THE END OF A YEAR IN ONE PLACE

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(Originally posted on the website Heron Flight)

From April 1, 2004 until today, I worked on a daily photo project which I titled “A Year in One Place.” There is a field about 100 feet from my house. On the opposite side of the field is a stream. My goal was to take a photo of this end of the field every day for a year. The photo to the left is a reminder that I put in my car. It now has such character that everyone in the family has agreed that I need to leave the reminder there for good. Yes, I sometimes eat bananas in the car.

Here are some highlights from a year of taking daily photos in this place:


  • April 12 – garbage appears (maybe a cardboard box) and is visible until May 17
  • April 21 – new leaves are noticeable on the trees
  • April 29 – first wildflowers appear
  • May 12 – trees are noticeably full
  • May 18 – the stream is no longer visible
  • June ? – the first time someone asked me why the hell I was taking pictures there every day
  • June 18 – wheat begins to turn brown
  • July 1 – first photo taken by someone other than myself (guest photographers included Hannah, Maddy, Tim, Kayla, Arissa)
  • July 6 – wheat is harvasted
  • July 6 – first two of three vehicles appear
  • September 4 – first photo missed because someone forgot while I was out of town
  • September 15 – third vehicle
  • September 18 – field is flooded
  • September 21 – trees begin to appear noticeably thinner
  • October 13 – leaves begin to change colors
  • October 19 – first time I forgot
  • Total number of days missed – 9
  • Total out of the 9 that are on a misplaced disk somewhere – 3
  • November 4 – first frost
  • November 10 – leaves nearly gone
  • November 28 – stream is visible again
  • December 27 – first snow
  • January 22 – first photo taken during a snow storm
  • February 1 – first footprints in the snow
  • February 18 – first (and only) dog appears bringing the first (and only) human along with her
  • March 5 – my shadow is in the picture
  • March 24 – last time it snowed
  • March 31 (day 365) – first time a police officer stopped and asked what I was doing. I told him, “Nothing now. I’m finished.”

CLICK HERE to see the Year in One Place photo project.

Down Six Pounds

(Originally posted on the website Heron Flight)

THIS JUST IN…

I was informed that “we” are no longer doing the seven day detox! “She” is planning on making chicken on Thursday night (because company is coming). However, I am still going strong! I am now down 6 pounds. Nothing but rice, vegetables and fruit since Sunday. No sugar. No coffee. No alcohol. No grains (just a little oatmeal). No fats. Brown rice, sweet potatoes and kale for breakfast today. I also have orange juice with powdered soy protein each morning. I have heavy duty multivitamins, Omega-3, and Q-10 with breakfast and dinner.

So far… so good!

Oh yeah… I unwittingly mislead everyone… on the two day fast of the detox diet, you can have any kind of herbal tea, not only green tea. So it’s not quite as restricted in that regard. No black teas are allowed though.

AM I NOT COOL?

(Originally posted on the website Heron Flight)

I went to buy new jeans last night.

I have one pair that is just perfect right now. Perfectly faded. Perfectly soft. Perfectly comfortable.

I have another pair that is just beyond that point of perfection. It has a few holes in not the best of places, one of them being the pocket I carry my wallet in. Or rather, the pocket I used to carry my wallet in.

A third pair of jeans never had the chance to reach that perfectly faded and comfortable stage. It also has a hole in the wallet pocket, not from wear, but from a jagged-edged flange on a garage door. I tried to squeeze past the back end of my cousin’s car and my back end got snagged on the door. Fortunately, only my jeans ripped. No other personal assets were injured. The jeans were rendered useless for all except back up when pair #1 are in the wash.

As three minus two is one, and one worn for too many days in a row is ewww… we went shopping for jeans.

There was a time in my life when I only wore one brand of jeans. LEVIS. I was young. I was thin enough to squeeze past garaged cars. And I was cool.

I was also a teenager. There are particulars about being a teenager that make you either cool or uncool. I wore Levis. I also carried one of those large plastic combs with the handle. I had long rock star hair. I was cool. I needed a comb like that in my back pocket. One never knew when he would find himself in a rock star-like situation. Girls loved guys with rock star hair. Girls loved guys in Levis.

The thing is, I haven’t worn Levis in quite a few years now. I’ve been wearing Wranglers. (Hey! Where did all the girls go?) For a guy with a bunch of kids, Wranglers were within my economic reach. Why should I pay considerably more for Levis? Do you know how much food you can buy with the money you save by snagging a pair of Wranglers instead? We’re talking quite a few boxes of Kraft macaroni and cheese here!

What? Am I not cool now?

I did try on a pair of Levis last night. They brought about some reminiscing, a flashback (or was it a relapse?) to the glorious teenage days. What a disappointment! (the jeans, not the flashback) The quality was lame. The fit was lame. The coolness was… simply not there. So I took the Levis off, gathered together my coolness, and headed straight for the rack of Wranglers!

Yes, I put my old pants back on first.

I happily bought two pairs of Wranglers. Regardless of what all the other kids say, I know I’m still cool. I know what’s important. I know it’s not just a brand, an image, an appearance. Coolness runs deeper than that.

Not needing to carry a big comb because I don’t have enough hair for it? THAT is not so cool! But this article wasn’t about hair. Was it?

JUNK LIKE A CHEESE STEAK

(Originally posted on the website Heron Flight)

“…because, when you get too hungry from not eating at all, you’ll be crazy by lunchtime and more likely to eat junk, like a cheese steak.”

As I wrote yesterday, I failed on the first two days of fasting for the detox program. More correctly, “we” were not able to make it through the whole weekend on green tea and water alone. We tried. We tried valiantly. We failed gracefully. (Again, more on the “we” another day.)

I say gracefully because we have salvaged the plan. I was going to fast with green tea again today until after work. But then decided that the other half of the “we” was correct in the quote above. I probably would have given in by lunchtime and ended up consuming a big ol’ cheese steak with considerable gusto… and not a small amount of guilt. Having made it mostly through each of the two days of the weekend before finally eating, some good most have been accomplished. So, we decided to continue with the last five days of the diet, which consist of eating mainly vegetables and fruit. We can have brown rice and most fruits and vegetables (no corn, no grapefruit). We can drink as much green tea and water as we wish. Primarily, what we cannot have is sugar, coffee, alcohol, oils (only 2 tablespoons of olive oil per day), nuts, dairy products, wheat, oats, and condiments. We can use salt, pepper and any other seasonings. That is what our diet will consist of for this week.

This is actually not such a hard thing. We have been deliberately trying to eat more vegetables and less meat, more fruits and less sugary snacks. We raided the cookbook section of Barnes and Nobles and came away with armfuls of vegetarian cookbooks. We have already experimented with several vegetarian dishes. (Have you ever had broccoli coleslaw in a spinach wrap with feta cheese and black olive spread? Ahhhhh! If I could only have cheese this week!) The snacks have been hard to cut down on. Eating less meat has not been. For a while now, I’ve been teetering on the edge of becoming a complete vegetarian. The detox program may just be the catalyst to pushing me over that edge. It did save me from inflicting a cheese steak upon myself at lunch today.

Several readers have asked for information on this detox diet. The book we have been reading is called “7-Day Detox Miracle” by Peter Bennett, Sara Faye, and Stephen Barrie. Click on the title to purchase the book from Amazon.com.

HAPPY EASTER!

20050327basketofeastereggs

(Originally posted on the website Heron Flight)

This is the first article of the original Heron Flight website.

It’s Easter. A good day for a new start!

The last time I posted a journal entry was… well… quite a while ago! Too much time has transpired. Circumstances have changed. Events have happened. People have come and gone. Too much has gone unnoted.

Easter… the day of resurrection… new life. What better day for revival and renewal?

For some time I have been wanting to redesign my website. Of course, intentions and available time tend to avoid each other. I had the best ideas at the most inopportune moments and pitiful ambition when free hours surrounded me. Then today I installed Moveable Type. Now my web publishing life has become much simpler! Moveable Type’s available templates and easy archiving system have taken much of the difficulty out of the whole process. There is much that I need to learn about Moveable Type. For now, at least the site has a new design and provides a place for me to finally write again.

I need to write. I really need to write. The need has finally gotten to the point where it had to happen NOW! If you love to write you will relate to what I’m saying. Writers HAVE to write. Whether we write poorly or brilliantly, we HAVE to do it. Surely we want to write something amazing each time we sit before our computers or take a pen in our hands. No one wants to write poorly. But to not write at all is worse than the worst of the worst writing.

So… Today…

We spent the afternoon at my mom’s house. (Yes, “we.” The “we” will be explained another day.) My sisters and my niece were there. It was an impromptu gathering. Mom had been sick this week. So, no one was sure if we would get together or not. My stepfather had to work. (Doesn’t THAT suck?) We brought flowers over for Mom and ended up staying. Since none of us were prepared for this we ended up buying sandwiches, chips and chocolate at Quick Chek. Yes, we BOUGHT chocolate on Easter. Damn Easter Bunny! Poor Mom was sick and he didn’t even have sympathy enough to leave chocolate! Anyway… We had fun watching my niece find Easter eggs. We talked and laughed a lot. That was good in light of recent circumstances (also to be explained another day).

The only downside to the day was that I had been attempting a seven day detox diet. The first two days of the program allow you to have nothing but green tea and water. I started yesterday. I made it to 8 PM, then broke down and ordered Chinese food. Heh! Today I made it until 3 PM, then rushed to Quick Chek. Oh well. It’s a holiday… bad time to start any kind of diet. I did lose five pounds between Saturday and Sunday though! Not too shabby!

Tonight I came home and fiddled with the ol’ website until… *POOF!* Here it is! All brandy new!

There are plenty of things to write about, plenty to catch up on. But right now I’m tired. Time for a shower… maybe a movie… and then bed.

More later…………..