See you next year

The unseasonably warm weather means the lights are coming off the house today. The ornaments will be put away and the tree will come down in another week or so.

Spring is just around the corner. Right?

Shaken, not stirred

The simple gin Martini served "up" (no ice) with olives is probably the drink that best symbolizes the cocktail of past business executives. You know, the two Martini lunch that lasted four hours and routinely showed up on expense accounts...

And, of course, "Bond. James Bond."

But I think of something else too. Remember Bewitched? Remember how Sam would have a pitcher waiting for Darrin when he got home from work? A PITCHER! No wonder he was able to tolerate his awful boss, Larry Tate. And, come to think of it, maybe Sam didn't really do those witch things. Maybe those were just Darrin's hallucinations from drinking an entire pitcher of Martinis every night.

Anyway, here's to you my friends: Sam, Darrin, James, and even you Larry-- "Cheers!"

Icicle season

The answer to the old riddle: What melts and freezes at the same time?


Oh sure, they're pretty, but some people have to use extreme caution around icicles. Yesterday Terri swatted one off the overhang just outside our front door and cut her hand between her fingers. During finals week, Saralyn was "almost killed" by one that fell off the roof of a school building as she was walking past.

Yes, I am surrounded by women who live life on the edge of danger.

Pavilion

On this beautiful, clear and crisp winter morning I went out to the nearby forest preserve with Morgan to test out my new wide angle zoom lens. (Yes, Santa read my 12/22 blog post.)

Hickory Creek (LaPorte Road Access) underwent a major renovation in 2009. This Frank Lloyd Wright-esque pavilion is brand new. I think it is as beautiful as it is practical.

Make it stop!

Obviously, Saralyn hates the sound of two pieces of styrofoam screeching against one another.

Either that or she just opened a gift box with a really ugly sweater.

Generations

Charlette (Charley, 11 days old) met great-grandma (Stella, 34,995 days old) on Christmas Day. Charley is Stella's 17th great-grandchild.

It seemed they both enjoyed the comfort of this moment.

Merry Christmas

Good morning

Is it an asterisk? A snowflake? A stick man? It's what I see when I wake up each morning.

Of course it's a ceiling fan and light. But when you don't have your glasses on and you just woke up and it's still dark, it really could look like any one of those other things.

Geek-tiques

Old stuff. Amazing, just a few years ago this was invaluable software. Now, it's on a shelf waiting for... hmmm, I don't know what it's waiting for.

Blog tool

When I first committed to posting a picture a day on this blog back in October, about half of the pictures were taken with my iPhone and the other half with this camera, a Nikon D60. Now I find myself carrying the Nikon with me on most of my travels.

The camera came with two zoom lenses: an 18-55 (this one) and a 55-200. I'd like to get a wide-angle lens to use as my "everyday" lens.

Santa, are you reading this?

Antique

You either love old-school decorations like this, or you are reminded of the new TV commercial in which one character tells the other that his decorations are "ho-ho-rendous".

Yum!

It's Christmas cookie time! Yesterday Terri made her iced vanilla cookies. They're mostly for friends and family, but I get to sample the broken and extra-crispy ones. And that's OK with me.

My beautiful girls

Misha, Terri and Saralyn. It's probably not fair to show this one of Sara, but she's still beautiful, even while making this face. And that is her personality-- beautiful and goofy.

And, they are all as nice and intelligent as they are beautiful. Am I lucky to be surrounded by such hot babes or what?

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

As I drove through Southern Illinois...

Hurry-- they won't last long!

Squint

I remember decorating the tree when I was much younger. Mom taught me her trick for checking to see if the lights were done right. She said, "Sit across the room, squint, and look at the tree. That's how you find any bare spots."

This tree's peak doesn't have lights because there is a long skirt on the angel at the top. So, I'd say the squint test shows that this tree is pretty well-lighted. Hmm, except for that one bare spot near the top.

Comin' atcha!

Yeah, sometimes life feels this way.

(Photo taken heading east on Walnut in Murphysboro, Illinois.)

Whatzit?

No, it's not an aerial view of Chicago at night, it's a parallel port card from a PC of course.

Whenever I fly in to Chicago at night (and I've done it all of two or three times) the symmetry and architecture of the city reminds me of a circuit board such as the one shown here.

Does this make me a computer geek?

An old time Christmas decoration, Part 2

If you guessed four, you were correct! A great decoration, all three smaller Santas nest inside the big one.

An old time Christmas decoration, Part 1

Quick, how many Santas are here?

(Answer Monday morning at 10:10.)

Naked

Just a few weeks ago you should have seen the pretty colors this lady was wearing. But she shed those because she chooses to go through the Winter with nothing on.

Ho Ho Woof

Christmas Eve is two weeks from today. Are you ready for Christmas? Morgan is!

But Morgan, even though you put on your Santa hat, you're still not getting any egg nog.

Sailboat going up

I suppose this could be filed under the I don't really care what I'm doing at my job heading. This was one of the two pantings in my hotel room on Wednesday night. Both were hung sideways. The one over the bed had to be horizontal because there was no room for it vertically. This one, as you can see, could have/should have been mounted the correct way.

Home tonight

Room 327. It's one of these...I think.

I love this view. It looks like you could run as fast as you want-- forever, without running out of space.

Redrum.

A day full of Elizabeths

This photo was taken today in Elizabethtown on the southern edge of Illinois. (That's the Ohio River in the background.) The sign for Ms. Lizzie's Restaurant reminded me of my friend Liz who loves to cook and has a blog called lizziecooks. Then, shortly after I took this pic, I heard the news that Elizabeth Edwards lost her battle with cancer earlier this morning.

That's a lot of Elizabeth references in one day.

Cold morning

Close-up of frost on the inside of the garage window.

Slight revision to the "Greatest Story Ever Told"

Angel, three kings, and two bearded dragons visit Joseph, Mary, and the baby Jesus. Bet you never knew about the bearded dragons, did you?

What a difference!

Amazing, after we shoveled the snow off the driveway, the house looked completely different-- more like Playa del Carmen in August.

A bend in the road

Electric

This is why the lights go on when we flip the switch. I thought that the person who did this work must be someone who cares about symmetry and design-- an artist in electrician's clothing.

In honor of the artistic electrician, I played with the colors to give the photo somewhat of a Warholian effect.

Really?

Really? People have to be told this?

Yeah, some areas I travel to are places where the locals need to be reminded of these rules. I was going to write obvious rules, but I guess to some people, they're not.