Crocheting

Now that winter has arrived, I'm spending much more time doing crafts and much less time outside... that is, when I'm not busy doing my Big Media Job... Last year, I made this blanket and pillow... well, actually, I started this project when I was in the federal prison camp in Danbury, Connecticut. It originally was going to be a small lap blanket and then it grew and grew to become the blanket and pillow set that it is today. "Necessity is the mother of invention" is the basis for the design. I ran out of pink yarn and could obtain no more from the prison commissary (none more was to be had). So, I started making white flowers with this gray background... and liked it... so I turned it into an inner border. When I got turned loose, I discovered that I had more pink... so that was the start of the outer border!
The blanket turned out to be too large to be entered into the contest at America's Fair, formerly known as the Erie County Fair. I did enter a smaller blanket into the small blanket category and won an honorable mention. Since that time, I gave the blanket to some friends, who had recently had a baby.

Zoey and Smokey converse

Zoe and Smokey spend a lot of time together. Activities that they enjoy include: washing each other, staring each other down, wrestling, biting, fighting over a toy mouse, chasing one another, and talking. Zoe has shown herself to be the boss in this picture, even though Smokey is the bigger cat. He doesn't quite trust her, though, hence, the ears that have gone way back.
Frequently, a potential squabble between these two friends ends when one of them becomes distracted. They can be distracted by a sunbeam.
Zoe still enjoys chasing and biting her own tail.

ice picture

Here is a bush that was covered by ice... almost as if the raindrops were frozen in space and time... instead of running off of the branches, as they would during warmer times.

Ice Storms

On Sunday night, the freezing rain came and the trees looked as if they had been encased in ice. The branches glittered and glowed, almost as if they were glass.
When I saw the apple tree in front of the house for the first time, it was early in the morning and the sun had not yet risen. In the dark, the branches glittered even more. The recently fallen snow sparkled beneath the partial moon with colors... the spectrum breaking apart beneath the faint light.
Beneath the thin layer of snow was ice...
... This ice had fallen everywhere...
... causing branches to fall in streets and yards... electrical wires came down... many people stayed at home while others went out onto the treacherous roadway... and there were more car accidents than usual.
It was a holiday, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. day.
It was cold, very cold... a good day to stay indoors and to reflect on civil rights and human rights. ... on Iraq and Afghanistan and Colombia and Guantanamo...
and on things closer to home, too...