Snow reason not to

Above is a view of our driveway heading out toward the road. Below is Pandora in the backyard. A couple days ago we were looking at a much greener landscape around here. With the rain and warmer temperatures the snow was all but gone. Suddenly, boom! Several inches of snow. Welcome to Maine.

I haven't shoveled or done any snowblowing yet because the temperatures are supposed to get into the 40s. If that happens and goes on for most of the day, it would be a waste of time to bother with snow removal. As the day wears on, I might have to do something, but for now...

Turtle Dreams

A few years ago, Carrie got me this drawer/cabinet knob. She wasn't quite sure what I might use it for, but thought it too neat an item not to get.

Well, in our new house, one of the few things left behind by the previous owner was a computer desk. It has a cabinet that was missing a handle. Yesterday Carrie put this on in its place.

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Sunday Funnies

Coming in July.

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Happy New Year

Yeah, a little late to wish you a Happy New Year. Even if we mean the Lunar New Year. That was February 14th. But there were special events planned the weekend before and the weekend after in Boston's China Town. We took a little road trip for the last one, which was the Lion Dance Parade.

Different troups were sponsored, much like Little League Baseball, by various businesses. There were at least half a dozen wandering around the streets. Different color costumes, different numbers of lions, and different types of support players helped differentiate them all.

Local businesses put out a head of lettuce and an orange for the lion to "eat" which makes them drunk and a little unstable. Then the firecrackers come out and chases the lion off to the next stop. There was a lot of shredded lettuce all over the streets by the end of the day.

Thanks to Kemmer, we didn't have to try and find parking downtown with its outrageous prices. We parked outside the area and took the subway in following her directions. That also caused us to drive near a Trader Joes, so we stopped in on our way home and bought stuff. Yum!

Click on the lion's eyes to lion-size the photo.

Kleaning

I have attempted to clean that photo up a bit.

The Old is News

I'm currently scanning old family photos and emailing them to my niece, Stephanie Coble.

The one below is the oldest in the collection. The lady on the right is my great grandmother, Clara. She was around during the Civil War.

The one on the right is, hopefully, the only nude of me that will ever show up on the internet. Even then I knew the value of a high fiber diet!

Komputer Room

The computer room has its furniture and major organizational demarcations all set. Lots of smaller organizing still needs to be done and may undergo several waves of redoing. Above is the major computer desk with internet connection. Scanner to the left with all my USB cables hanging on the side. Most of our hand puppets are on the upper shelf, and our 3 big puppets are on the bookcase to the right. That case holds trading cards and autograph collections. I also have part of a stereo there. Eventually I will have a turntable set up so I can transfer a lot of vinyl to mp3 files.



This second photo shows more of the room continuing toward the right. The second desk currently holds the printer and second computer. Our 2 filing cabinets here hold mostly mundane files. Most of my art files are up in the studio where I'll be doing most of my drawing. The bankers box on top holds most of my postage stamps. On the wall next to the window is my uncut sheet of The Avengers trading cards. The shelves hold mailing materials as well as related collections of foreign and US postcards, first day covers, etc.

The closet on the right holds more than I want to keep there right now, but eventually it will be just for overflow clothes and supplies for this room's collections.

The bench on the right wall is where people will sit when doing Puppet Improv. We'll be opposite the computer camera set up so we can see what we're recording as we do it.

The rug is a bit of excess cut from the recent carpet installation in the studio.

Bizzy Winter

Looking out over our driveway toward the road.















I drive 45 minutes each way to work, work an 8 hour day with another hour in there for lunch, then usually work at least an hour of overtime. With the days getting longer I'm now seeing daylight in the morning, but the drive home is still in the dark. And Carrie has a longer drive and a lot more overtime than I do. In other words, we don't have a lot of free time these days. When we do, we're often doing needed errands or chores.












We had a bit of snow during the first part of the winter. Carrie has even done a few turns at the snow blowing. But it was up to me to shovel off the roof. I hadn't been keeping up with clearing the edges with our roof rake, so an ice dam was starting to build up. We weren't certain how much the next precipitation, a rain storm, would wash away the ice or add to it, so I had to get up there with the shovel. Fortunately, that was all that was needed to ensure the rest got melted in the rain.







Inside, with no photos to post just yet, we've got a lot of shelves up in the studio and all my comics are now accessible. I just have to put them in order.

The main part of the house is starting to feel like it's actually ours now that we've been putting out our bric-a-brac and hung a few things on the walls.