Odds & Ends

April 8, 2014 / Ally Bean / 10 Comments

:: The daffodils that we planted last autumn are up now. Known as Gigantic Stars, they have been a rousing disappointment. The bulbs that have managed to bloom are a whopping 8-10″ high. Whether we planted them wrong [ain’t hardly likely] or whether the winter took its toll on these bulbs [could be possible], I don’t know.

All I know is that tall beauties, they are NOT.

:: A few months ago I bought a Clarisonic Mia 2. It’s a rechargeable, face-washing device. Rather cute, actually. I’d read about it and wondered if it was worth the price. Well I gotta tell ‘ya that for me, it has been great. In fact, when I went to the salon for a haircut the woman who has cut my hair for years commented that my skin looked so much clearer.

So there you have, proof positive that this device is worth the cost. 😉

:: I am a lousy ironer. Z-D, on the other hand, is a marvelous ironer. So last night, while watching the final March Madness game, Mr. Man was ironing his pants. While doing so, unbeknownst to him, a stink bug was inside a pant leg and Zen-Den ironed the stink bug– thereby killing it. Mr. Man didn’t squish the bug as much as he flattened it, meaning there was no stink.

The things you learn…

:: Over the weekend we finished watching Torchwood. [Spoilers, Sweetie] The last year of the series, Miracle Day, took place in America and was a darker story– much less Dr. Who-ish. I enjoyed it, if only to see Wayne Knight [Newman from Seinfeld] play a heavy [figuratively] and to find out that Captain Jack Harkness is, indeed, indestructible. But there was lots of violence & blood– and a disturbing, but believable, plot line that did not reflect well on the human race.

I’ll be thinking on this one for a while.

[Hello FTC! I think that you know by now that when I recommend something I have not been given this something by the manufacturer. No, I’m just saying, in my opinion, I liked it. So we’re good FTC, right?]

Late Winter Weather Keeps Me Guessing

March 3, 2014March 3, 2014 / Ally Bean / 18 Comments

Delightful.

Saturday afternoon was sunny and about 55ºF outside. I wandered around our property and found this green patch of pachysandra juxtaposed against the blah browns of the forest primeval. Isn’t it a pretty reminder that Spring is on its way?

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Invigorating.

Yes, a mere 40 hours ago I was walking down these limestone steps to get to the lower terraced level of our property. In fact, once down there I paused to enjoy the fresh air and sunshine.

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Inspiring.

And then I spent a few minutes taking photos of what I saw: the blue sky above an evergreen tree surrounded by tall golden grasses, for instance.

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Dangerous.

However, that was then and this is now. Today, Monday morning, there’s white stuff everywhere, even outside the front door. Can you find the step to the stoop, covered in 3″ of snow, that leads to our front door? Look closely now.

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Annoying.

Oddly enough, it’s as if this last Saturday never happened. Sunshine and warmth? There was none that around here, you silly girl. You must have dreamed it all, says the Winter that’ll never end.

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Winter Beauty: A Simple Lesson In Perspective

January 23, 2014January 23, 2014 / Ally Bean / 10 Comments

Yesterday as I was going through some photos of winter scenes that I shot a few weeks ago, I was taken with the following simple lesson in perspective.

It’s a lesson that applies to photography as well as problems.

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Sometimes the simplest things look complex & confusing when you see them up close. For instance, here is a tangle of brown tree branches covered in white snow.

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Step back, add a bit of a blue sky and the snow-covered brown tree branches begin to look less chaotic. In fact, from this angle the tree branches appear more organized & interconnected.

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Expand your perspective again and the snow-covered brown tree branches in the foreground become incidental to the clear blue sky that forms the background.

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The simple lesson here?

By putting a little distance between you and whatever, you’ll see the big picture. And from that vantage point, we can only hope, you’ll understand what’s really going on.

5 Truths & A Lie

November 22, 2013February 27, 2015 / Ally Bean / 21 Comments

[I got the idea for this post from Rara at Rarasaur; her answers are here. She got the idea for her post from Jen at Sips of Jen and Tonic; her answers are here. Go visit them both. You’ll like ’em.]

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Here’s what I’m doing. It’s a bit of a game. I’m going to tell you a few things about me: 5 things will be truthful, 1 thing will be a lie. Depending on how closely you’ve been paying attention to me all these years you’ll know the lie immediately. Or not.

Whoever correctly figures out which statement is a lie, will win the opportunity to either: 1) be a guest poster on this blog; or 2) have me write a haiku about you that’ll be posted on this blog. Your choice.

Ready? Here goes.

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1. THE HUBSTER proposed to me in the parking lot of a bakery. He had no ring with him. All he said was: “so when do you want to get married?” And that was that.

2. I PLAYED the violin when I was a girl. I learned in a Suzuki method class [which means by ear, not by written music]. While I never excelled at playing the violin I did make it to state regional orchestra level one year. I was the last seat. And I hated the experience.

3. WE LIVE in a hilly area in a home built on a wooded ravine lot. Once upon a time we purchased 200 tons of dirt so that we could create a backyard. It was a messy project, but now we have a lower level terrace instead of the forest primeval.

4. I DRIVE a gray SUV. I named him Bullwinkle because of his color [which Lexus says is blue, but they’re wrong]. He’s not a new vehicle, but he gets me where I need to go.

5. I’M NOT a fan of the traditional Thanksgiving Day dinner. I’ve made my share of them over the years and they were delicious, but I’d rather have a good steak with a baked potato for dinner than turkey + all that carbohydrate crap.

6. I HAVE narrow feet, as in women’s AA shoes. This is more of a problem than you might initially imagine because there are very, very, very few AA shoes available. The result of this is that I keep my shoes forever and am usually forced to wear a pair of “so out of date you have no idea what decade they came from” shoes.

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