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Author: Shelly
Better Late than Never
I finally found time to transcribe some more Letters to Esther. I believe I uploaded 11 new files, which completes the first–and smallest–box o’ letters. Whew! As I get time, I’m going to put the transcripts on-line, with scans of the actual letters. That way they’ll be more searchable and user-friendly. Or, at least, that’s the intention.
One box down, four or five boxes to go!
That’s about all I have to report. It’s bloody damned hot–95F with 1000% humidity. I need gills. All I want to do is sit and try to expend as little energy as possible. The dogs aren’t enjoying it, either. They’re both as flat, and useless, as pancakes.
This photo is from a week ago. It’s nice and cool and green, which is not at all what my yard looks like right now. Now, it’s overgrown (too damned hot to mow) and steamy looking.
Edit: I forgot to mention the mosquito bites. Lordy! I went with some friends to scope out the loot at a yard sale they were having. I scored a bunch of books for arting, some cool bones (big–cow or horse or something in that vein) and a mess of mosquito bites. I’m about to cry. I put lidocaine lotion on them and took Benadryl, but nothing seems to be helping. Yuck!
We also went to see Batman Begins after the yard sale set-up. I’ve never been a fan of the Batman movies, but I was impressed. It was easily one of the best movies I’ve seen in quite awhile–well worth full evening price. It’s dark and, while there are humorous moments, it’s not at ALL cheesy.
One last thing! Here’s the top of an end table I decoupaged a few years ago. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s a fun and colorful way to tart up an ugly piece of junky furniture.
Monday Crankypantsing
Apparently, my web host has been having techsicault diffnulties this afternoon. I’ve had trouble getting into various parts of my website (slooooooow and spotty outages), and haven’t been able to access my blog at all, not even the admin parts, all afternoon. It looks like it’s back up now, though. Hrmph.
While checking my error reports, I noticed that I had seriously fubarred the uploading of some of the thumbnail images for the blog, and, since I was wanting to break all the links between the blog and the old website anyway, I went ahead (before the crash) and redirected everything so that it points at the new gallery. I hope. If I’ve missed something, I’m sure it’ll show up in an error report, or just mention it in comments or email and I’ll fix it. As soon as I’m positive I’ve got all the files duplicated properly, and all the links redirected, and all the text info moved (haven’t even started on that, yet), I’ll nuke the old pages.
Happy damned Monday!
New Uploads
I uploaded eleven more pages to the composition book journal album.
And, some gratituous cuteness:
Harriet is a heat seeker. She doesn’t like to get cold, so when the AC is cranked up, she likes to be covered up with her binkey while she naps. One of her favorite spots to sleep while I’m working on the computer is underneath my work table.
And the June full moon:
Fireflies
I stayed up a little later than I intended last night. I usually try to go to bed by 8:00 on work nights, because I get up at 4am. Last night, though, I didn’t get to bed until around 9:30. I let the dogs out at nine-ish for their last potty break. It wasn’t quite full dark yet, but the fireflies were unbelievable. Over the past few years, I’ve noticed that their numbers have decreased. Last summer, it was rare to see more than a handful on any given night. Last night, though. Oh my. There were hundreds and hundreds of little twinkling faery lights. It was gorgeous. I sat on the deck, watching them and listening to the dogs wuffling around in the grass. After awhile, the twinkling became hypnotic. It was difficult to determine their relative distances, which made it seem as if space were collapsing. It was an odd, claustrophobic sort of feeling and I was reminded of one of my mom’s favorite poems, Edna St. Vincent Millay’s Renascence.
And, speaking of happy bugs, I discovered a stand of milkweed growing in the scrubby area between my fence and my neighbor’s fence. Yesterday evening, big, fat, lazy bumblebees and some sort of swallowtail butterfly were feeding from its flowers. I didn’t get a picture of the swallowtail, but I think I got one of a bumblebee. If it turned out, I’ll post it. The spangled fritillaries are back, too! I’ll try to get photos of the whole gang.
Nudie Pix
I had an e-mail request for nude celebrity photos, so here’s one of Miss Harriet Brown. She’s not exactly a celebrity, but it’s the best I could do.
She’s a shameless jezebel, isn’t she? (And, yes, that is the ugliest couch in captivity. Thankfully, it was put to sleep a few years ago.)
Vulva Puppets
Oh, and before I forget: Vulva Puppets. Enjoy!
It’s Heeeeeeeeeere!
I finally got the lion’s share of my website finished and updated. Whew! I think the worst of it was uploading everything. I couldn’t get my FTP program to talk nicely with my host’s system, so I ended up using their web-based FTP. Which only uploads five files at a time. Which was right some Jesus tedious. But it’s done, done, done.
There are a few finishing touches that need to be added and wrinkles that need to be ironed out, but it’s basically done and functional. I’ve got more composition book journal pages to add and I need to figure out why the text-only navigation links at the tops of all the pages aren’t displaying exactly alike. It’s not a big deal, but it’s one of those things that makes me go hmmm. I’ve tested everything in Firefox and IE, and will check them in Opera, too. I don’t have access to Netscape, though, so if any of y’all who use Netscape can test drive it, I’d appreciate it.
Edit: I figured out the problem with the text-only links–I missed uploading style sheets for them–and I’ve fixed it. A bigger issue is that I need to go in and make the full-size images open on top, instead of inside the lower frame. I meant to do that in the first place, but forgot. Blech. That means I’ll have to alter every single slide page, which should be, um, fun.
I’d guess that about half the content is new (or, new to the web). The old stuff has been rephotographed or scanned, so the images are much cleaner. There are a few pieces that need to be reshot, because there’s surface glare, but for the most part, all the images are in decent shape. I’m not normally a fan of frames, but this seemed a logical place to use them. On each gallery page, there are image thumbnails across the top of the page that link to frames that contain mid-sized images and, often, info about the piece. The mid-sized images (most are around 50K) link to big images (most range from 200-500K).
So, without further ado:
Letters to Esther Updates Forthcoming
I have what may prove to be a really boring photo project planned for tomorrow. But! Because of the nature of the project, I should have time to finally (!) work on Letters to Esther. I’ve been neglecting it dreadfully and figured that if I voiced my plans out loud (um, in writing), I wouldn’t be able to back out of them.
In other, tangentially related news, I’m nearly finished with the art website. The package I bought had a ridiculous amount of space (five (5!!!) gigs), so I’ll have more than enough room to host Letters to Esther and its future, related art projects there, too. This has been an interesting project for me. The two halves of my brain just do not play well together, so the constant to-ing and fro-ing has been a challenge–a fun challenge, though.
Hmmm… What else…
- The wind and storms have finally died down (thanks a lot, Arlene!), so we should have blue skies and warm-but-not-ungodly-hot temps for the next few days.
- I kept forgetting to take my camera with me, so I missed my chance to take a picture of The Bust o’ Darth Vader perched atop the Burger King building. At one point, he was about 1/3 deflated, so he was half reclined, wielding–like a cop holding a billy club in one hand and thwacking it against the other–a similarly deflated light saber. In all, it was the worst Viagra ad, EVAR!1!! Alas, Mr. Vader was gone when I drove by this morning.
- I had to stop at three–three!–Bigfoot/Circle K/BP/Macs (lord knows what they’ll be called next week) before I found one with a working pepsisodapopcoke fountain machine. And, no, I couldn’t just stop for a cold, caffeinated, carbonated beverage at any of the other 250 gas stations between my house and my workplace, because none of those other places has my favorite brand of crack–Go Ape Energy Drink. It’s red, it’s ubercaffeinated, it’s tart, it’s slightly bitter, and it’s fizzy. In short, it’s divine ambrosia.
- Summer teevee sucks so badly that I’m counting the days until Big Brother starts. Yes, I know how sad and pathetic that is.
- I’m sick to death of cataloging COR Opinions. Title o’ the Day: Opinion on the proposal for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning the quality of bathing water. Riveting stuff.
- The last book for a round robin I’m participating in went AWOL. Hopefully it’ll turn up soon, but it should’ve been here three weeks ago. Mail out day was yesterday, so now its absence is cutting into the next person’s work time. There’s nothing I can do about it, though I can’t help but feel bad that someone’s book might have gotten terminally lost in the post. At this point, I’m just hoping the next one gets here before the its mail-out date.
- It was finally cool enough last night for some spectacular biteyface action. I was enjoying the show too much to go get the camera, so I didn’t get any pictures. It was really, really good, though–lots and lots of zooming, vaulting, rolling, and dragging each other around by the face. Oh, and the faux snarling and growling. Mustn’t forget that. It sounded like a pack of rabid hyenas had landed in my yard. And, afterward, I had two flat dogs with lolling, slab-o-ham tongues who were more than happy to go to bed early.
- Speaking of dogs, Harriet has discovered that, if she brings me a mouthful of looong grass, I’ll tear each blade into small pieces and hand feed it to her. She’s not spoiled or anything. My excuse for obliging her is that there is nothing, and I mean n-o-t-h-i-n-g, cuter than a Boxer dog smack-smack-smacking her lips while eating itty bitty pieces of grass.
from 2000-ish
I think that’s about everything. As you can see, I live a most exciting life!
More Clouds
I took this a couple of weeks ago. We’d been having crappy weather, but toward the end of the day, the clouds started to break up. I was hoping they’d clear enough in the west for a good sunset, but they didn’t. The consolation prize was this view to the southeast. Not quite the picture postcard I’d been hoping for, but sometimes you get what you get.
