AWOKEN BY THE SMELL OF RAIN

Leave a comment

 

Being a heavy sleeper has its advantages when the Professor and our pup get up pre-dawn for their daily constitutional but lately it has been the sound of thunder and sudden torrential downpours rather than any absence of warm bodies in bed that have signalled to my unconsciousness that another day has begun. This unusually cool spell has meant we have been lucky enough to be able to open the windows at night and this morning’s reveille of raindrops was a sweetly clean yet heady fragrance reminiscent of simpler times.

SoMe Sky

4 Comments

some sky

I’ve run across alot of people recently who are just worn down, exhausted and overwhelmed by information and social media. Is disconnection and a realignment of hands-on priorities the solution or just a few days in a warm climate dipping our toes in the surf? A change is as good as a rest…

Gimme Shelter

Leave a comment

Hope the roof on this baby wasn’t built by the same contractor who installed the one on the Olympic Stadium :laughing:
I really wish local government would get with the program and accept that not all tourists to our fair city are francophone: Such a great PS installation should at least be bilingual and then everyone could go home and say they saw the world’s largest :poop: and not wonder what that was all about.

This was Thursday: A Lifetime Ago

6 Comments

vote

Print advertising in Playboy Magazine, 1972.

Read your history : Find out what happened : Note the change : Recognize why we are here : Vote responsibly.

Not thrilled with a lot of things these days but have decided that this 1000th post will help keep things moving forward.

Life imitates Art imitates Art imitates Life

1 Comment

gazoo graffiti

I’m always fascinated by the elements that make up some of the larger murals splashed around Montreal. In this three-story high piece, there’s a very literate and informed conversation going on between artist and viewer but I’m not actually sure how many people are picking up the thread, how many passers-by are aware of the references (age, interest and culture probably being a deciding factor) and how such iconic images are woven together in a greater commentary.

Walk on by or stop and think about it for awhile.

Carrying on a fine Tradition

Leave a comment

gourd

On a recent arrival home from some time away, one of the first things I noticed was an arrangement of decorative seasonal gourds on the dining room table. Miss Z was following in my footsteps, discovering the joys of the local market and had brought home a colourful harvest for the family to share. Each one is unique and riotous in its markings, much like our tribe, and worthy of joining the painterly edits that I have been amassing over the last few years.

This particular edit brought to mind a post about the etiquette of food photography where the ongoing conversations in the comments had led to much reflection on how I wound up with so many shots of ordinary fruit and veg in my own archives.

Twenty odd years ago as my son and I were zooming up a street, I saw a kid outside of his garage selling large canvases of close-ups of the most magnificent mangoes and plums, odd veg and seafood in the most brilliant colours and rendered in an energetic impressionist style. It was just that flash of something extraordinary that made me pull up the car and go and have a look – I should have bought them right then and there, but could ill afford it and so I went to visit his other works in a few cafes and a gallery, later looked for his stuff online, googled them years after and always regretted not having deprived myself of something else to have been able to look upon that luscious fruit every day.

It marked me in much the same way that Wayne Thiebaud had an influence on how I see the ordinary. It is that driving need to tell the story of the very basic stuff of life, the things that go unnoticed, the colours and shapes we ignore in the busyness of it all – that is what keeps me taking food photos. Photography is all about the way we transform what we see so that we can give others a glimpse and get them thinking, remembering, wondering, engaging and even taking part in keeping the creative process dynamic.

So yes, I do take pictures of my food: I can revel in them at will, remember exactly what I was thinking or doing, ascribe circumstance or tradition, have them stand out as markers in that timeline of life. They are mine… and now they are yours.

Two Cents Tuesday Challenge: Improvise

5 Comments

improvise

Don’t judge a book by its cover

Someone on another social media site recently said that when they were in their teens being twenty-something meant joining the ranks of adulthood (choke) but now that they were in their 20s it was pretty much alot of flailing about looking for food. I’m not actually sure that ever changes – the arm-spinning, whirlwind chaos of being, I mean. It seems that no matter how much knowledge we amass, how much life experience, on-the-job-training, travel and leisure put it in the scrapbook, document that memory stuff we cram into our brains, we are just basically winging it.

Are we that far removed from our dawn-of-time ancestors? Not really. Some of our best solutions come when we have to think fast, on the run, now or never: not so different from figuring out which end of the mastodon is going to be the least dangerous when your spear is broken and Erg has run for the hills with a panic attack.

Life can often be one big improv scene and the things it throws at us aren’t always solved with tried and true remedies or by the book formulas. Take a chance. Play. Listen. Learn by doing something new.

The Two Cents Tuesday Challenge suspects that everyone can and does. “How do you jump to it?” – jerry-rig, duct-tape big, blurt out or ponder, ignite or ignore. Feel free to put your two cents about how you Improvise in the comments…

We would love to see your vision.

For all those who are new readers to Across the Bored, here are some guidelines for the challenge: HOW DOES THIS WORK?

  1.  I will post some commentary on a random topic that pops into my head (such as the above) and then ask you to respond on the same.
  2. Your point of view on the current week’s challenge can take any form: a quote, a motto or saying, an essay, poem or opinion of yours or attributed to someone else, a piece of music, a song, a video, a work of art, photograph, graffiti, drawing or scribble – but it has to be about the topic!
  3. Please, don’t just link to an old post… challenge yourself.
  4. ENJOY, have FUN and TELL your friends and fellow bloggers.

 SO – Create your Two Cents Tuesday Challenge post

  1. Then add a link to your blog in my comment box.
  2. To make it easy for others to check out your post, title your blog post “Two Cents Tuesday Challenge” and add the same as a tag.
  3. If you would like your reader to see what others are presenting for the same challenge, add a link to the “Two Cents Tuesday” challenge on your own blog.
  4. Feel free to pick up your badge on the Two Cents Tuesday Challenge page
  5. Remember to Follow My Blog to get your weekly (hopefully) reminders.

Out of the Earth comes my Pleasure

4 Comments

turnips

An acquaintance has a keen eye for produce (among other things) and has been kind enough to encourage my painterly treatment of his photographs. What thrills me the most is that we seem to see the natural in much the same way. This bounty of turnips could not be any more glorious for their story of early mornings, simpler times, hands pulling the harvest from the dark fragrant soil to send to market. When the divine took a brush to this humble vegetable, it was for us to look upon such things with renewed wonder and breathe in with gratitude the overlooked beauty that surrounds us.

Going Nuts

5 Comments

nuts

Walking a lovely tree-lined avenue can be a dangerous proposition these days. The squirrels have no appetite for these thorny projectiles and perch high in the branches laughing while pedestrians jump at narrow misses. The ravens, however, are thrilled and gather to pick through the debris for choice bits: those they cannot crack in their bills are dropped from a height to shatter against the sidewalks. I suspect they choose their moments.

Two Cents Tuesday Challenge: Comfort Food

5 Comments

jellomore please!

The Inscrutable Dr. Fu is taking full advantage of the freedom to experiment in my kitchen and likes to put her own twist on what she jokingly refers to as “white people” food. Who am I to complain when presented with these little treats?

This week’s culinary foray is NSFKids homemade Jello made from fresh strawberry-raspberry juice and a liberal splash of vodka topped with a lovely little strawberry mint garnish straight from the garden.

The Two Cents Tuesday Challenge just knows that there are tasty tidbits and go-to dishes that make you go aaaahhhh …

“Do you have a favourite childhood treat?”  Feel free to leave your two cents about the most delicious of your Comfort Foods in the comments…

We would love to see your vision.

For all those who are new readers to Across the Bored, here are some guidelines for the challenge: HOW DOES THIS WORK?

  1.  I will post some commentary on a random topic that pops into my head (such as the above) and then ask you to respond on the same.
  2. Your point of view on the current week’s challenge can take any form: a quote, a motto or saying, an essay, poem or opinion of yours or attributed to someone else, a piece of music, a song, a video, a work of art, photograph, graffiti, drawing or scribble – but it has to be about the topic!
  3. Please, don’t just link to an old post… challenge yourself.
  4. ENJOY, have FUN and TELL your friends and fellow bloggers.

 SO – Create your Two Cents Tuesday Challenge post

  1. Then add a link to your blog in my comment box.
  2. To make it easy for others to check out your post, title your blog post “Two Cents Tuesday Challenge” and add the same as a tag.
  3. If you would like your reader to see what others are presenting for the same challenge, add a link to the “Two Cents Tuesday” challenge on your own blog.
  4. Feel free to pick up your badge on the Two Cents Tuesday Challenge page
  5. Remember to Follow My Blog to get your weekly (hopefully) reminders.