Poppy Dreaming

water color for a note card

shadows are from scanner but I'm pretending I was clever enough to paint in shadows from surrounding flowers

I have two computers and they both crashed within days of each other...this cannot be!

My laptop's virus protection, (free Avast) downloaded it's latest definitions, rebooted and my laptop expired on the spot....the tech said the OS was destroyed...$120 to fix.

The PC was too slow...almost five minutes to boot up...tech said the hard drive was dying...(seven years old)...

Soooooo....money being paid out for opinions and tech help...and the decision must be made what to do.

You know where all the answers are, my friends...in cherry vanilla ice cream...bet you didn't know that...or maybe you did...

On another subject....continuing from the last post as a movie critic, I went to see Sherlock Holmes and left in the middle. As far as I could tell it was one long, loud bashing fight with a little dialog sprinkled in between bouts....and an implausible plot. On the other hand, my daughter and granddaughter liked it...... go figure. (It's been tested and proven that whatever movie my daughter likes, I don't go see...haha...the movie gene was lost in the crossing)

can't sleep so will blog about Avatar, a science fiction movie set in 2154, which I saw earlier this evening.
I want all of my movies in 3D from now on, thank you. I'm being cheated for accepting less.
An avatar is a personification of an idea...and the people in Avatar, humanoids called the Na'vi, are the embodiment of our higher selves.....and they clash...go to war... with the worst of us...the military who go into foreign countries in real life and bomb the ecology and humanity to smithereens.
I want to be a Na'vi and ride a pteranadon, which they clumsily rename a Banshee.....a giant flying reptile from the dinosaur age. The setting is on Alpha Centauri's moon, Pandora, where the humans want to mine for unobtanium, a precious mineral.
The actors wore skull caps with little cameras in front taking pictures of their facial expressions, which were then digitally transferred to the digitally created characters.
In Avatar, a human's intelligence could be transferred to one of the Na'vi...so a few main characters bounced back and forth between being a human or being a Na'vi. Sigourney Weaver from Aliens played a main role.
I won't tell any more of the plot in case you are going to see the picture....the plot is secondary in a way...the magnificence of the movie is the special effects. Forget the 3D glasses of the 50's.....the audience actually gasped when it began and some things were right in front of your eyes....I thought I might reach out and grasp the little floating jellyfish.
I'm waiting for the industry to make a second screen to fit over the main movie screen so we don't have to wear glasses....and I'm waiting for all movies and tv to be in 3D.....and I'm waiting for humans to evolve into the Na'vi.

If you can dream it, it can be...(or did I just make that up?)

hanging around, getting into mischief

The correct term for a flock is a "rafter" of turkeys

but a gobble of turkeys sound better
I step outside and at the first noise of the door, the wild turkey flock burst into gobbles. It is so instant that it seems automatic. The sound is one sound...every gobble at the same time. I stay quiet for a second and then gobble back. Again the loud gobble from the flock…it interests me how quick the response is so I keep playing the game until I tire of it….easily amused am I.
The only thing I can relate this response to is when you see a flock of birds wheeling in the sky…the turns they make are so together you wonder who the leaders are…the turkey gobble from the whole flock is that quick…..ok….enough I guess…it’s just fascinating how it works.
We are routinely having flocks of 40 to 50 birds gather by the garage door calling for Jack to come out and feed them. He’s really feeding the other birds but the turkeys get their fill too. Sometimes another flock waits on the slope above the driveway, as you see in the picture. There is a hierarchy…a pecking order and woe to the bird who steps out of line, or the flock who wants their share and dares to come too close.
We have far too many turkeys here. They were introduced to this area and have become a nuisance. I think the only enemies they have are the rare wandering dog and the raccoons and they can only hurt the eggs or very young poults.

The flock tear up the ground with their big strong feet…they pick at all the plants even though they don’t want to eat them. They pick my iris blossoms to death before they ever open, and scratch out any sedum I plant.
When we first moved here I liked to see them come around the house because I’d never seen wild turkeys before. I was surprised to see how well they fly, even the babies. At fourteen days the chicks have strong wing and tail feathers and fly up onto the fence around our back yard.

We have two hunting dogs inside the fence and each has caught a wild turkey a couple of times. There is a suspicious amount of large feathers laying out there right now.
Except for their ugly heads, they are beautiful birds…their feathers gleam in bronzes,blues,greens and rust.......shimmering colors like oil on water.

Benjamin Franklin wanted the wild turkey to be the nation’s bird instead of the eagle. In a letter to his daughter he trashed the eagle as a bird of low character while of the turkey he said, “a true original Native of America... He is besides, though a little vain & silly, a Bird of Courage, and would not hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards who should presume to invade his Farm Yard with a red Coat on."
I can’t imagine a turkey attacking. It’s taken years for me to get within ten feet of them without them running off.
Actually, the gobbler in all his courting glory would make a great patriotic picture because his head is bright red white and blue.

Old Glory

Oregon Junco
watercolor on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper

Redwing Blackbird

watercolor on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper

I found a nest like this once, and wondered in awe how the little mother recognized the reeds that were close enough to use...and how she kept the first grasses in place as she started to weave...and do the fathers know how to weave?

The day before Thanksgiving 2009...and this year it means nothing to me. Relatives aren't around...I'm just over an illness....things are peaceful and that's the way it will be tomorrow...peaceful and turkeyless...by choice. I've had many a year of full sized dinners stuffed with relatives...and mostly my giving. The younger generation works full time and can't cook anyway...haha. I'm afraid if they gave a dinner it would be tv dinners.
My turkeys always had the stuffing inside...which doesn't seem to be the popular thing these days....might get sick or something. Also, turkeys are cooked breast down these days...and have been for a few years but not when I started. Then I heard two more new things, (to me)
The first was a cooking show discussion on the best roasting pan to have...They had four...a $200 one...a$100 one...an $80 one and a cheap one for $50...ahh me. I won't bore you with the discussion and which one won or why....In the beginning I used to use a blue and white speckled roaster that was closer to fifty cents than fifty dollars and the turkey was great. Later, I used just the broiler pan and the little V shaped holder that turkeys rest in. Worked great.
The second new thing discussed the fact that the white meat and the dark meat needed different cooking times...the white meat a lower temp...so the plan was to line a huge bowl with bags of ice and put the turkey in upside down so the breast meat was resting on the ice. Then they put a bag of ice into the turkey cavity and another into the neck cavity. They left the turkey cooling until the white meat was 36 degrees...Then into the oven...and the two types of meat were supposed to come out perfectly. Well.....a lotta trouble unless all this works makes you supremely happy.

Hope your Thanksgiving is/or was just the way you want it...ours will be.

first pencil I could grab...paper out of printer... bird sketches.....
One of an Oregon junco...a little black headed, pink sided, seedeater that lives year round in large parts of Oregon...usually stays in flocks...happy little birdies...at least they make people happy to see them flitting around. I want to do a water color of the bottom sketch tomorrow for a card. I remember my first biology class in college...I was excited to be able to learn the names of all the little birds in my yard....then I discovered the teacher called them all dickey birds. I was flabbergasted...some education...haha.

This is all the art I did today...has not been a blue ribbon day. First, I didn't sleep a wink last night, so I couldn't make it to the computer club meeting this morning.....I guess the social committee went all out and it was decorated in Halloween splendor.....with lots of candy and goodies...dang. The 50/50 was the largest in months...almost 75 dollars which I'm sure I'd have won if I'd been there...haha.
Then Jack comes home from shopping at Costco and he had a $450 dollar ticket because his handicap parking ticket expired 4 days ago....yikes...He can appeal, but not in town. It was another county so he has to go there and only on certain days. In finding that out, he discovered his driving licence had expired too...we didn't get the heads up they usually mail out. Anyway, this time he has to have proof he's not a terrorist or alien so he digs out his birth certificate...which of course they won't accept. It's signed by everybody but the angels and has a huge gold seal of approval....but that's not good enough for them. Nor the fact that he's held a valid licence in this state for over fifty years.
So he contacts...or tries to contact the city and building where they are keeping something better for him....but got lost in the telephone maze when he had to start typing his name...backwards...Hentges, G, John using the key pad. He did learn it would cost $20 to get this copy even though I think no person will be involved....he didn't have anyone on the phone...just numbers. I think they'll accept all the info...then call up the copy from the basement...send it out via email, all electronically......and collect twenty bucks...I don't know....I'm going to do it for him tomorrow on the internet.
So, then I went down to the DMV to find out what I would need although I don't need to renew for five years. They didn't like my birth certificate either....that precious little piece of yellow paper with the seal and the signatures of my oh so young mother and father...the paper I've been guarding for over half a century...nope...ain't worth nuthin' lady. BUT...I have a passport so naah naah naah.
There's more but I'm tired of talking about it....I want to go back to the fifties thank you.....or back to bed might do, too.

colored pencil on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper .

..couldn't get it all on scanner.
Billie Jean
Billie Jean is up for adoption but you have to go to Arkansas to get her.

3 overripe bananas means banana nut bread.
what's not good for you? eggs...bananas...milk...nuts...

I cut a slice into quarters because no one has ever been able to find any calories in such a tiny piece, so it's safe to eat.

come on over

graphite on watercolor hotpress

Perfect day today. Did exactly what I wanted to while it drizzled outside. Messed around...watched my soaps...drew this horse....made a carrot and raisen salad, pea soup, and cornbread for dinner.

They tell you to learn when to quit on a drawing, but on a pencil drawing I don't want to quit. How simple my life would be if I'd rid myself of all my colored pencils and watercolors and simply worked with a pencil...it's my favorite.

I get so irritated with Blogger. So many times I can't access my blog to work on it. They throw me on a page to begin a new blog and they won't take my password. Don't ever ask them what your password is unless you're a whole lot smarter than the average bear. Finally after about the 15th time, using the same password, they let me in. Fie on them! A hex on them! May bleach splash on all their clothes tomorrow.