Saturday, September 29, 2012

9 29 12

AH FALL!
 
There once was a time when morning temperatures under the forty degree mark sent my sense of  hunting of wild game over the boiling level.  As a teenager I had taken up bow hunting and, as we lived in suburban New Jersey, that weapon was a necessity if you wanted to hunt.  Even in the time of the dinosaurs one could not hunt in urban areas with a gun.  Your neighbors would simply call the cops if you were discovered.  So my crowd of five or six took up the bow and arrow.  It's much more quiet and hence would be less likely to raise the wrath of the gentry.
 
To this day I am simply amazed that we were not all thrown in the gulag until we reached our 25th birthdays.  For instance, as practice we would play archery golf on the "Private" country club in the area.  I am sure the golfers were a little shocked as an arrow flew overhead just as they were about to swing.
 
We never killed anything but spent many days crashing around in the local woodlots.  Now those woodlots were just an undeveloped lots between houses with some trees.  Still amazed that we all avoided juvenile records. 
 
But back to Fall and the chase.
 
 
Back then if we even had a shot at a doe, we had accomplished something.  Never hit any but that was immaterial at the time.  The above image was taken more recently at Valley Forge in Pennsylvania.  Finding it this morning just brought back a bunch of memories...but heck isn't that what photographs are for?

Friday, September 28, 2012

9 28 12

 
I don't believe, at 3:15 in the afternoon, that I have time for this....  Anyway! It's all set up to post tomorrow and then I can do some real work?

 Now it's tomorrow and I am well into the first Pike Place Roast and wondering just what my next chore will be.

 It's still cool here in Shangra La South but the leaves on the trees are still hanging onto every ounce of chlorophyll and fall is present only in the morning temperatures.  I really should be driving the car west and north to the mountains looking for decent drive by shootings, but then I look at the gas gauge and see....Well it would be $50 just to get started and probably another fifty to get back from wherever I would wander and that's a bleak thought.  I will probably just work on listing some more fabulous photographs on FAA that are new and fresh and to date unseen by the buying public.  More of the same...followed by yard work just to keep the muscles on my butt in condition.  Amazing what deterioration of butt muscles takes place when one sits on it all day long working at a puter.  So here's my planning schedule for the rest of the year!

Somewhere in all these futuristic projections are two art shows.  My first in three years.  I am out of my mind and am doing this just to prove it to myself....I will need help but, every shrink I have ever talked to needed one worse than me.  So they easily convinced me that I am normal.
 
Halloween's coming ... like soon?
 
 
The cinder block wall in the front of the house needs decorating for the event.  I will disguise the gun ports with some fake cobwebs, a couple of pumpkins on the top of the wall for target practice, and and a mini slide down which the candy will be dispensed.  O yes...it has to be candy don'tchya know.  Fruit and nutritious things to eat might cause rioting in the streets.  And no I am not paranoid...both shotguns have been sawed off, loaded and are considered to be street sweepers.  The graffiti on the face of the wall generously provided at no cost by the "Bloods" and "Crypts", purveyors of equal opportunity death.  Actually not bad art work!
 
Then there's..

Turkey day..........You know that's when we give thanks because sometimes we can't remember to do so every other day of the year!
And thank God the real Refs will be back.  That ensures the post ingestion nap.  Which reminds me I need to go out and get some more Prilosec.  Turkey for some reason never agrees with my stupid stomach, but I love it.
 
 
And then there's the Biggy, I need to arrange for the six month second mortgages just to play Santa!
Although I hear that the banks aren't lending anymore unless you're rated up there with the bank of England.  They won't even take your first born as collateral.  What good is that?  It's going to be a slim Christmas again this year.  Four years of this economy is just not comfortable unless your among the 47% that live off the govt.  Counting the govt. workers, I'll bet that number is even higher.  The rest of us just have to depend upon our own ingenuity or a wool mask, a note, a gun and a bank.
 
There will be a trip sometime in December up north to see the kids and grands, so considering the way things are going I will be buying 20 gallons of gas each week and storing it to offset the late season gauging.  God, just for once it would be nice to be the dog and not the tail!
 

And if there's anything left .......................then it's calendar turning time!
 

Sigh!
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

9 26 12

IS IT JUST ME?
 
The images here in are some that I have captured elsewhere on the web just to help prove a point.
I thank those artists in advance for the use of their work.
 
 
The lame stream news jerks seems to be having the newest "Mediagasm" over the strike in the NFL.  Even comparing the circumstances to those in Wisconsin earlier in the year....given unions and such vs. the managing elite.  I am not even going to discuss the merits or lack thereof....of the positions of either side.  That is not the point of this.
 
I feel sorry for the replacement guys....they don't have the expertise, training or experience to do that job but certainly take the heat for what they do.
 
Now I like football, don't get me wrong, and I even played some schoolyard touch way back when.  You know skins and shirts stuff.  Or was that basketball?  But I must admit that I do enjoy college sports better than the pros.  They still have a little old school Rah Rah stuff left in them, even if it is only so they can eventually go into the pros.
 
 This rant is not about the game so much as it is about people's reaction to things.
 
  It seems the most of the pundits, writers, news casters, talk showists, talking heads, news babes, and the rest of the elitists in the media are up in arms about the striking refs in the NFL.  And most of the ones making the most noise are not sports casters.  So what the hell do they know?  It apparently is the new and most important, to our lives, topic of the day.
 
  WHY?
 
The answer to that, in my humble opinion is distraction.  But then I would be called cynical....Think?  Actually, I am not so humble.  I don't want to argue or discuss this with any of my liberal friends.  I'm  right...you're wrong.  End of discussion.
 
Our people across the world are being attacked by lunatics and all people can talk about is the NFL?
 
  Huh?
 
  Come on people where are your priorities?

 
Should we maybe get a little outraged about this?  Think about changing things up?   Or do we talk about it for a weekend and then...well it passes into oblivion on the news room floor.  And our leaders are reluctant to call it what it is.  Maybe I should have said "Our Leader".  Misnomer!
 
 Where is the outrage?
 
  Dammit people it's your flag.
 
  Your countrymen murdered!
 
And then there is our leadership.
 

There is something about the "Constitution" thingy that says that the Senate must pass a budget every year.
 
  Every year.
 
  Nasty thing that! 
Gets in the way of all kinds of progressive thinking!
 
They certainly give one a sense of confidence.  Doesn't it?
 
Come on people get it right!
 

 

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

9 25 12

Best laid plans of men and mice........or something like that.  Did not go "Freestyling" over the weekend. 
 
The guest room needed painting, so rather than enjoy the great weather....smelly old paint!
 
Fifty six degrees this morning and guess that means it's fall.  The first time that low since sometime in the spring.  Blue bird sky and I have yard work and food shopping to do.  And post some more of the Sepia Lighthouses....see the gallery.  I did sell a note card last night sometime around three AM.  Don't ya just love this 24 hour market the net provides.
 

I am not sure how much of this sepia stuff will sell, but the topic suits itself well to the old time look.  And I do think that they market well.  For instance a three piece wall hang could be just right for some interiors.

 
The three images over the bed represent what metal prints would look like in a room setting.  Of course framed and matted styles are but a click away in my galleries.  The images can be found in the lighthouse gallery or the sepia and black and white gallery.  The bedroom itself is a figment of someone else's imagination.
 
Hey..........It's not too early to think about Christmas.  Or even Easter of next year for that matter.
 

 

Sunday, September 23, 2012

9 23 12

YOU JUST KNOW IT'S GONNA BE GOOD!
 
OK, it's Sunday and I slept late!  Sat out on the porch in the quiet with my first Pike Place Roast and enjoyed sixty seven degrees, blue bird sky, no wind, no dogs barking, or trains over on Frink Street. 
 
 My current church of choice.
 
  Read a passage or two from a publication left off by the wanderer's from the Latter Day Saints, and all is good.  No self recriminations for a life past, for a change, and just enjoying a moment of quiet reflection.  Probably won't get me saved, but sure is a nice change.
 
My thoughts like the fall flow in a stream.
 
 
Old life moving on!
 
Saw the new Clint Eastwood movie about a cranky old man I can identify with.  Should be an Oscar but won't because of the empty chair.   They're a little ideological out there on the left coast.
 
My two football teams won yesterday.  Both televised at the same time.
 
It's all good!
 
I just know it will be in the eighties today.  Later on.  Three o'clock or so.  But low humidity will make it just outstanding.  Just the kind of day to do some "Free style photography".  That's where you take the camera and tripod, the car, and anybody else who happens to want to go and hit the back roads looking for subjects.  Over the years I have been blessed with (a) the opportunity to do that and (2) the luck to find some outstanding photo ops.  And it's more fun than setting up shots....well, maybe not but being behind the camera is where it's at.  All the rest of it is "Necessity", but the photography is the Nirvana.
 
 However, I find both aspects of the business better than the homeless shelter.
 
 
 
 
 

Friday, September 21, 2012

9 21 12

Guess I am lucky!
 
Just imagine having to walk through tall grass, dodging the hooves of cattle bigger than yourself, just to get breakfast.
 
America is certainly exceptional.  I have some bacon for breakfast that comes out of a plastic package bought in the super market.  I won't bore you with how it got from the belly of a pig to that package.
 
The eggs come in a non recyclable plastic container....all washed and individually stamped with some company logo.
 
My orange juice is in a paper container, so processed that it might as well have been "Tang" to start with and not a peel in sight.
 
The toast started out somewhere in Kansas and now if put in water would shrink up to a ball of dough the size of a peanut.
 
And my waffle comes out of a toaster covered with syrup (?) consisting of  more chemicals than found in a high school chemistry class.
 
But it's all good!  Until of course it's not there any more.  God Bless the "Preppers"!
 
But I have digressed.  The poor guy/gal dodging the cattle hooves is appropriately called a "Cattle
Egret".
 
 
Seen here all cleaned up in his/her mating plumage.  The image taken at the Alligator Farm in St. Augustine, Florida.
 
But of course if you're all dressed up to mate, you need one of the other side as well.
 
 
Me, I would much prefer taking a nice shower, adding some crummy cologne, and hangin out at some nice restaurant with ma sweety.  Maybe a Hardys or an upscale Mickey D's.  You can tell, I'm just all class!
 
Aint' America Great and aren't we lucky?


 
 

Thursday, September 20, 2012

9 20 12

The Surf Fisherman's Exceptional American World
 
I am always amazed at what I have done in the past to pursue some of my favorite pastimes.  Take fishing or hunting for instance.
 
You get out of bed somewhere before 90% of the sane people of the world.  Endure any kind of inclement weather.  Often times the worse the better.  Head off in car or boat to reach a place that only a few people in their right minds would care to see still before old Sol comes limping up over the horizon.  Shiver in temperatures that have frozen a half glass of water on the back porch overnight.  Put enough black coffee into your stomach to burn through the bottom of an old galvanized bucket.
 
But heck it's worth it..........Right?
 
  Right?
 
You better believe it.
 
The isolation of the early day with a close friend, maybe even a son or daughter....Draws people like me to those human experiences like flies to day old road kill.  I would not miss them for all the world.  Call it camaraderie, sport, relaxation, vacation or maybe love.
 
  Maybe to some of just no interest.  I pity them.
 
To me however, the sun making it's presence felt as a red ball or as simply a light grey over the horizon is something akin to prayer.
 
 
 
  Sharing the fork of a hundred and fifty old oak tree with a teenage son on his first bow hunt for deer is a memory etched into my cerebellum forever.  So what if I missed that buck deer at 30 yards....killing is not what it was all about.
 
 
  Or when a daughter slowly pulled her first blue crab to the surface clinging to a piece of salted eel tied to the end of a cotton string.  Steamed crabs are sure tasty, but that's not what it was about.  How lucky can I be. 
 
 
 Particularly when I turn on the TV to see children of the world burning our flag, hurling rocks at some unseen person with a tear gas gun, or watching some idiot pack a child with a body suit made of TNT.
 
Just lucky to have been born in a country where I can sit in that tree, net that crab, or stand in the cold surf trying to lure a giant fish to my bait.
 
 
Think about that.

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

9 19 12

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPS!
 
 
I made this picture some years ago.  This is Annapolis, Maryland and the Naval Academy is center upper half. 
 
My partner and I decided to get a friend to fly us all around the Chesapeake Bay to take pictures of the Bay, The Chesapeake Bay Bridge, and Annapolis.  Particularly the State House.  We made about four circles around the State House snapping away...low and slow.  I might also add that because the wing of the plane was below the cockpit, we had to fly at on a ninety degree angle to the ground ...
 
 around in circles..
 
My partner was in the rear of the plane and I in the copilots seat....might as well have bee India for all I knew about airplanes.
 
At any rate after the fourth circle I said...."If you don't get this thing flying level, flying in a straight line, I will throw up all over the dials in front of me!"  It's a wonder he didn't break a wing off  the thing coming out of that flight pattern. 
 
He asked if I wanted to fly the plane....often it's easier when you drive.  I told him I could also empty a church when I sang a hymn, so flying the plane probably wouldn't be advisable either.
 
Long story short.  We got all our pics.  I wasn't sick, but wasn't right all the rest of the day either.  Haven't been right since, some would say, but that's just probably an impartial observation.
 

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

9 17 12



Looks like "Amazing Grace" took first place.
http://fineartamerica.com/contests/clouds-only.html?tab=leaderboard

Only in America can you enter an art contest and happen to win out of 260 entries.  Blind hog finding an acorn comes to mind.

Here are a couple of comments I stole from facebook friends which seem to make pretty good sense to me and witness American Exceptionalism.
 
The Green Thing
By Pinky Leurssen
 

Checking out at the store, the young cashier suggested to the older woman, that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.

The woman apologized and explained, "We didn't have this green thing back in my earlier days."

The clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations." She was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags, that we reused for numerous things, most memorable besides household garbage bags, was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property, the books provided for our use by the school was not defaced by our scribblings.

Then we were able to personalize our books. But too bad we didn't do the green thing back then.

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building.
We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks. But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady is right; we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana. In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.
But she's right; we didn't have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull. But we didn't have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest burger joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we older folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?
---

I might ad that we look at all the things my generation did (way back then) and compared to what happens today....We and our kids were/are exceptional.

---
Along the same lines another friend of a friend posted about how things have changed, for the most part to the better. 

But also witness to how some today would reasonably not  understand us seasoned citizens, she said...

"I'm going to poll my freshmen tomorrow to see who knows who the hell Joanie and Chachi are.  Heck,  they don't even know who Ron Howard is or that Henry Winkler was a bad-a mo-fo before he was that old dude principal in one of the Scream movies."
---
Maybe all that will give me the grace to help me understand how some people vote the way they do! 

Monday, September 17, 2012

AMERICA'S EXCEPTIONALISM
 
There is a man in Bishopville, South Carolina that has taken minding the lawn to a whole different level. 
 
A couple of years ago we spent the better part of a Saturday with him at his home.  Just walked up onto his lawn and he came right out of his house to greet us.  Of course we were totally unannounced, but that was not bother.  His name is Pearl Fryar and he is unbelievable.  He has created somewhere around four acres into the most fantastic Topiary garden you can imagine and it was all a hobby.
 
Go to his link above and visit his home page....Very much modernized today, but a few years ago he squeezed his hobby between his job and church.  These are some of the photos I took of the American Exceptionalism.  Visit his home page for more photos.
 

PEARL
 


 
 

Sunday, September 16, 2012

9 16 12

 
2012-1776=236
 
No, I haven't been around that long...close maybe and some would say my opinions would have better fit in the earlier stages of that 236 years.
 
Folks, that 236 years represents the greatest experiment in human achievement the "WORLD" has ever seen.
 
In 1776 a bunch of "Revolutionaries" believed in freedom and the success of man as God saw it.  Gasp!  Did he say God?  Not a bunch of sand encrusted Imans that simply would kill all those that don't believe.
 
 
It started here with a revolution....Long and hard as at Valley Forge.
 

It took a long and costly Civil War giving us a Gettysburg.
 

But we got through all of the nasty fighting to become the greatest country that the world has ever seen.  I know some of you are gritting your teeth about that comment....if so, try Venezuela and the Dictator Chavez.  You'd probably become BFF's.  Or maybe a cave in Tora Bora!

 
The bridge above in Valley Forge is an example of the growth in achievement that this country has created.
 
 
Then in 1952 American Ingenuity produced this huge span of the Chesapeake Bay.
Those two bridges over the bay are but a wonderful example of the exceptional creativity, strength and growth of this country since the days of that covered bridge in Pennsylvania.
 
Protect it.  Protect our history.  Protect your way of life, because there are those who wish to make it so fragile.

 
 

Saturday, September 15, 2012

9 15 12

AMERICA'S EXCEPTIONALISM
 
  
It seems to me that there are just too many people going around the World complaining and apologizing about how retarded the United States has become. 
 
 
That's just plain sad and wrong! 
 
In the next few days and weeks I am going to add to a new gallery, with my images, that portray just how great this country is and in so doing take exception with those (including the current administration) that say we have lost it.

For the next couple of months, I will be devoting this blog to this theme.  If you have images you would like to see here, be given credit for, and contribute to this theme, just email them to me at skipw@sc.rr.com.  Use Exceptional in the subject part of your email.  Make your own comments on the blog...but beware of my razor sharp wit.  I may not be nice!  Maybe we can all contribute and continue making something great .... even more exceptional!
 
 To those who "Apologize" for America....If you are so ashamed......Leave!
 
  
  Keep it simple stupid.  If you are so disgusted that your attitude and behavior disgusts me....Leave!
 
But just remember what shore you're leaving and what your headed for.
 
  Go ahead and let the door hit you in the butt on the way out because there are millions of people who are willing to take your place that do have positive attitudes.  Positive attitudes about their Country and their future.  And probably better capabilities as well.
 
Please take the time to visit my "Exceptional America" gallery in the next few weeks and give some serious thought to the positive things in your life and our country.
 
God Bless America!
 
 

Friday, September 14, 2012

9x14x12

OMG It's Friday!
 
Yesterday was Thursday and I just figured it out.
 
I missed hump day!
 Now Sheri (like in other half)  says I got to wait till next week!
 
Getting old ain't for sissies........believe me.
 
I really have no idea where the week went or what I got accomplished......But, I see there are some things I didn't do.

How could that be?

Maybe I should just downsize and just forget about it!

 

Thursday, September 13, 2012

The 13th of the 9th

Neglectful of the blog I have been.  Call it writers block, body aches, migraines, or just plain laziness..........I've had it all and apologize for not writing sooner.  I know your all just at your wits end looking for my wit and absolutely accurate observations about everything and nothing!
 
Sad, but when one doesn't feel particularly well.....Wit is hard to grasp, and you know it's really bad that sarcasm is illusive.  But enough of my self deprecating feeling sorry for myself.  I come to you today as if "Bowing to a Saudi Prince".
 
  Just a shame that you my loyal readers have to go to somewhere else for entertainment.  Like MSNBC for instance or some other news station that hopes to take mushy brains for a walk down the path of one sided journalism.  Oh well!
 
Rather than ramble, I have been converting some of my photos to black and white and sepia toned photos in an attempt to capture at least a part of that elusive "Niche" market of purists who just love to say  "See I am sensitive to the old tyme art stuff"!  Please note I didn't say that in any condescending or disrespectful manner.
 
 
This is an image I made before the lighthouse at Jupiter Inlet in Florida was repainted.  This conversion does one important thing...I don't have to go back and photograph it again because the color of the thing has been changed.  And that saves a huge amount of money.  Timeless photography supplied by your friendly PhotoShop software.  Press a button and you have 794,000 designer shades of brown.  Actually, I think that it is pretty cool.
 
 
The above is a sunset at a marina on "Gratitude" in Rock Hall, Maryland.  A place where I spent summers during my formative teenage years.  Probably kept me from being arrested in some larger city.  The color rendition is nice but also is impressive in black and white.  Both of these will be posted on FAA in a day or so.
 
The weather here is Shangra La south has been just delightful.  Fall for the south means we only get up to the lower nineties during the days and in the sixties at night.  It has, I must admit been a good summer in as much as we did not spend too many days in the 100's.  Man am I scraping up something to write....weather? 
 
 I guess it's better than regurgitating all the "New" stuff I learned at the two political conventions.  Did I mention that I am a political junky of sorts.  My mother was probably right, I should have become a lawyer, then I could have been elected to office in Washington and become rich. Talk about getting arrested!  I am warning you all however, there is a political rant coming.  I just need to ratshit up my anger level up a little more and we'll be there.  OH, did I misspell something there...er, sorry.
 
I have just been told that the dogs are in fine fettle this morning and that it really is past feeding time and I need a refill on the Pike Place Roast.  So it's chore time...see ya all on the flip side.
 
 
 
 

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

9-11-12

We do not forget!
 
For all those who think that they can change us.........witness all the scum that perpetrated the 9-11 atrocity.  They are either in jail or "Gone"!
 
 
And to those who wish to change us to some kind of European socialist utopia....we have peaceful elections every four years.  Either get in line with the Constitution or get out of the way.
 
America is exceptional!
 
 
 

Monday, September 3, 2012

Sunday, September 2, 2012

THE SECOND OF THE NINTH

I did build this business!
 
And I hope you enjoy yourself here.

 
It's September, and what we started in May is now but a sweet memory!
 
 
 
 
 
 

Saturday, September 1, 2012

The first of the ninth.

Long Labor Day Weekend
 
According to Wikepedia.....
Labor Day is an American federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September (September 3 in 2012) that celebrates the economic and social contributions of workers.
 
Labor Day pays tribute to the contributions and achievements of American workers. Gee, maybe the Holiday really does celebrate the fact that we all individually really do build something.  It also symbolizes the end of summer for many Americans, and is celebrated with parties, parades and athletic events.
 
To me, in my formative years, it meant a long weekend at the Eastern Shore of Maryland.
 
 
  The last chance before I had to put my shoes back on and go back to school or later the job. 
 
 
 In any event, it meant that I would be able to spend quality time with my father and mother and later my own children.  Good times.  But it was the official end of the summer.  If I recall correctly even the weather changed on the first of september.  It seemed to get cooler in the mornings and the days were certainly getting shorter. 
 
 
 The Osprey would leave in two weeks, Septrmber 15th like clock work.
 

The geese and ducks would begin to show up around the bay, also in a couple of weeks.
 
 
 
  And the beaches would begin to resemble what our founding fathers discovered those 200 some odd years ago.
 
 
Today, I write a blog and try to sell photographic art over something that wasn't even invented back in those formative days.  Lots of memories and retrospects fill the long weekends today and every photograph I list almost brings a tear to the eye, remembering the circumstances upon which they were made.  The promise of people ending vacations and beginning to spend again for things less fleeting than gas for the car and hotel rooms.  Cotton candy and saltwater taffy spending will hopefully turn into new art for the summer home, the primary home, or the office.  As the days shorten now, the sky begings to reflect the shift in the weather and certainly my attitude...September through November always seemed to yield the better sunsets and sunrises for some reason.
 
 
  Just yesterday, there were four large pieces of art sold on FAA to someone who was obviously opening a dentist's office ... All were dental themes and not mine.  But maybe the economy of the empty chair will start to improve during the fall.  We small business people can only hope, as seemingly the important decisions are being made by men and women whose agenda is at odds with ours.  It's hard to remember not to argue with idiots because they only drag us down to their level and beat us with experience.  But that too may be, like the first of September, a change of seasons.  We'll probably know in November!
 
I wish all my readers, family and friends a wonderful holiday weekend and hope yours will be as blessed as mine.