Lightning Show in Nevada

Lightning Show in Nevada
Originally uploaded by Roadsidepictures

Photo uploaded from flickr - just because I liked it.

It wasn't lastnight or anything...it is from Roadsidepictures Flickr photo album.

I Hear The Rolling Thunder

It sounded like the end of the world and I was glad and kind of scared too. Not used to being awakened at 3 a.m. by thunder, not since leaving back East, and mid-west.
A change of pace is what I need. A new outlook is what I need. I don't know what I need actually and it's ok. Hmm, you can't always get what you want...you can't always get what you want....never could sing very good.

Flash Flood Warning
A flash flood warning for Clark County has been extended until 10:45 a.m. today. Many areas are reporting flooded intersections. Heavy flooding throughout the area has many vehicles stalled in roadways. Power outages around the area have affected traffic signals.Updated: 08/27/2007 5:39 AM

Throwing Raku bottle with tall neck

Why all the agonizing over centering and perfection- just throw the darn thing and be done - just like this.

Who Cares?

I'm done.
I'm kind of tired.

San Francisco Ferry Building

The sun was out, it was actually HOT by S.F. standards! My trip to the Ferry Building was such fun. Good food, good company and yummy gourmet treats throughout the building.

Desha came home with a beautiful orchid, I picked up some special sourdough bread and some cheese I am told is "out of this world". I am almost afraid to open it up and try it; what if I can't stop and I eat it all, then it will be all gone.....

Well, Jeff at The Cowgirl Creamery http://www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com/cowgirl_creamery.php

will just have to sell me some more next time I make the trek to THE CITY!!

To Seek or Not to Seek Isolation?

Oh, what is happening? When I started to blog I meant to keep my isolating self all to my isolating self. Then I started to sort of say hi to other people thru my blog and also to play a blog game; so lately I am feeling waaay too friendly. I don't want people ask to come over and have coffee and cookies and chit chat, you know, get to know me.

2 weeks ago someone confided in me and told me a huge, gigantic secret and I will not repeat it of course. I am quite good at keeping other people's secrets but I cannot seem to keep my own. Anyhooooo, (I think anyhooooo is Norwegian or North Dakotan) she said, "I can tell you this because you don't have any friends, so you don't have anyone to tell". I told her, "Thanks a lot", and I laughed but I keep thinking about it. Not the secret but the other. I don't know what to do with it. Well, I see a close friend tomorrow and we can talk about it. I am going to The City as San Francisco is called by those of us outside the city and county of San Francisco. We are going to go here:http://www.ferrybuildingmarketplace.com/ Unless, of course she says "Something came up".....

He who binds himself to a joy

Does the winged life destroy;

But he who kisses the joy as it flies

Lives in eternity's sunrise.-

William Blake, Eternity

On Line Internet Toys Like Flickr!

Even though Ihaven't yet figured out how to get those fancy click on word links to work I did get my flickr pictures to post. That little box they are in is called a badge, who knew? I am not sure I like it, maybe it's annoying to have those pictures pop up at me. There is another format I can try if this one is ruled out. Right now I am playing with some of the fun gadgets available on Blogger.

Today is my mah jong day; in the meantime I am doing laundry and the dryer is putting out an icky smell. I pulled it out and vacuumed out as much lint as I could and reconnected the big tube vent. Oh, I would love to dry things outside in the sunshine....if I had a line ..... if I had some sunshine....

Go Away

In some cases a doormat that says go away might be a joke but in this setting it appears that they mean it.
My neighborhood is a mixed up one which I like, we have a variety of people here. In this section of town are many small homes that were built as vacation homes for wealthy San Franciscans, of course that was a long time ago. Many of them have fallen into disrepair and have absentee landlords or maybe the cost of living in this area has simply taken its toll, I don't know. These homes sit within a block or 3 from the beach, which I must add is terribly hard on houses and cars, etc. Each year a few more houses change hands and new owners sometimes tear the old homes down to the foundation and start over. If they start from the foundation I understand that they can keep their Prop. 13 status which is a highly coveted tax break for land owners. When a "Go Away" doormat is on the step of a loved and cared for home it certainly looks different than when I see it on a dark and overgrown setting!! Which reminds me that I must find a way to fix my greenhouse roof...

Please Take My Stuff

In my neighborhood it can be difficult to be rid of things. If you put "Free" on them and put them on the street sometimes everyone gets lucky and someone wants them. Of course, I am a sucker and if I had a big house I'd take them home. But I don't have a big house or a truck to haul them home in....
"Look, someone is throwing out a perfectly good, ugly, white metal scratched up library style bookcase". Guess it's a good that I don't have that truck! I used to have a Jeep before everyone had Jeeps, and I did sometimes haul stuff home but it usually wasn't free. In Illinois they didn't have free things on the street, at least that I saw. But I did have a dog that rode in the back with me and we had a big snowy hill so a Jeep made perfect sense. I don't think I should talk about people that drive Jeeps or SUV's around here right now. I have other things to think about... :)

On My Walk Today

I felt a bit crabby so food and exercise were in order....I went for a walk. All I saw were disgusting things at first, broken glass, weeds, trash. After having a bit to eat things started looking up. At my coffee house (one of them) a young man played his music, at the beach a girl was posing for the camera and I visited the man with his birds. The flowers that magically appear everywhere around here in August were blooming. The locals call them naked ladies but I think they are Amaryllis. So although the scenery didn't actually change I did.

Class With Tiffany

This fall I am enrolling with a new instructor that has some outstanding skills. She uses a variety of surface decorations that I am interested in and has some throwing skills I am ready, willing and hopefully able to do. The wrists are getting bad with arthritis - it comes and goes and lately it is visiting. She is http://www.tiffanyschmierer.com/ Drat, I still haven't learned how to put in those fancy click-on name or word links. Anyway, it seems like summer has flown past me. One thing I want to learn to do is make a teapot and I want to enhance my forms with decent glazes. If I could throw a big huge platter that would be fun too.

I don't know how I will get the window fixed - my greenhouse where I do my clay work has a missing window in the roof. It just rotted away and fell into the interior of the workspace.

Mah Jong

Monday is Mah Jong day. Last Monday I lost horribly and had to put $3.00 into the mah jong fund (hey, it's a LOT!)

Today I didn't put anything into the fund. It was a good day. Our group plays the game the old fashioned way - the traditional way - the only way the game should be played. We do not use cards as some of the groups do today. We scorn them....I was taught to scorn them you see. If you are addicted to mah jong and wear mah jong jewelry and the like, it's ok with us as long as you bring your mah jong money and play FAST! One of our players is the Mah Jong Nazi, but I can't tell which one that one is. It wouldn't be nice, dontcha know, but her name starts with C.

I won so much on the day shown here that they wouldn't let me play, I had to sit out and take their pictures as we rotated players....well, part of that is true!

Nutty Narrows

I am not really bashing Longview in this one but I can't resist reminding myself that Longview has a number of bridges, among them is the Nutty Narrows.
Ok, truth be told, I am trying to get one of those click-on links to work...it only works on the title. Back to my homework!

Mac The Lab

Having a digital camera means I can take all kinds of goofy photos and my grandchildren wanted a photo of this dog. He lives in Washington State and they haven't seen him for a while. His name is Mac. This family names all of their dogs Mac, there is a long line of them too; pre 1960-2007. They are all black Labs. I don't understand why they do this and I never will, it used to bother me ~ I have given up trying to understand.
This particular Mac likes to sit of my feet.
His eyes turned so blue here, I think it's my camera.

KAISER PERMANENTE THE DEATH MACHINE

MY SUMMER REPORT ON KAISER PERMANENTE.

Beware Kaiser patients in the greater Portland, Oregon area!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't know about other areas of the United States but out West Kaiser the HMO rules the HMO scene and they've got your money and that's all they care about.

This sick person that I know and love became ill while in California and was hospitalized in Vallejo, California at Kaiser. She got good care there it seems.

BUT THEN ~~~ upon returning home to the Pacific Northwest (after a 12 day hospital stay in Vallejo) ~ it's the same old stuff. She needs a cardiologist's care but is being denied that in a most polite and maddening way. She is still very sick and Kaiser is giving her the run around. Her primary care dr. must refer her, oh, no, her primary care dr. is on vacation for 2 weeks. Can she see another primary care dr.? The rigamarole to change dr.'s will take X amount of time. Here, take some pills.

Kaiser's deceptive television ads are beautiful, healthy people; running, playing ball, swinging on swings, swimming....their motto is: "Thrive".

Oh, please.

This is not my first complaint about the care she has received from Kaiser in the Portland, Oregon area. X-rays mysteriously dissappear and never again surface after major surgeries, that kind of thing.

The computers between Vallejo, California and Portland, Oregon are not compatible; they could not access her medical records and in turn, they could not forward her medical information concerning the care she received while in California to anyone in the Northwest!

I wonder about health care advocates for Kaiser patients, with dread I feel another manifesto coming on; or do I?

SIMON LEACH -Rolling a rim

I even like watching Other People work with clay!

My kiln opening was less than spectacular. I managed to get a few good things, so I am satisfied. This is a small "butter dish" I made a long time ago. I fired it multiple times trying to get the right effect, I don't have it anymore, I wish I hadn't sold it.

Today we are having a typical Bay Area coastal day, dreary. I am trying to get out to my workspace to make some things but find it difficult this morning...

What do you do when you say something so crazy on someone's blog that you just shut down the computer and scream? Well, it's done, can't be taken back so I think I will smile and pretend like it's all okay. I'm the only one that pays attention anyway. You know, like we all think that it's all about us? Oh, well....

I bought some plants yesterday to cover the bare spots in my yard that I don't like. I visited a new nursery and the nice woman actually helped me find something that I don't have to water once it is established and it isn't invasive and it grows to cover up bare spots just fine. I actually went there with a big used black plastic bag looking for sawdust (it is a lumberyard that is branching out - don't you like puns?) but they didn't have any. Do you suppose some other mad potter beat me to it? I need an old metal garbage can too, one with a few holes in it so I can do a sawdust firing; I may have to purchase a new one and poke holes in it, seems so wasteful....

Landscape in Clay

I have no idea where this came from but there you go. I did it, someone said it looked like a fish. Well, I took umbrage, it is not a fish, it is a landscape. Of course after I photographed it I saw what they were talking about. I have never done oil colors but it might be a little like this. Watercolor is my favorite medium; after clay of course.

My landscape measure 22" long, it reminds me of someplace I have lived or visited. Idaho?

Sensory Overload

As much as I am hooked on my computer it gives me sensory and information overload. I want to know it all. I didn't say be a know it all, it just seems like there is never enough time to find out everything I want to know about.

It is such fun to see what everyone else is doing in their lives through looking at their blogs that it could be easy to forget to live my own. And sometimes a blog will be so big and wonderful it will kind of assault me. So fragile you know....

All I want to accomlish today is the ironing, pay the bills, make dr. appt., play mah jong, go to the post office, make dinner..that is all I want to do.

Selling Naked

This fish is actually quite glossy and cinnamon brown, each scale was applied by hand and I put a lot of effort into it. I put a dot on top of each scale too. The photo does not do it justice, pottery glazes can be so shiny that when photographed they turn out looking ugly - or at least not like they look through your eye, but different. I am going to use wire fired into the back of my fish so there will not be leather or hemp or wire running thru the holes. No more holes.

A friend of mine that also does pottery asked me if I would like to vend at her Club since they were going to have a big bash this weekend. Well, I thought if might be kind of fun but also kind of not fun. I have sat outside in the heat while a loud band played next to me and children ran screaming through the area... A fellow potter took a couple of my tiles to see if they might be popular. We will see. See is the operative word for this particular vending opportunity since her Club is a nudist camp. I asked her how can they buy anything without pockets to put their money in....

What a Dump

I do wish someone at my IP would read my blog and then they would understand. My life line (tv and internet line) drops from the street waaay behind me, and it is a big long drop. My telephone line is tacked to a tree too! What a dump! ~ It isn't really I just wanted to say that snotty Bette Davis line....
During our raging winter rain storms that sweep right off the ocean into my life, that line often gets knocked down. So while everyone else gets their service back....I sit and gnash and snarl. Wah, wah, poor me, no one understands that my line is down on the ground and they don't fix it for days and years and eons!
I must water the yard I guess, I am told that this will help the plants live. You see, I grew up in Washington and the only time we ever, ever watered was usually in August or whenever it got warm enough to run through the sprinkler. Watering is not in my genes. And I'm not expecting any raging winter rain storms soon....