Tag: blog

Studly’s Big Birthday Adventure, Part 2

On our way home from New Orleans where we purchased parts for a motorcycle Studly Doright is building (see Tuesday’s post) we stopped to tour the USS ALABAMA, a decommissioned battleship that saw duty from August of 1942 until 1947. Since January of 1965, the ship has been the centerpiece at the USS ALABAMA Battleship Memorial Park east of Mobile.

I highly recommend a visit to the park where, in addition to touring the battleship one can also tour the submarine USS DRUM, and an aircraft exhibit. 

Below are just a few of the photos we took during our tour:

Does this propeller make my butt look big?
View of the ship from the gangplank.
Part of the deck was made wooden planks.


GUNS AND MORE GUNS!
Compass
The ship’s chapel in the photos above and below.
Medical isolation room–gave me the creeps!

Talk about a fearsome sight!

The ALABAMA earned nine battle stars, and shot down 22 enemy planes during World War II. She’s a beautifully fearsome ship. 

More than ever, peace, people!

Snapshot #62

I snapped this one on our way home from New Orleans. I’m calling it, “Rest Area Splendor.”

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like…

It’s beginning to look a lot like…

…the end of November.

As winter approaches in the Florida panhandle, rain substitutes for snow, while galoshes and umbrellas sub for snow boots and mittens. As I dressed for work on this rainy, but warm morning (71 degrees at 7:30 a.m.) I didn’t complain. I’d much rather drive on wet roads than icy ones. After experiencing several winters in North Dakota and Illinois, I’m no longer nostalgic for pretty snowfalls and roaring fires. 

Doright Manor is still decorated for Thanksgiving, and will remain thus until the first weekend in December. I have nothing against those who put up their Christmas trees the day after Thanksgiving, but my heart clings to November like the last leaf on an oak tree. 


Meanwhile all around me folks are humming Christmas carols and buying wrapping paper. The Hallmark Channel is running sappy made-for-tv holiday movies 24/7. Santa Claus is already holding court at the mall. 

Enough already! I say, let November have its special place in the American psyche. Savor November. And while you’re at it, listen to Guns N’ Roses, November Rain.

https://g.co/kgs/FFEJsw
Peace, people!

Sanity Box

She’d chosen her own box,
Crystal clear lucite walls;
Sturdy and impermeable.

Easy, she found, to watch
A world come undone from
The confines of the enclosure.

Breathing became difficult,
But over time she found that
Didn’t matter much anymore.

The world irrevocably changed
Safe places now menacing
The monsters made normal.

Thank heaven for the box
Her only wish was that
She’d made it smaller.

Broken 

Broken promises
Blithely said; soon forgotten
Whispered entreaties

Living with liars
Broken souls who breed despair
Seek refuge in truth


Hiding in plain sight
Limping behind tight, sad smiles
Broken hearts still beat

Politics: What’s Words With Friends Got To Do With It?

The 2016 election was a soul sucker. It was like carrying a baby for nine months and after 36 hours of labor having the doctor announce, “Congratulations, it’s a full grown rattlesnake!” 

On the one hand, you’re glad it’s all over, while on the other hand you wonder how long it’ll be before your baby delivers the lethal bite. Ah! Good times. 


Thank goodness for diversions like Words With Friends. Currently I have 21 games in progress, and any time there’s a lull in the action I start another one. Right now, I don’t even care if I win or lose. It’s the distraction from current events that counts.

The president-elect names a white supremacist as his chief strategist and senior counselor? I find a way to play a word containing both z and v.

A woman who doesn’t support public schools is named Secretary of Education? No worries, I play “teazles” for 182 points, and I don’t care that I have no idea what it means!*

I hear that Trump is refusing to take security briefings? Ok, I cried, but then I went on to play “equinoxes” and temporarily forgot that we have elected a lightweight to the highest office in the free world.

Reality bites right now. I think I’ll go start another game.

*verb archaic: 

teazle 

1. raise a nap on (cloth) with or as if with teasels.

The Sewing Circle

The Sewing Circle
by Leslie Noyes

Friends of a feather
Gathered closely together
Nimble fingers poised


A work in progress
Stitches in red, white, and blue
Most, perfectly spaced


“Janis, there’s a hitch
In the shape of your last stitch.”
“No, that clump is trump.”


My Accomplishments

Sometimes one must toot one’s own horn lest it go untooted:

1) I pulled together an incredible Thanksgiving Day meal.

2) Neither Studly Doright nor I have developed any signs of food poisoning.

3) I took the best nap of my entire life. Thanks L-Tryptophan!

4) I have single handedly consumed an entire bottle of wine today and am sober as a judge.

Now I sit with Studly watching the Dallas Cowboys play the evil Washington Redskins as I contemplate my plans for tomorrow. Should I venture out into Black Friday crowds? Only fools venture where angels fear to tread. But, I’m no angel, and there’s always more wine.

Peace, people.

 

Snapshot #60

My view from the kitchen sink here at Doright Manor. I call this one, “Happy Thanksgiving.”

Peace, people!