raintree

What a pretty flower. It is from a raintree. Nice reflection of the flower. Iy is actually a very small flower and this picture is a close-up of it.

Here is the raintree with its yellow flowers in bloom. I am not sure what the red things are. The trees start off yellow and gradually the flowers drop off and the red things are left (anyone know what those red things are?). I was sitting under this tree in my pick-up truck resting while Mary was looking at some items in a yard sale across the street. We were about three or four blocks from home. Suddenly a flower fell off the tree and landed on my hood. Then another. And then another still. What I nice shine on the hood in the picture below. Never had to wax it. I don’t think that you have to wax cars anymore. I think that there is a plastic coating over the paint. Isn’t modern technology great.

When a breeze came up, it would snow yellow flowers. They were all over the ground under the tree.

Here you can see them all over the ground in front of my truck. How do you like that Chevy emblem on the front of my truck? Yep, I’m a Chevy man. This is the third Chevy pick-up that I have owned. No Fords. When I go to the stock car races, I always root for the Chevy cars to win. If it weren’t for the serendipity of Mary wanting to stop for the yard sale, I would have missed all of this experience with the yellow raintree flowers. I had seen the raintrees with the yellow flowers from a distance as I drove down the road but until now I never knew just how pretty the flowers are up close as the top picture shows. I was in the right place at the right time. Have a day of discovery today and slow down to take a look at and smell the flowers. Be good. Lew

alternate uses

I know that this may seem like a strange post for a blog bgut you know, I use my digital camera for taking pictures of things other than flowers and scenery. Whenever I work on something or doing repairs, I always get pictures before I start so that I can get things back to the way they were in the beginning. It is really quite helpful. Although it seems simple to remember these things sometimes I become unsure of how something goes back together and all I have to do is look at the picture to refresh the memory. For example, the wire on my headphones got broken off of both earpieces and so the bad portion of the wire had to be unsoldered and cut out and the good portion of the wire resoldered. There were two different wires for each speaker, a colored wire and a bare wire. The colored wire goes on the contact on the right and the bare wire goes on the contact on the left. Or was it the other way around?

I check my picture and sure enough, the colored wire goes on the left not the right. Good thing that I checked. See what I mean about having the picture?

I use a magnifying lens in front of the camera to make the close ups even closer.
This method of taking pictures also helped me recently when I was doing a plumbing repair on the sink. The vertical rod that controls the sink stopper in the bathroom stopped working. I look under the sink and take a picture and printed it. Then it was off to the hardware store where I show the picture to the guy at the hardware store while I am telling him what happened. I think that he was looking at the picture more than listening to me because the picture was more helpful to him than my disjointed explanation. As they say a picture is worth a thousand words. I got the right part at the hardware store the first time and the job went smoothly at home. I find digital cameras great because the pictures are free, no expensive processing like with film-type cameras. But I must admit that most of my pictures are nature pictures. The beauty of nature is everywhere and I love getting pictures of it. Have a nice day and try to stay cool. Have an icee, preferably one of the blue ones which are my favorite. Be kind to someone today. Lew

upside-down world

This is our topsy-turvy tomato plant and it is doing just fine. Soon we should have lots of red luscious tomatoes just waiting to be picked. At least that is what they show on the picture on the box. But today as I was leaving the house I looked at the plant and a humorous thought occured to me. The earth is a large round ball and the people in the northern hemisphere are standing upright on it. Logical, right? Those on top would be standing straight up. Now see if you can follow this illogical logic. As viewed from space, the people on the bottom of the ball (southern hemisphere) would be standing upside down. Like folks in Australia for example. So wouldn’t a young tomato plant from Australia work better in the topsy-turvy planter better because of it being from Australia and the plant would already be use to growing upside down? Now that bit of fractured logic should draw a lot of flak from the people down under. Now I want the people of Australia to know that I like Crocodile Dundee and Quigley Down Under and Mel Gibson lived near me when he was very young and living in New York State. So Aussie’s, please go easy on me for my tongue-in-cheek humor.
With that said, I had better end this blog. I have dug myself into a deep-enough hole already. Everyone have a nice day and everyone who is experiencing cool weather, be grateful. It is hot here in Florida. Lew

pretty blue sky

St. Joseph’s Hospital, Phoenix, Arizona. Circa, 1970. It is 3:30 in the afternoon and I have finished my work shift. I go and walk down the stairwell at the back of the hospital and exit the rear door of the hospital into a large asphalt area which is a loading dock area. To my left is a large white tank that holds the liquid oxygen for the patients in the hospital. Initially, the gas flows through pipes surrounded by cooling fins or should I say “warming fins” because the purpose of the fins is to warm the oxygen before reaching the patient. The fins are perpetually coated with a thick layer of ice. The fins are hosed down daily with water to melt the ice from the fins. This day, I am in luck. The liquid oxygen supply truck is making a delivery and has what looks like a fire hose running from the tanker to the liquid oxygen tank as it pumps the liquid oxygen from the truck to the tank. I have watched this a number of times before and I know the treat that I am in store for. I stand around talking to the driver as a stalling tactic until he is finished pumping and disconnects the hose. When the pumping is completed, the hose is still full of liquid oxygen. Lots of it. Gallons and gallons of it. And when he disconnects the hose from the truck he lets the liquid oxygen pour out from the hose onto the asphalt of the parking lot. I loved watching the liquid oxygen flow from the end of the hose because it had a beautiful light blue color to it. The first time that I had watched this I had expected for the liquid oxygen to be clear. But it was this pretty shade of light blue. Interesting and fascinating. But wait, this is Phoenix, Arizona known as the Land of the Sun and it was summertime. We all know what a bright hot sun does to an asphalt parking lot. Hot, hot, hot. When the liquid oxygen hits that hot asphalt it turns into a fog. The fog would hug the ground and last because it was continually fed by fog from the remaining liquid oxygen on the ground. Even on the ground, the liquid oxygen was still blue. It was always fun to watch and for the driver I was just a gadfly during his deliveries. I always watched the show of pretty blue and spectacular white clouds of fog. And so I as I sat at the dining room table looking east out the window this morning as the dawn broke I saw how pretty the pale blue sky was just like the liquid oxygen. How nice it is that the planet earth has blue skies instead of the red skies of Mars. Blue is a prettier color. What a nice way to start the day, a pretty view of the sunrise and a pleasant memory of times past. Lew

roast beef hash

Today is Saturday and that means “big breakfast day”. Sometimes we have corned beef hash which has been browned in the toaster oven and then two eggs placed on top of the hash. We were grocery shopping a few days ago and Mary asked me if I had ever had roast beef hash. I told her that I hadn’t and asked if we could try the roast beef hash instead of the corned beef hash to see what the difference was. So this morning it was roast beef hash. We both agreed that it was good but that the corned beef hash was better because it was more flavorful. Cinnamon raisin English muffins with pineapple jam on top rounded out the breakfast. This morning we will be washing the front windows of the house and then in the afternoon after lunch I will be taking my x-ray continuing education course test on-line. The test will probably take me at least an hour and a lot of concentration and brain-picking. Have a nice day. Lew

Frankenstein cake

This is the cake that Mary baked for Halloween. It is aptly called “The Frankenstein cake" because of all the different ingredients in it. Sort of like making a Frankenstein monster out of a leg her and an arm there (gross). The cake is a yellow cake mix with orange food coloring mixed in to give it that Halloween color. Raisins, chocolate chips and butterscotch chips were added. Starting to sound like a Frankenstein cake yet?

Then she iced the cake with a coconut and pecan icing. Quite a mixture of unrelated things for the Halloween cake which is more affectionately known as the Frankenstein cake. We shall get to taste it after lunch today. Bon appetit as Julia Childs use to say. Remember her? Lew

flowers everywhere

Mary likes to decorate with flowers. Even the garage is decorated. The top of the water heater has its bouquets.

There are even flowers above the windows in the garage. This window faces west.

This window faces south.

And the door faces south also. Lots of pretty decorations to cheer everything up. The garage can be either ho-hum or cheery with the flowers. I like the “cheery garage” with the flowers better. So how did you like the artificial flower show? The pictures were taken during the wee hours of the morning before the sun came up and that is why it is dark outside the windows and door. I get up each morning usually between 5:00 am and 5:30 am. Hopefully soon, we will be turning the clocks back an hour. That will give us an extra hour to sleep in. Have a cheery day. Lew