitting in the very back of the room fighting with my new glasses. Couldn't quite see what the coffeecup part of the label was supposed to be so all I could do was draw the dark shapes I could see.

A show and tell when we were all finished. He held up each person's drawing and pointed out all the good stuff on it. He concluded every one with, "That's a good drawing right there."

Next he drug in a plant from the hallway. Yes! Something with major fudge-factorability. Nobody is gonna know what the stalks and leaves really look like so freeform time on the foliage.

I was drawing away and the teacher stood behind me and watched. For some reason that gave me the heebie-jeebies. Because I couldn't see my drawing with the new bifocals, I just looked at the plant and drew what amounted to a blind contour. He watched me doing this for a while and said, "So how long have you been drawing?" Arrggh. Busted.

Told him I had never had a drawing class, that this was the first. (eyebrow cocks in disbelief) But I study and read a lot....

He loaned me a book he had brought for show-n-tell, The Artist's Complete Guide to Drawing the Head, by William L. Maughan. He said he had a whole library of art books at his house and I was welcome to borrow all that I wanted. Woot! Tightwad's Nirvana.

Realized on the way home that my brain is geared for speed sketching...quick, imprecise, capturing only the essence of a moment. I've tried very, very hard to break myself of the need to draw all the little nit-picky details. To sit and draw them now was proving difficult. Skerritttt! Zzzzzztt! Major synapse disconnect.
I have much to learn.

And lastly, apropos of nothing, the song "Sylvia's Mother" has been stuck in my head for the last three days.

And the operator says "40 cents more for the next 3 minutes"
Ple-ease Mrs. Avery, I just gotta talk to her
I'll only keep her a while
Please Mrs. Avery, I just wanna tell 'er goodbye

The Lodge Room

Journaling:

Nana's Guest Room - Decorated like an Adirondack lodge, with ducks, fish, sticks, twigs, and bark...and a TV with remote. Discovered the "Arts" channel. I'm in love. Can go to sleep to the sweet sounds of Bach, Vivaldi and Tchaikovsky.

Woke up dog tired and decided going back to bed sounded like a good idea. Slept all day and finally started feeling human again around 10:00 p.m.

Nana's Photos and Frames

Journaling:

Arrived at Nana's yesterday afternoon. Wanted to start with a small project that we could finish by bedtime. Decided to straighten up these two cubbies that contained her photos and frames. Turned out to be a big project that took four hours yesterday and all day today.

These cubbies were packed with formal portraits, photos in frames, and empty frames and easels. Forty years of snapshots are lurking in boxes hidden under the stairs. That will be a major project for another day.

Sorted all the multiple copies of portraits by person then put each sitting in a page protector for the moment. They will need to be mounted in an album in the future. Took all the photos out of the frames and sorted them into the page protectors.

Put the page protectors in some old albums that had sticky pages and tossed the sticky pages. Culled any tired, tragic, or broken frames and sent two big boxes of decent ones to Goodwill.

Now Nana can find what she needs in here without an avalanche of stuff falling out. She was thrilled.

Saints & Sinners

(Click to embiggen)

Journaling:

Apparently we have neither (saints nor sinners) in our family at the moment because these are the mementos that nobody wanted. How my very Methodist grandmother ended up with two very Catholic Virgin Mary statues I'll never know.

Labels, starting at the top, then left to right: Jesus on a cedar slab, Virgin Mary with rose, Virgin Mary with Baby Jesus (I guess this should really be Madonna with Child), Craggy praying hands, Roving Eye Shotglasses.

Kind of a weird dichotomy of stuff here, swinging from one extreme to the other.

The Jesus-On-A-Slab and the Virgin Marys came from my grandmother's house. Jesus hung on her kitchen wall over the big Dearborn heater since the beginning of time, along with some trivets, plates, and a small painting by a cousin. The varnish on it is very yellowed from the heat and fumes.

I can remember sitting at her kitchen table eating purple hull peas and skillet cornbread, staring at it, wondering why she kept it. The other things around it would change every so often getting replaced or updated, but Jesus was always there. He stuck out like a sore thumb looking like a roadside tourist trap souvenir among the nicer things.

The Virgin Marys were probably gifts. The one with the baby Jesus has maker's marks all on the bottom and is stamped "Germany". (sigh) I've been watching too much Antiques Roadshow and wonder now if I should get rid of it or not.

The craggy praying hands and the shotglasses were Mom and Dad's. I find it ironic that they had these things. Not a lot of praying going on at our house except for the rare dinnertime blessing when company came. And there was absolutely no drinking going on. Alcohol was strictly verboten.

The Roving Eye shotglasses are 1950s era I think. They have the face painted on the outside of the glass and the black and white eye painted on the inside of the glass. When the glass is moved, the eye seems to rove around up and down or side to side depending on which way the glass is moved.

The red one has "Down Da Hatch!" on the back. The other one, which is yellow, has "S-SDelightful!" on the reverse. There were four in the set originally. Don't know what happened to the other two. They lived in the high kitchen cabinet with the fine china and crystal. I wasn't supposed to play with them because they were glass but I think I did anyway. Humm....the other two might have fallen victim to my little hands.

These things are now going to Goodwill since nobody in the family wanted them. Maybe some shopper there will be able to find or lose their religion.

Yay! Lots more stuff out of my house!

(Virgin Mary with Rose detail)

Aluminum

Journaling:

Daddy worked for Reynolds Metals for most of his life and retired after 30 years. Because of that, we had lots of aluminum products around the house when I was growing up. We even had an aluminum barbecue grill. Somewhere I still have a little bar of aluminum called a "pig" with the Reynolds name stamped in it.

The coaster was from the 1950s or so and I think there were 10 or 12 coasters in the set. My sister Nana has all but this one. When I was little the coasters lived in the top kitchen cabinet with the good china and crystal. They were the only things in the cabinet I was allowed to touch.

The coaster is stamped with the Reynolds Metals logo used since 1935. It was inspired by Raphael's version of St. George and the Dragon and symbolizes the crusading spirit. Daddy had cuff links, tie tacks, tie clips and a signet ring with a diamond in it with this logo. He was a Company Man.

He starting working for Reynolds at the Jones Mills Reduction Plant. A reduction plant zaps white powdery alumina with a zillion gigawatts of electricity to turn it into molten aluminum. Daddy was the electrical supervisor in the rectifier building.

I'm not sure what rectifier means, but I think that's where they take standard electricity off the grid and gig it up to make it be a zillion gigawatts. There is a second identical ashtray from the Jones Mills plant to denote the five billion pounds of aluminum production mark in November 1974.

Later in life Daddy transferred to another Reynolds plant where they made alumina from raw bauxite ore. I got to work there with him one summer when I was in college.

These aluminum mementos are now going to live with my niece R'bie along with the Reynolds Metals story.

Three more bits of tchochke out of my house. Yay!

61-62 City Champs

Journaling:

This is Daddy's bowling trophy; his only bowling trophy. We found it during the final clean out of the house. I was rather surprised there was a bowling trophy at all because the bowling alley in town closed when I was a wee tot. I only remember Daddy playing golf.

He took me bowling once or twice when I was a teenager, (special trip, neighboring town) but that's about it. I do remember his bowling ball though. It lived in the back of his closet for all eternity. I wasn't allowed to play with it because it was dangerous...a big, black 18-pounder with fingertip holes and his name carved in it.

That's about it for my memories of Daddy bowling. Trophy is now going to live with my niece R'bie. Another piece of history preserved; another thing out of my house.

Brush Pen Doodles

Late-night doodles, drawn while watching a marathon of Barrett-Jackson car auction on TV, drawing whatever is in front of me, then whatever poops out of my brain.

Showed the first one to Hubby:

"Do you recognize it?"

"No, should I?"

"It's the coaster you sit your Pepsi can on every day."

"Oh."

(eye roll)

Daddy's Chair - Where he reigns supreme over the household. (snort) The hump in the seat is one of those cotton hull neck pillows.

The fringed wool blanket on the table is for Smudge the Cat. She likes to sit in Hubby's lap because he is warm and she is old and gets chilly. He won't get up if she's in his lap even if he has to pee. So the blanket was the solution. It was that or Depends.


Smudge on her blanket and other brain poop: