September 28th, 2008
new computer goodies
I am shopping for memory, my son advises. He also got me a cup warmer (of all things) with a usb hub, so now I don’t have to use the port i
September 28th, 2008
sourdough bread
I am making another batch of sourdough bread, this time I think bolillos, or little hoagies. They rise faster and bake faster, it’s still too hot to bake, but I’m tired of waiting for cooler temps and am doing it anyway. The bread rises really good in this heat.
I got a new recipe book the other day and can’t wait to make some of the cookie recipes in it.
It can’t stay this hot for much longer, soon I will be baking again.
School is hard!
Totally off subject, but really not, since baking relieves some of my stress. Spanish is especially tough right now, my teacher is senile, keeps repeating his stories and drifts off mid-sentence. His tests are like a children’s where’s waldo book, full of nasty tricks that have nothing to do with the knowledge of spanish, and he takes such glee in the fact that everyone in the class is fooled by it. He must think we are playing a game, but I am SO serious! Some of my money depends on getting A’s. I need at least 3.75 GPA to get some of the grants and scholarships that allow me to continue school. I have been looking into my options, seems like I can petition to the head of the department and slide over into a different class, and if things don’t change this week, that’s what I will have to do. I am studying like crazy, so I can fit into whatever level I find myself into if I switch. I don’t want to complain and then look dumb.
September 28th, 2008
computer toys
I am shopping for more memory, going to get 100 more mg, k or whatever RAM. My son says if I want to simplify my whole livingroom, I should look into getting a HDMI switch . So that’s something else I need to look at while I am in my friendly neighborhood electronics store.
We went to Norm Pedersen’s photography show last night at Space 55. It was great, of course. Paris and Heather went with us, and we picked up Norm on the way.
There was a live presentation going on at the theater, but we didn’t go in there, just looked at the pics.
After, we went for pie, Norm and I had coffee, everyone else was afraid they wouldn’t get to sleep if they had coffee, but I wasn’t afraid. I really like coffe with my pie, and Norm agreed that it was the best way to have dessert. Slept like a baby.
I’d like to attach another of Norman Pedersen’s posters that I did for his show, but I’m having some kind of problem. Later.
September 26th, 2008
Norman Pederson Part 2
Here’s another poster, problem is, they are Adobe Illustrator files, I saved them as PDF and JPG, the jpgs go here, but I can’t get the computer to believe me when I say I want a ‘thumbnail’. Oh well, here’s another one in all it’s glory, we go see the pic tomorrow night, picking Norm up on the way.
Illustrator is so great to work with, but I’m always a little intimidated by the great work the ‘kids’ in my classes put out. It’s pretty inspiring, these youngsters with the body jewelry and tattoos really crank out the good visual ideas.
I hope to get that good someday, meanwhile, I’ll help Norm by making posters with his cool pics.
September 26th, 2008
Norm Pedersen
Norman Pedersen's Nixon
Norm Pedersen, the great photographer is having a show at a new gallery downtown at Roosevelt and 6th Street called Space 55.
I am honored to be a friend of Norm’s. He’s been an Arizona treasure since the 40′s. He worked for the Phoenix Gazette and the Republic, photographed Nixon for the paper and the Supia Indians down in the Grand Canyon for Arizona Highways. He had a commercial studio where he did work for grocery stores (those big pics above the vegetable counter, huge murals of meat, some of those are his to this day), he shot saddles, whiskey, baby clothes, Sun City pieces for Del Web.
I had the honor of doing some posters for him, let’s see if I can get one out here for you to see.
He’s quite a guy, and starting on his third childhood and at least his third career. You go guy!
September 26th, 2008
Walking
I’ve been riding my bike to school because the parking SUCKS!!! There isn’t enough parking, and I end up circling the campus several times before parking. I live close enough to where I could walk, been looking at those MBT shoes shoes. Soon as the weather cools down a little I’ll be walking.
I like riding the bike, but bikes are not allowed IN the campus, you need to tie them up out on the edge of campus, so when I have a class deep in the heart of the campus, I may as well have walked there in the first place. The yoga class is in a building complex out away from the main campus, so I can park right in front of that one, it’s sweet.
September 16th, 2008
school is hard!
I need a vacation. This is still the first third of my term, and I’m burned out. Already had one meltdown, and this weekend I had a sudden desire to not go back to Phoenix, not go back to school.
Luckily it wasn’t a very strong or long-lived urge, so I’m back, but what happens when the term gets really hard? Like I know it can, what happens then?
Last term it was no problem, and I think it was because we had a nice vacation the year before, we went to Puerta Vallarta and chilled for ten days.
I really liked it, next I’d like to try a Caribbean villa rentals, I’ve never been East.
South is nice, though. In the winter, that is, while I’m in school.
What I need is a summer spot. A friend of mine recently went to Hawaii, she said it was cool in the summer.
Right now all I got is Ajo, AZ. At least the dogs like it. Here’s another pic.
cattle dog fun
September 16th, 2008
Hank and Fae, happy dogs
Hank and Fae are enjoying the cool weather, they love chasing sticks. Fae likes it when she has to swim for it, but Hank doesn’t swim well, just sinks, It’s actually hilarious. Probably the reason is, Fae has a lot of body fat to help her float, and Hank doesn’t.
Ajo arroyo dogs
The summer might finally be over, even in Ajo, lots of people were outdoors. We counted four different Bob stroller thingies, full of kids. It was that cool. I doubt if it was over ninety. I cannot hardly waitfor winter. The dogs get really long, meandering walks around the mountain preserve, alwasy on the lookout for the ‘khaki backs’ who will fine us if they see the dogs off the leash. and they’ll fine us big, too.
I’m such a scofflaw, I feel like a pretty poor example to the kids.
No, really what I think it is, is that I’m a geezer. I see it, I just can’t do anything about it.
Get your laws off my dogs!
September 16th, 2008
pictures
Hank the Cow Dog
Hank and Fae really like catching sticks. Hank’s not much of a swimmer, but Fae really likes to get the stick in the water. Hank’s more of a runner, sinks when he swims.
The water holes were mostly ankle deep, but there was a couple of deep ones.
September 15th, 2008
Digital pictures of Ajo, Arizona
Procrastinating on my homework, I want to share some of the pictures we got in Ajo this week-end with our digital cameras.
It had rained Thursday, and this was Saturday and Sunday mornings. Mom’s rain guage showed about an inch or 3/4 when we got up Sat a.m. We drove down on Friday night, so the dogs got two good runs up the wash. It is so beautiful after a rain.
Well, I’ve got these photos, and loving them, great ones of the dogs, but now I’m getting an IO error, so need to talk to my son. Somehow I can’t upload the pics. I will figure this out and put some pics up next.
Next post will be all Ajo picture and no boring words at all.
September 15th, 2008
Miniclip Poker
school keeps me pretty busy, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have time to play. My latest mania is miniclip.com
OMG they have so many fun games! and for free. They don’t seem to bog down my computer speed, either, like some of the other game sites. I guess those free game sites have to pay for it somehow, so they put extra ads on which cause drag. At least that’s how I think it goes. For someone majoring in web-related arts, you’d think I’d have more tech savvy, but I figure that’s what my son is for. And the above explanation about speed and website ads is what I got from his explanation, him not being too technical. Doing me a favor and using human language instead of tech-nese.
I’m enamored of Governor of Texas, a hold ‘em game. I lost my shirt twice, but now I’m way up. You have to buy the game to get out of town, but you can play the same guys over and over ad infinitum and they always bring more money to the table.
But I have so much homework, that I’d have to take diet pills to get it all done and still find time for Governor of Texas, so I use it as a treat when all my work is done.
Gotta go get my homework done.
September 15th, 2008
visiting AJO arizona
we had a great weekend, very quiet in the little town of Ajo, AZ. We walked down to the new restaurant in town, a steak house, had a nice steak and then walked back to the local bar, Pugsies, had an Amber Bock on tap, at $1.25 per glass, it’s the best buy in town.
It was night, and the moon was full and it was so cool and nice, we strolled around a bit, looked at homes for sale. Mom will probably need help eventually, she is making some pretty iffy decisions right now, financially speaking, and we are afraid she will lose everything and end up homeless. Nothing I can do about it, but the worst case scenario is that we have to have a house in Ajo for her to live in. So we’re looking. She might be better than we think, but I doubt it.
September 10th, 2008
boomers in school
There aren’t a lot of us. I started the yoga class yesterday, though, and found a lot of us, all women, but at least 50% grey.
The yoga class is great, I am so glad I took it. It’s in the morning and I don’t have any classes after, nothing to carry, so I rode the bike. SWEET! It’s nice going to school so close to home, last year it was a 30 minute commute.
School is keeping me pretty busy this year, and very challenging. I got ‘roped into’ a humanities class. It’s a lot of work, mostly social services stuff, and you may as well know right now that I’m not the bleeding heart liberal you might expect of a Democrat that was a teen in the 60′s. I was once, but those days are gone.
But some of the assignments are interesting. We broke up into teams for social-work projects, our looks to be to select a person who cannot pay for a surgery or some medical care and raise funds for them.
I cannot get my team together! It’s frustrating, because I found the person, if we approve her, and we need to get going on the next step. What is the next step? Well, I can’t get any of the kids to pin down a time to meet and talk, two of them actually respond to my emails, but I guess conciseness in communication is a learned skill, these kids are right out of high school. We only have three months to wrap it up with a presentation of our results. What results? I could probably do the whole thing myself, but how would that be a team effort? what if some of the team don’t like my choices? If I get short on time, I will just plow ahead.
Spanish class is great, but also a lot of work. The book costs $100.00 so I didn’t buy it (with what?), trying to find tutorials online, I found some audio that helps a lot, and the college library has some audio, too, which I will listen to today before class. I’ve been going here.
and here
http://www.quiz-buddy.com/Spanish_Phrases_with_Audio.html
The rest of my stuff pretty much is fun and easy, except I need to keep up on my online desktop publisher class, it’s too easy to let an online class get the best of me, time-wise, but so far I am even, almost ahead.
The green quilt is really looking fine, I am stitching on the backing now, from the front. It is making pretty geometric designs on the back. I’m loving it, but don’t have a lot of time, it’s mostly my stress-relief valve. It makes a soothing escape. You’d be surprised at how a few minutes here and there add up to progress, though. It’s downright heartening. Joleen will love it. She has a few more coming, since she had all those kids without even one baby blankie from me. I’m so glad we are back in touch, it’s never too late to connect with your family.
I love you, Joleen!
Gotta go to class, full day today.
September 2nd, 2008
victoriana quilts
I’ve been a ‘lurker’ on this quilting site for a long time, get a lot of inspiration from it. And I get emails monthly from them.
I want to share this great site. They are changing things soon, but from what I can see, for the better. Here’s the link
http://www.victorianaquiltdesigns.com/VictorianaQuilters/PatternPage/QuiltPatternPage.htm
My green quilt is in the process of being pinned all over so I can top-stitch it. I have about a hundred safety pins in it right now. It’s going to be a nice weight, the back is a slick material, but I don’t think it will be too slick after it’s quilted. The bumps will slow it down. Don’t want it to slide off the bed!
My bread this week-end turned out the best it ever did, that was some sourdough!!! then I turned right around and made another batch and it didn’t do nearly as well. Maybe had something to do with the humidity.
my best loaf
School is hard, quilting is good, and breadmaking is a challenge. Life is spicy for me!!