61 // via Nikon Coolpix L12: The Icing on the Cake
For the first time ever, I iced a cake. Two, in fact, one for my son’s birthday, one for my daughter’s. Mickey Mouse, and some sort of Cars scene. It was frustrating, but fun, and the cakes turned out to be more icing than sponge.
A cake’s progress:
59 // via Free Clip Art Junction: Happy Birthday, Bug!
My son is 3 years old today and lights me up. Nuff said.
60 // via drawing and Samsung Instinct M800: Out of the Box
Here’s to dreaming a big dream. I’ve had an idea, and who knows if it’s going to work out. Maybe it won’t. Maybe I’ll never get to the point where it’s anything but words on paper.
But I’m crazy passionate about it. I can’t say what it is right now, obviously. I don’t want to give it the kiss of death.
But at least I want to throw a nod its way, let it know that I haven’t forgotten it, that incrementally I’m building toward it. The foundations are dug. Soon, the bricks will go in.
Here’s to dreaming a big dream. Here’s to those crazy dreamers who dream them.
58 // via Fuji FinePix F480: Handbags in waiting
Alligators. Vicious bastards, alligators. And that’s why they’re cool.
If you want to see ‘em up close and personal in the wild, although at a convenient more-than-arm’s-length, there’s a spot along the famous Alligator Alley that runs east to west connecting Miami to Naples.
We took the kids there, first time for my son, second time for my daughter (she was really too young to appreciate it the first time).
It’s a short boardwalk, maybe 70 yards long, that sits above a long canal next to a gravel road. (People actually live along it, amazingly enough.)
Alligators just gather there and slumber right alongside turtles and other wildlife. Tons of them, lurking in the brackish green water. With teeth. Big teeth.
Here’s a map. If you’re ever in south Florida, you can go see for yourself. It’s about halfway across.
View Alligators on view in a larger map
57 // via screengrab: I am @cgcumber
Twitter is like my new favorite thing.
Really. You may not understand it, you may question its worth — fairly enough — but Twitter users (or tweeps) are having a conversation, and you may well not know about it.
For a journalist like myself, Twitter is a way to engage in conversation with an audience. It’s also a good way to find out about cool stuff going on, or just to meet interesting people.
You can see my Twitter feed by scrolling down to the bottom of the page.
56 // via Olympus C860L: Retirement planning
This is Polperro, a small, very small, Cornish fishing village in England. This photo is from 2002, my last visit. One day, I want to perhaps retire there. A quiet cottage, maybe a room. And I’d like to sit for a while, think back on my life and paint watercolors.
55 // via Olympus something or other
Ah, mea culpa, to quote the Latin.
It’s been far too long since I’ve posted. That’s not to say I’ve had no happy moments recently, only that I haven’t had time to write them up. The happy moments, I assure you, have been plentiful.
About four weeks ago they began in earnest when I went on vacation to my parent’s place in Naples, Fl. The gated community my parents live in boasts (at least it did when they bought it) the largest pool in southwest Florida.
And a pretty nice pool it is, with an island and waterfalls and cabanas and palm trees. And this trip was filled with so much: alligators; staring contests; beard growth; quiet evenings on the lanai.
So, here it is: today’s happy shit (to use my friend Sarah’s title for this blog): vacation. Ah, let me slumber restful ‘neath a shady tree.
54 // via Samsung Instinct M800: Roll With It
I taught my kids to hill roll the other day. That is to say, I rolled down the hill, they watched, and then attempted to copy.
When I came home I was itching like a bitch. I don’t know what I rolled in, but it wasn’t pleasant. Anyhow, itching in multiple places aside, Das Kids have been initiated into a tradition of children everywhere. And they didn’t come home scratching, either.
53 // via Samsung Instinct M800: Bird’s eggs
Morning doves have made our house their home for as long as we’ve lived here. At first they lived in the drier vent. Well, that wasn’t a really good plan, so I closed that up with some wire fence. Now they’re living under the deck.
And they’re having a family. Yay!
53 // via Samsung Instinct M800: Hibachi!
Date night with the wife, last night, so we went to the hibachi grill Matsutake at the Westridge shopping center. I’d forgotten how much fun it is — the clatter of steel on steel as the chef precisely slices and dices on a sizzling stainless steel table.
This is the chef torching some onions into a flaming volcano.
