Wanna Come Play?

The Internet is my playground. I love looking stuff up on Wikipedia. I love finding odd websites. And when it comes to blogs I look for the strange, the mundane, whatever. One thing I enjoy doing is after taking care of my own blog, I will click on “next blog” in the upper left corner and see where it takes me. I spent an entire afternoon once happily learning all about a certain pre-school in New Zealand from a blog one of the teachers has. Sometimes I will come across a blog in another language with no translate function, but if there are a lot of pictures, I’ll look around anyway. Here are a few of my favorites that I’ve bookmarked and like to revisit.

French Manhole Covers

http://manhole-covers.net/galerie/slide.php3?f=0

I love art in almost any form and, especially when it’s art for art’s sake. A manhole cover does not need to be attractive. It needs to be functional. These French ones are works of art.

Japanese Manhole Covers

http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/03/the-beauty-of-japans-artistic-manhole-covers/

I first learned of these from a friend who lives in Japan. I found this site and was amazed at the intricate beauty of these. There is also a link to the official site of the Japan Society of Manhole Covers where there are a TON more pictures. That site is in Japanese, so just start clicking on stuff and you will find pictures.

Bored Panda

http://www.boredpanda.com/

Wonderful place to stroll around in. Always something different. I’m always on the lookout for inspiration for my artwork in a lot of the sites I go to. This has it. It will also take you all over the place.

Things to be Happy About

http://www.thingstobehappyabout.com/

If nothing else, you can go here and find at least one thing to be happy about in your life. If you can’t, then you need to call someone to come over for company.

Marc Johns

http://www.marcjohns.com/blog/

This guy is so talented I can’t stand it. While I would never be able to imitate his art style, I do get inspiration from his work. Great stuff!

I hope you check some of these places out.

Book Report April 2016

The Copper Kettle (1939) by Annette Turngren

This was a cute older kids book from a library sale. It takes place in the 1800s in a small Swedish village. Mari is a typical tomboy who manages to get herself into trouble more often than not. Her father is the local pastor. Mari hears about the new singing sensation Jenny Lind and it’s all she wants in life to be able to hear this “Swedish Nightingale.” She finally gets the chance.

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Opal The Journal of an Understanding Heart (1984) adapted by Jane Boulton

This is supposed to be part of the diary of Opal Whiteley, age 5 or 6. The veracity of the diary has been questioned and debated. Opal died in 1992 in her 90s and had been in a mental institution for many years. Whether this is a true account or not, it’s written in a very charming manner and is worth the read.

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Lights! Camera! Action! (2014) by Emily Thomas

A Blue Hills Library book. The local theater is heavily damaged by a fire and while it’s being remodeled someone keeps breaking in and vandalizing the work. Ben and Ryan decide to build a tree house and get to design and raise the money to do it themselves with a little supervision.

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Carry On, Mr. Bowditch (1955) by Jean Lee Latham

Good YA biography about Nathaniel Bowditch. He was an early American mathematician. He couldn’t afford schooling, so taught himself and became the foremost maritime navigator in America. His book is still used by the Navy.

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Nobody Nowhere (1992) by Donna Williams

An amazing autobiography! I find it hard to describe this book. Donna Williams was apparently born very autistic, but was never diagnosed as such until she pretty much discovered it herself in her 20s. The struggles she went through I find hard to imagine. I have a lot of respect for her. This book is the first of 4 that chronicle her journey.

Random ramblings April 2016

A couple of random thoughts dealing with Facebook:

1) I love the Bitstrips. And I know you know that, because I’ve been rather profligate about the whole thing. But it’s fun, it doesn’t cost anything (other than my dignity and rep) and I’m going to keep on doing them until someone tells me to stop. I haven’t seen any new ones in some time on the site and am hoping for something new when the summer Olympics start. They had some pretty good ones for the winter sports, and I did have a lot of fun with those. They’ve had some running and award ones, but I’d like to see some for gymnastics. I KNOW my avatar can do some pretty good things on the balance beam…

2) Now, I know it’s petty and shallow, but misspellings REALLY bother me. I don’t mean the occasional typo, I’m guilty of that myself. I mean the really fantastic memes that have a great pic and great words, and the words are misspelled. I don’t care how great the thing is, if “your” and “you’re” are there incorrectly, it bugs the heck out of me. And I just can’t bring myself to share them on, no matter how good. I never make fun, though. And I am NOT a grammar Nazi. I just like things neatly done. And one more thing: It’s spelled “WHOA”!!!

Now for an embarrassing confession… I have never learned how to fold a fitted sheet! It’s true! I have NEVER folded my fitted sheets in my entire life. I fold the flat one and then do my best with the fitted one and just put them in the hall closet. My Aunt LoLita used to iron her sheets. As much as I loved her (and she was my favorite person in the whole world) I thought ironing sheets was complete insanity. I also never learned how to do a button hole on the sewing machine. My grandma showed me many times and I just never got it.

My readers already know how I feel about going shopping in the rain. Ugh…But I have been really trying to watch my thinking on this. Starting the trip with a very negative outlook does NOT help. Several weeks ago Marv and I had to go out and get some stuff that we really needed. No question about putting it off. It was cold, rainy and I was in pain. We had three stops to make. At two places there was handicap parking available, the other one had a space close to the door. I was able to get DRY carts at a couple of the places, the other place we used those little red baskets since we didn’t need to get much at that stop. The lines weren’t bad and the checkers were cheerful. All in all, it was an all right experience.

You know all those hilarious videos that feature cats being absolutely terrorized by cucumbers? Funniest stuff around. Love ‘em. We finally got a cuke to have a bit of fun with Harper. He was peacefully eating from his dish in the kitchen when we placed the scary veg nearby. Harper turned, looked at it, leaned forward to sniff it and went back to eating. We tried it another time the next day. Nothing. We seriously think those video cats were paid.