2 and a half D

 
When viewed from the front, this piece of art appears normally proportioned and three dimensional. A nicely executed optical illusion also at BB's. From an extreme side angle, it looks picasso-esque. 

Not a Macro

 
Just call me a rule breaker: it's not a macro, it's not strange, it's not even artsy fartsy or hard to grok. It just made me laugh, so I thought I'd share. I came across this sign while hanging out at BB's Coffee Shop waiting for Rowan's birthday celebration at school. I will admit to moving a couple things around, but I put everything back and bought a donut. 

Money

 
Okay, so the Macro Day theme is "Money" -- I found out that it's not quite as hard as I thought to manipulate a dollar bill inside a cowrie shell. Why a cowrie shell, you ask? It was a form of money as early as 1200 BC and as late as the 1700's to buy slaves from West African groups. At the Monticello cite I read, and it was so boggling I don't know whether to believe it, that cowrie shells were imported from Asia to Europe as essentially "packing peanuts" and then exported from Europe to Africa as the currency to buy people on that continent.

PS I just found out this received "Editor's Pick" on Macro Day. Wooooohooooo! My first Internet Challenge recognition. Yowza. Thanks Carlo Ferroni!

 

Mystery Subject

 
Can you guess what this is? (Click for the answer.) 

Counting the Days

 
I'm not sure which happened first, Photo Friday's topic "Baby" or the idea of combining an abacus with some of the paperwork associated with our adoption of Li Mei. I've not a lot of experience with still life, though I feel like I'm finally gaining an intuition about composition. This was a hard picture to take -- three, four sessions, arranging and re-arranging, experimenting and so forth.

Generally, I take a picture when something catches my magpie-eyes and I think, "Now that's neat." This time, I did feel the need to communicate, not unlike when I write fiction or poetry. It is artificial, it is a creation, a reflection of a mind's eye emotion, a concrete representation of an amorphous ache. That sounds a bit melodramatic and sentimental which ordinarily I try to avoid -- but as long as I'm not avoiding it, I might as well share and hope it was a successful effort.

Adoption and pregnancy have a lot in common. 

Flowers!

 
I think I need to move to the tropics.

My wonderful husband sends me flowers and I spend all day photographing them and thinking about camping and hiking. We're in a cold snap, about 20 degree highs, but I was jonesing for spring long before that. So anyway, here's a little detail of one of my flowers and my wishes for a short winter.

I just saw Starship Troopers in its entirety. Yes, I was sporting my, "Go Bugs!" paraphernalia. No, actually I was wearing my "I feel pretty!" shirt with a picture of Grrr in makeup that would make Tammy Fay proud. 

Equations of Love

 
A bit more Artsy Fartsy than usual. Happy (late) Lupercalia! 

Crocodile Teeth

 


I'm not sure why these crystals made me think of croc teeth, but there you are. We grew them from a crystal kit until our cat, Yeti, knocked over the solution of water and monaluminum phosphate (the chemical as my sleepy brain remembers it). Currently we're tumbling some rocks (ready to start the third and final polishing stage) and I hope to start a new batch of crystals tomorrow.

My big news that I mentioned in my previous post is two-fold. First, we have been matched with our daughter in China (see Wave, Tree and Bloom Note the updated URL!) and I got the job working in software development for NMR.

I'm a very lucky chick. 

Pot Top

 

I never thought I'd see the day I could legitimately use a palindrome. I noticed the irridescent oils on the lid of our coffee pot when I was making the daily wake up pot. By the time I finished taking pictures, we were late for school that morning.

Big news ... 

Facets

 

This is the crystal ball of a 10cm tall pewter dragon; the ball is about 1cm in diameter. It caught my eye as I was walking up the stairs and thinking that I'd didn't have any good fungus of which to take pictures. So, I get all set up, use the air compressor to knock off the main dust, run some water to get off more dust, and then the air compressor again and snap a few and put 'em on the compy.

Eeeeeeeeewwwww. Talk about filthy. UGH! So I grab my optics cleaning stuff and attack the microscopic dust bunnies again with about a 75% success rate. Snap a few more, clean a bit more snap a few more and finally get something that doesn't make me want to go take a very long and soapy shower. It's all kinda funny when I realize what a mess my house is. I think I'll try to get some cleaning into my schedule.

I've been reading The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism in Christianity, Judism, and Christianity (I think the religions were in that order), by Karen Armstrong. It gives me an interesting perspective on the Danish cartoon news bits.

More news, we may have a match in our adoption quest. We received some basic information about a little girl in Shan Xi province and we're waiting for the follow up information. I've been very distracted with all my thoughts of her. It doesn't really help me focus on my grading work. More on the adoption as it becomes available.

I may have a job... a cool job, a perfect job. I got an offer and I sent an accepting email and phone call, but I'm waiting for them to get back to me. That too is distracting. I hate waiting.

I need a good massage, a dark beer, and some white noise. Since that ain't going to happen, I better just try and sleep. 

Happy New Year (a few days later)!

 

This year we went to the New Year's celebration put on by the Denver Chinese School. I have to say we were a little lost, somehow we missed the overall schedule of events. I did pick up some chinese outfits for the boys (complete with fake yarn ponytail attached to the hat) and lucky red envelopes. Kai and Rowan immediately put on the oufits and spent the money from the envelopes on some sandlewood fans. I bet next year we'll be less lost and have more to report. (For an extra picture, see my other blog's entry.) The boys remove their chinese clothes only when absolutely required to do so -- so this picture was hard to get. 

Toothpaste II

 
 

The Blue Side of the Mentodent

 

This seemed a good followup to the strawberry fungus pictures. The white grittier side of my Mentodent wasn't coming out, so I used my super strength and managed to squirt all the blue into the sink and all the white backwards into the dispenser. It would have been annoying had the blue not looked so cool. And then there is also the photo friday challenge "Vanity" -- the blue stuff I think is just the breath freshener part and toothpaste is found in many vanities. 

Strawberry Fungus III

 
 

Strawberry Fungus II

 
 

Strawberry Fungus

 

I don't know much about fungus, so if anyone has some identifying tips, I'd be glad to hear them! I do like how alien and strange-looking fungi are. 

Boo-ya

 

Then of course, for "Pink" it's hard to beat Boo-ya, our hairless rat. (See the previous blog entries for the runners up.)

Boo-ya's name was inspired by Rufus, the naked mole rat of the too-soon-cancelled tv show Kim Possible. After they cancelled FireFly, cartoons are about all we watch anymore. Invader Zim! ... oh wait, that's been cancelled too. Avatar is still on, whoo-hooo!

Anybody catch Hoodwinked yet? Some funny Thin Man spoof elements and it's hard to beat Patrick Warburton aka The Tick (also cancelled, but the original cartoon was better and the comic book the best) and Krunk. Anyway, Boo-ya has some definite checks in the Pro column of entry for "Pink". Different, cute in his own way, not a flower, and yes... about as pink as any adult animal ever gets. 

Same Color, In and Out

 

Another possible "Pink". Too red? My Orientalphile side likes this one. Less girly. 

Barbie Pink Clover Bloom

 

Photo Friday's theme is "Pink". This is one that I took back in Eldorado State Park's ranger station yard in June of 2005. I'm not sure if this will be my entry; flowers are such an obvious subject choice for the theme. This is nice and complex for a single bloom, and the skinny plane of focus gave it a feeling of endless dreamy pinkness. On the other hand, it's very girly.

I'll post a few more "Pink" things and then decide. 

Sparkles

 

This is part of a pipe-cleaner, purple and green snowflake decoration that Kai brought home before the holiday break. It kind of reminds me of a festive barbed wire.