POST-IT LOVE

This is so sweet.

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Stencil Graffiti Art 101

I got in a rather heated discussion with a young man who thought it was everyone's right to spray paint graffiti anywhere they choose.

I'm posting some nice examples of stencil art that I found on Google images but I absolutely think you need permission to place these on a building that you don't own. I would happily place the maid sweeping the dirt behind the curtains on my building.

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Dueling Church Signs

I love these dueling signs I found on the internet. They were pretty obviously photoshoped but they are still funny.


















C
All dogs go to heaven

P
Only humans go to heaven. Read the bible



















C
God loves all his creations, dogs included

P
Dogs don't have souls. This is not open for debate



















C
Catholic dogs go to heaven. Presbyterian dogs can talk to their pastor.

P
Converting to Catholicism does not magically grant your dog a soul.



















C
Free dog souls with conversion.

P
Dogs are animals. There aren't any rocks in heaven either (me—huh?—rocks?)













C
All rocks go to heaven.

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Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen Review

I just left the movie. It was action packed, funny, and definitely a big screen movie. A lot of teenage boys in the audience applauded when Meagan Fox first appeared. I don't have a girl crush but even I would have to say she looked hot. The first movie had a bit more plot and this one relied heavily on mega special effects but I recommend the movie highly.

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Johnny Depp as The Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland

When I found out that Tim Burton was doing Alice in Wonderland my first thought was good choice for a project, my second thought was will Johnny Depp be the Mad Hatter or the Caterpillar?

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DEADLINE post-it stop motion

I love this clever stop motion film.

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Dancing Robot - Lord of the Disk

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Photo of the Inside of My Refrigerator and Empty Refrigerator Haiku

The frig fairies have abandoned us. I don't know why but I hate grocery shopping; thankfully I'm married to someone who enjoys it.

The refrigerator is so bare of real food that I feel compelled to wash it out.

We have ice tea, lemonade, milk, half and half, water (we'll be well hydrated), eggs, sour cream, cottage cheese, cabbage, broccoli, chocolate pudding (any frig that contains chocolate custard made from scratch is a happy place), cheese, left over pancakes and condiments.

frittata for lunch
eggs, broccoli, cheese, pasta
yay, shopping can wait

The frittata is in the oven. The frig is even more empty but now it's nice and clean.

Frittata is Italian for "must go". You combine cooked pasta, vegetables and meat—Pour beaten eggs over the top—Add cheese and bake at 375 degrees. Numm...

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A Blond Moment

I had a bit of a blond moment. We had been listening to an audio book on my iPod and I had written down the number I saw on the boom box style player, 219.

Today I looked for where we left off and I realized there was no 219. I wrote down the time on player; we were actually on disc 13.

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Wild Turkey and Her Chicks

I wish I had my camera earlier (this isn't my photo) since a wild turkey was taking her poults out for a walk. I only seem to see wild turkeys in fields or alongside roads; never in the actual woods.

Last summer we had turkeys in the nature area at the end of our block; a few were near the bus stop.

We got to hear a small group of wild turkeys calling in a field; they had an amazing loud sound.

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Sailing on Our Hobie Cat Sailboat

I used to think everyone had webbed toes; when I found out they don't, I took it as a sign that I was meant to live in the water.

This is our Hobie Cat. We fell in love with sailing at Sandals Resort in Jamaica. There is nothing better than soaring across the lake and since most fishermen only fish in the morning and evening, we usually have the lake to ourselves.

The best thing about a Hobie Cat is its ease of use. There is not a lot of elaborate rigging and it's outrageously easy to sail.

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Cabin Bound

I think I need to go commune with nature and swat some bugs while painting so I'm cabin bound. We are near a nature reserve so we have eagles, deer, bear, loons, turkeys and the hummingbirds will tap on the windows to let us know we need to fill the feeders NOW.

We've spotted some big cat prints and it's a little unnerving when the dogs go window to window at night sniffing and growling.















This is our driveway.















There is always something in bloom. It's daisy season now and in about another week we'll have lady slippers growing throughout the woods.















Sunset on the lake.

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Cell Phone Hijinks

My daughter took this through the screen using the negative setting on her cell phone. The chair is blue, the table yellow, and I'm fairly certain the tree isn't purple.

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Kaki King rocks out to "Playing with Pink Noise" on Ted

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Food Fight

My daughter tossed a small chunk of bread towards my ice tea, she missed. I proceeded to pelt her with all the bread at the table and went into the kitchen to reload. Mayhem ensued with the dogs frantically trying to catch the flying bits. Clean up was much easier than the previous spaghetti food fight and the neighbors still talk about the great watermelon battle we had last year. One of the seeds actually planted itself and we had this melon grow in the yard. It only got to 6 inches long but we were very impressed.

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Funny Star Wars Ads

I love this series of ads from Disney; I put my favorites here. Darth Vader is hiding a light saber behind his back while waiting line to meet Luke Skywalker. Bubba Fett is bringing Han Solo who is still trapped in carbonite through baggage claim.

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Irises Blooming Along The Pond

Blooming Irises along the koi pond. The pond attracts many birds and the ducks like to visit with their new families.






























Bearded Irises; I thought they were especially luscious after an early morning rain.

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Chipmunk Being Fed By Chewbacca

Chris McVeigh took these adorable photographs and they are not photoshopped.

Chewie and Billy the chipmunk were my desktop wallpaper until someone asked me about the photo and I did a little research to find out who the photographer is. McVeigh has other shots of Billy with other Star Wars toys but I particularly like the unsettled expression on Billy the Chipmunk and when he encounters an Ewok. (Billy was actually responding to another chipmunk)

There is an interview with Chris at "The Official Star Wars Blog" where he discusses how he got Billy to cooperate with the photos; it took time, trust and a lot of almonds.

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Stoners Don't Make Good Editors

I took a Sudafed this morning for a headache. I can't handle 2 aspirin in a day so a Sudafed makes me loopy as a tangled Slinky.

I read my daughter's college paper and she figured out that the praise came post drugs. I offered to proof read it for her and was told "Stoners don't make good editors".

Since I had time on my hands I did a ACEO ink and watercolor drawing of Martian carrots invading Earth. The other Micron ink drawing is of vegetarian astronauts who think they found the perfect planet to colonize.

I'm not sure if I was inspired by drugs or ambivalent feelings from trying to only eat raw foods today such as fruit and vegetables.

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It's Finally Raining

The yard was beginning to look dreadful. We have one of the few houses in the neighborhood without automatic sprinklers and since we have so many mature trees we can avoid watering until things become pretty dire.

The flowering cactus Micron pen ACEO ink drawing was tinted with watercolor pencils. I had the pencils but never seemed inclined to use them.

They work OK but I prefer ink or watercolors. They would be nice for outdoor artistic endeavors where you don't want to bring along a lot of materials. I need to play with them more and develop better technique. I wasn't sure what would happen when I added water and how much color needed to be laid down so I wanted to try them on a simple sketch. I think I saw a cactus like this in a magazine at Barnes and Noble but I don't remember which; I did the drawing from my freaky memory.

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Evolution of Dance

I was checking the most viewed youtube videos of all time and this one was towards the top of the list. I had totally forgotten about this fun video.

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Burning Marijuana

I was looking for some images for burning weed (a local plant that makes your skin burn) and all I could find was marijuana stories. We were talking about this video the other night so when I ran across it I had to post it in my blog.

The story featuring Damien Day, was a bit on a British sit com called Drop the Dead Donkey. The end is slightly cut off and Damien says to the camera man "Let's go for a curry"

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I Feel A Road Trip Coming On

In my past life (when I had excess income) I traveled somewhere exotic at least every 3 months. The pressure is building and I think I need to hop on my motorcycle and pick a direction.

It's supposed to rain for the next 3 days so I need to come up with a one day trip.

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Refrigerator Fairy Ink and Marker Drawing

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

We keep going to the refrigerator looking for something good only to find the same things that were there 10 minutes earlier. Our excuse is that the frig fairy might have restocked.

She's been taking a bit too much time off lately—even the dogs don't get excited when we check—now they wait for proof of snacks before they get off the couch.

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Bad Day At The Dog Park ACEO 2.5" x 3.5"

Zelda, my Lhasapoo, is under 5 pounds—Marilyn, my Westiepoo, may approach 10 pounds after a hefty lunch and a dip in the lake—They should never go to the dog park.

I broke one of my rules, always take your own car so you can go home. I sat in the car with 2 furiously barking dogs and I sketched this while waiting for my friend to catch her beast, I mean giant canine. My dogs saw all the other big dogs and raced to safety on the top of my head.

Marilyn wasn't hit with an errant Frisbee but if she had barked much longer I might have taken a toss at her myself.

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Poison Ivy

My daughter is taking a summer class at the local college on Minnesota ecology and the grounds are thick with poison ivy. We live a block away so I'm rather interested.

I found this on Wikipedia—
The plants can grow as a shrub up to about 4 foot tall, as a ground cover 4–10 inches high, or as a climbing vine on various supports. Older vines on substantial supports send out lateral branches that may at first be mistaken for tree limbs.

The compound leaves of poison ivy consist of three pointed leaflets; the middle leaflet has a much longer stalk than the two side ones. The leaflet edges can be smooth or toothed but are rarely lobed. The leaves vary greatly in size, from 0.31" to 2.16" in length. They are reddish when they emerge in the spring, turn green during the summer, and become various shades of yellow, orange or red in the autumn.

The photos were taken from the Internet, the photographer is unknown.

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Buffalo With Calves Near Park Rapids

I tried to get closer to take more pictures of the buffalo babies but the mommas would start to rumble at me when I got within 40 feet of the farmer's fence. Bison herds must have been quite a sight when they roamed the plains.

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Gulls at Agate Beach outside of Duluth

The gulls look like they they are trying to decide whether or not to go surfing. The beach was bitterly cold Memorial Day with impressive waves. The tiny beach is a nice place to go and look for agates and it's a pretty drive along Highway 61.

Bob Dylan released Highway 61 Revisited in 1965

Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son"
Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on"
God say, "No." Abe say, "What?"
God say, "You can do what you want Abe, but
The next time you see me comin' you better run"
Well Abe says, "Where do you want this killin' done?"
God says, "Out on Highway 61."

Well Georgia Sam he had a bloody nose
Welfare Department they wouldn't give him no clothes
He asked poor Howard where can I go
Howard said there's only one place I know
Sam said tell me quick man I got to run
0l' Howard just pointed with his gun
And said that way down on Highway 61.

Well Mack the Finger said to Louie the King
I got forty red white and blue shoe strings
And a thousand telephones that don't ring
Do you know where I can get rid of these things
And Louie the King said let me think for a minute son
And he said yes I think it can be easily done
Just take everything down to Highway 61.

Now the fifth daughter on the twelfth night
Told the first father that things weren't right
My complexion she said is much too white
He said come here and step into the light he says hmm you're right
Let me tell the second mother this has been done
But the second mother was with the seventh son
And they were both out on Highway 61.

Now the rovin' gambler he was very bored
He was tryin' to create a next world war
He found a promoter who nearly fell off the floor
He said I never engaged in this kind of thing before
But yes I think it can be very easily done
We'll just put some bleachers out in the sun
And have it on Highway 61.

Some vacation condos were built across the bay; I didn't like them in the photo so I Photoshopped them out. Thanks to Photoshop you can have your perfect world.

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Bridgestone Super Bowl Ad - Taters

I've always loved Mr Potato Head and this Mr and Mrs Potato Head commercial is very funny.

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Fashion Queen Mr Potato Head Feeling Pretty

Mr Potato Head (not Mrs Potato Head) has glamor accessories for those special days when he wants to feel extra pretty; earrings, mascara, high heels and a purse to keep all his potato toppings.

This description is from the Playskool site.

PLAYSKOOL MR. POTATO HEAD PARTS ‘N PIECES GLAMOUR SPUD
click to enlarge image	It’s more mix-and-match fun for the potato you love! Create fashionably fun and wacky looks with glamorous accessories. You’re sure to produce a fashion queen with so much a-peel! Glamorous accessories for your MR. POTATO HEAD. Includes visor, pair of eyes, pair of earrings, mouth, pair of shoes, 2 arms and purse. Figure not included.

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Sunday Was A Good Day

Sunday was a good day. I napped in the hammock, watched the hummingbirds, went to Sonic for a cheeseburger, made rhubarb pie, and had a water fight with the kids.

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