Forever A Fangirl

Accidental Sunrise

Accidental Sunrise~ Frederick, Maryland 12.28.06

Sunrise~ Frederick, Maryland 12.28.08, my parent's backyard. Taken with my new-ish Canon Powershot 630--all on auto setting. No altering on any of them save reducing size/pixel count.

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Happy Festivus!!!

We'll have a relatively quiet morning here then we are headed up toward the Wisconsin-Illinois border to have Christmas with my spouse's family. For Roger's sil & brother it is their first Christmas in their first house with a new-this-year baby! So there should be good cheer right there.

                              

 

On Boxing Day I'm catching a red eye to Baltimore with my brother and his wife to go see my parents for a few days. My dad is struggling caring for my mom since her stroke (not her first) and fingers & toes crossed they'll consent to letting us help them move here.                                

 

                               

I'll be back home Friday and glad of it, I'm sure.

                               

 

                               

Happy Winter Solstice (week)!

                               

love,

                                 

--Cyn

Sand Sculpture

I usually go for snow sculpture during the winter season but I like this idea--plus the sand reminds me of the beach, which reminds me of the ocean, which puts me in a tropical mind-set. :)

The Arms Race

As beautiful as the other works are, this one speaks to me the most.

I like this one a lot, too.

I got ahold of these in an anonymous email fashion so if anyone wants to say hey, I made that or took the photos I'm glad to give credit.

The Christmas Spirit

After a over-nighter my son Jim and his little friend awake.

Remember This At Christmastime

According to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, while both male and female reindeer grow antlers in the summer each year, male reindeer drop their antlers at the beginning of winter, usually late November to mid-December. Female reindeer retain their antlers till after they give birth in the spring.

Therefore, according to EVERY historical rendition depicting Santa's reindeer, EVERY single one of them, from Rudolph to Blitzen, had to be a girl. 

Blogging: Does Nice Come Naturally?

Blogging connects us in ways that are at times quite exhilerating but just as in "real life" rude, ignorant people can  spread nastiness. A subset of these people are those that are cowards as well. They won't spew their bile in a person's face but instead do it behind their back or they take to the Internet and lash out online. Blogging facilitates this cowardice in that one can put forth the most vile assertions about another person and never be called on it because of the anonominity. But it is not ever neccesary to use the Internet to lash out personally (public figures are another story). It's fine, it may even be therapeutic to get your thoughts down in print but there's no need to publish it. Save it as a draft. Leave it alone for awhile and when you feel like it come back and read it over. You may quite possibly decide that you are glad you didn't publish it, though you may want to hang onto it as it represents who you were and what you were feeling/thinking. If it's a real life issue that needs discussion deal with it as you would have 5 or 10 years ago--in real life. I think  Mena Trott , the co-creator with husband Ben of Movable Type and this blogging platform TypePad,  has the right idea--and my experience with her latest venture,  VOX  has been delightful thus far. http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,20411-2490104,00.html

Blogosphere 2.0: civility strikes back Will the blogosphere be overrun by niceness? Bernhard Warner meets a woman who hopes it will be A year ago in Paris, the setting of so many heady philosophical debates through the ages, a young American entrepreneur stood up and challenged a crowd of technology advocates with the question, "Is civility dead?" Her audience squirmed. Others roared their objections. One spiky-haired Brit challenged the speaker. "This is bulls**t!,"he exclaimed, a reminder, in case we needed it, that we were not on the Left Bank. Actually, we were in the basement auditorium of a corporate bubble in the shadows of La Defensé. The debate was supposed to be about new tools for bloggers, but we had veered into a minefield. An American was asking her fellow bloggers from across the planet to consider: "Is it possible to be nicer to one another?" That fiery question, as many bloggers know, was uttered by Mena Trott, co-founder of the blogging software company Six Apart. That four-letter-word – nice – was now on the table for the world’s bloggers to consider. Trott wanted her fellow bloggers to consider the impact of using one’s trusty blog as a bully pulpit to unleash a vicious assault on an unsuspecting target. Nah, nice is no fun, was the consensus conclusion that day. And so the first attempt to disarm some of the blogosphere’s most combative voices was a dud. The debate raged for a few weeks in the echo chamber that is the blogosphere and then fizzled out. I spoke to Trott this week about the incident. She has no regrets about triggering the debate, she said, even if nothing was resolved. Well, she added, maybe she has one regret. She would have preferred she used the occasion to discuss accountability in the blogosphere, not that four-letter word. She also admitted wishing that she never called the spiky-haired guy an asshole, but what she was really kicking herself over was the other A-word, accountability. Trott has an interesting golden rule that she would like to see bloggers adopt. "If you aren’t going to say something directly to someone’s face, than don’t use online as an opportunity to say it," she says. "It is this sense of bravery that people get when they are anonymous that gives the blogosphere a bad reputation."

Christmastime Is Here

Some excellent picks from "DJ"  Dan .

Listen

Listen 

Mickey Dolenz

When I saw the headline to the article about Mickey Dolenz I cringed a bit in anticipation of clicking through and seeing a bald old guy looking thrashed by all the years since his heyday.

But he looks good--healthy and sounds content with his life. I think maybe--was it him that was a child actor, too? I'm not looking this up 'cos I knew this once.

My first big celebrity crush was his bandmate Davy Jones, but Mickey seemed more accessible. If I remember correctly it was Dolenz and Jones who had the most performing experience when drafted into the pre-fab made-for teevee band, the Monkees.

I haven't seen a photo of him in a while nor of the others.  I hope they all are  as happy as he looks.

Handout picture shows former Monkee Micky Dolenz. Dolenz just finished playing Charlemagne in the play 'Pippin' in Toronto. He's also had two books published this year -- a children's book titled 'Gakky Two-Feet' (Putnam, 2006) and a trivia game book titled 'Micky Dolenz' Rock 'n Rollin' Trivia' (Square One Publishers, 2006). (Timothy Fielding/Reuters)

LINK

Volver

Volver, originally uploaded by Caprica2006.
Century Cinema Theatre poster

 

Century Centre Mall

Century Centre Mall, originally uploaded by Caprica2006.

The BSG screening was a slight bust --took two hours to drive there,  When we finally did arrive we found that the show had "sold out" (they were free tickets!) at 6 p.m.--for the 7:30 p.m. screening. With a bit of cajoling my spouse was able to  to find out that there were indeed two VIP's who'd failed to show and we could have their seats at about the halfway over point for the screening.
This photo is after the screening when the merchants were shuttering their shops for the night.

Fan Wanking All Over Myself

So I was skimmimg through the TVGuide.com recap of Unfinished Business, last week's episode of  Battlestar Galactica when I got a prompt to enter the contest mentioned in the blurb here.

I figured what the hey--and each household had at least two trys.

So who wins? My non-BSG-fanboy spouse.

But he gets to bring me. What a prize, huh? You know I mean the tickets, right?

Oh, I am so jazzed!!! I'm fan-wanking all over myself.

Five Girls For Every 2 Guys?

These guys were not having a great day. Firstly, notice that the  brown (female) ducks outnumber the pretty green-headed guy-ducks (drakes). I wonder if the Artic winter blast 10 days ago that crippled so much of the Midwest took out a few guy ducks.

Go back! Go Back!

Then an unforseen problem: A dead end where the little creek runs into the frozen pond. I'll bet someone never heard the end of that. :/

I just like the subject__my son--sorta smiling!__ in the photo and the composition.

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Cropped to see more of Chris

To Forgive, Divine

Yoko Ono in front of John Lennon's portrait at a news conference in Tokyo, October 4, 2005. She has called for the anniversary of Lennon's death to become a worldwide day of forgiveness but said she could not yet absolve her husband's killer. REUTERS/Toru Hanai

Say what you will about Yoko Ono, she seems to have remained unwaiveringly loyal to John Lennon's memory.
Her stark honesty about not being able to forgive Lennon's killer is something I can completely understand, too. My heart is not big enough to include that nut job (whose name I feel should not be repeated)... Rest in Peace, John.

In Re: The Season's Reason

I've been sick for the last couple of days but my headache has now diminshed enough that it doesn't hurt to read:

This is an opinion piece by Eric Zorn, columnist for the Chicago Tribune which does make my head hurt as it has me pondering where I stand on the issues he addresses.

I am absolutely a sun worshipper though so I would be leaning in that direction--if there were any sunlight to lean toward.

http://tinyurl.com/wshhq

I've got your "reason for the season" right here, pal.

Just outside the window, to be exact:  Sunlight.

No secret there.  Civilizations all over the northern hemisphere have been making merry toward the end of December for thousands of years, with most of the celebrations linked somehow to the "return" of the sun --- the longer periods of daylight that begin on the Winter Solstice December 21.

Which is why the triumphant, even defiant slogan "Jesus is the reason for the season" -- seen this time of year on buttons, T-shirts and bumper stickers and heard from those who grouse that secular society is at war with Christmas--- is so irritating.

A cynic with more energy than I have ought to create "Marduk is the reason for the season" banners in honor of the beloved Zagmuk story.

Some 4,000 years ago in ancient Mesopotamia,  Marduk was the patron diety of the city of Babylon.   Marduk was said to have conquered the monster of chaos, Tiamat,  and thus paved the way for creation.  But,  every year,  alas,  the monster fought back, the fields went barren, the days got shorter and life itself hung in the balance.

The 12-day, late December Zagmuk throw down, then,  was replete with rituals believed to help Marduk win his annual battle with Tiamat, and then to celebrate the return of light.

Ancient Romans celebrated Saturnalia during roughly the same calendar window, while the Perisans  observed the festival of Sacaea.  History does not record whether peevish Mesopotamians, perceiving a dilution of their seasonal tradition, began a campaign to "put Marduk back into Zagmuk."

But even by then, the season belonged to many cultures and was viewed as a magical, mysterious and portentous time.

Quite a coincidence that Jesus Christ was born at a time when folks all over were already partying, eh?

Well, probably not.

Scholars don't even agree on the year Jesus was born, much less the month or day.  Given the reported presence of shepherds watching their flocks by night, the best guess is sometime in the late spring or early fall.

If you have lots of time on your hands, Google the phrase "When was Jesus born?" and start poking around the 13,000 Web sites where exegetes and skeptics alike parse the text and history books for answers. (see below for samples)

The question didn't seem to concern early Christians all that much. It wasn't until 350 A.D. that  Pope Julius I of Rome, fixed the date for the Feast of the Nativity on December 25.

It looked like a cynical choice designed to co-opt the wanton hoo-haw already raging at that time of year, and not an educated estimate.

Early American Puritans were among the Christians who felt the choice amounted to unseemly piggy-backing: "It was in compliance with the pagan Saturnalia that Christmas Holy Days were first invented," sniffed Puritan pastor and Harvard president Increase Mather in 1687, explaining why those in his denomination scorned the observance.

But, hey. Whatever the source of his calculations,  Pope Julius  got it right.  Christmas is not the holiest day on the Christian calendar --- that would be Easter --  but it's become by far the biggest.

The reason? Sunlight.

Sunlight is also, coincidentally, said to be the best disinfectant --- here a disinfectant to kill the toxic notion that any one faith "owns" this season of renewal,  hope, joy, generosity  and the victory over darkness.

"Seasons greetings" and "happy holidays" take nothing from the Christians who also chose this time of year to celebrate the birth of their divine source of renewal, hope, joy, generosity and victory.  He is their reason for the season, not the reason.

These generic expressions are not banalities that trivialize the festivities.   

They are  invitations to all to join in.  Invitations to find and revel in your own reasons to be glad for the trappings and trimmings of this time of year and the promise that lies ahead.

High Level Thinking

You are driving in a car at a constant speed.  On your left side is a "drop off" (The ground is 18-20 inches below the level you are traveling on),  and on your right side is a fire engine traveling at the same speed as you. In front of you is a galloping horse which is the same size as your car and you cannot overtake it. Behind you is another  galloping horse. Both horses are also traveling at the same speed as you. What must you do to safely get out of this highly dangerous situation? 

       

For the answer : click and drag your mouse from star to star.        
 * Get your drunk ass off the merry-go-round.    *

                                                               

Snowed In

My son got his wish: no school.
We are lucky, we didn't lose any power or (fingers crossed) Internet access.
My car is among many in the parking lot obscured by ice and snow.
Our dog Raven needed a path made immediately this morning so she could get past the porch and TCB.

I would love to go get some snaps of the various examples of winter beauty but having just experienced almost a week of 60F weather, I'm not going anywhere for any reason let alone out for "fun." (And the wind is howling like a son-of-a-gun).
Yes, I am not a winter person. Pretty to look at--unless you are into skiing or snowshoeing a bitch to live in. I made all my snow forts as a kid. When it warms up I'm still ok with snow angels and sledding but it's gotta be above a 20F wind chill.

I'm a bit cranky as spouse is running into delays in his DIY--ancient fixtures are sometimes really hard to remove. He worked forever last night trying to extract the fan from the ceiling. He finally did it--but right now I have a gaping hole which hopefully will be transformed into a quiet, modern-looking fan tonight.