Yesterday I drove to Sherman, a town about 30 miles north of here, initially to photograph some gravestones of distant relatives for my genealogical research. As is the case with a typical huge cemetery, it wasn’t that photogenic. My cohort and I spent most of our time prowling around the back sides of buildings in the old downtown area, and exploring an old abandoned grain elevator, where we found a lot of wonderful graffiti. I was mad at myself because I had the “wrong” lens on my camera. I was forced to change the way I was shooting, which was aggravating, since I’m out of practice. I didn’t shoot as many frames as I could have, and consequently, I’m not so happy with the results. Still, I think I can find one in ten that I like, which is a pretty good ratio.

This photo is from the side of an old railroad car.

Green Clearwing Dragonfly

I’m fascinated by bugs, especially when I can view one close up. I don’t know why I grew up disliking them, or why I was terrified of spiders. (I still despise cockroaches, though.) Is it a Western cultural thing to see insects and reptiles as evil things? It seems most of the aliens in sci-fi movies have reptilian faces or insectlike eyes and mandibles. Propaganda! Bigotry! Stereotype!

Squirrel with pecan. I’ve heard people saying it’s going to be a cold winter in North Texas, but really, Senor Squirrel, is that any excuse to stuff your face this way? And Dude, your oral hygiene sucks. Brush those teeth once in a while. Eeeeew!

Found Papers: playing card & 2 cigarette packs.

A co-worker was showing me her latest scrapbooking efforts this week, and I was struck by how much money she has invested in her hobby, so much so that she says people will only be getting handmade cards for Christmas, and nothing else. She’s got a machine to die-cut letters, a machine to put sticky stuff on the back of paper, rubber stamps for every holiday, store-bought matching papers, and I don’t know what else. She estimates it costs at least $6.00 to make one card. Well, I had to come home and make this collage, which cost me nothing except for the glue. It’s a crude effort, but I think I’d rather go this direction, than that of my co-worker. Her stuff is very exacting, lots of neat squares and coordinating papers, and pretty…..but it’s downright dull. I wanna be a wild girl!

yeah, baby, this SUV owner knows the score.

maybe he/she is a sub-prime lender?

maybe a CEO at Morgan Stanley?

Need I ask the question begging to be answered; ie, “why would you be so stupid as to advertise this fact?”

Animatronic Baby T-Rex from the Dinosaurs Alive! exhibit at McKinney’s Heard Museum. These were pretty cool. The eyes and body were set in motion as if the dinosaurs sensed your approach and were really looking at you. Scary! You could hear kids squealing up and down the trail.

This is the kind of muse I need sometimes. Maybe the threat of teeth would prod me into action. I’ve been working on my genealogy web pages again after a tentative start almost a year ago. I’ve amassed so much information on so many different branches of the family I often despair about pulling it all together into a coherent story. I love the thrill of the hunt, chasing down obscure facts, but I never know where to start with collating the data. That will probably be one of my winter projects. In the meantime I’m enjoying the sunny not-so-hot weather and beginning to prep the house for cold weather. Now that the walls are insulated it should be a much cozier place.

Repeat after me:
My health is more important than…..[fill in the blank].
(almost everything I can think of?)

Two days after the heart-attack incident at work a former co-worker suffered an extremely high pulse rate and checked himself into a hospital. He was on the brink of having a stroke. This stuff scares me because these guys are not that much older than I am. I don’t want to be those guys, so this past week I’ve been attending to my own health. I hate exercise, but that’s what I need to do. My back and its bad disks always protest, but then they protest even when I don’t exercise. For the last three years I’ve been unable to sustain any kind of exercise routine for more than a week. I feel guilty, but I can’t get motivated. Now I’m concerned. So now I’m working on my baby steps of an exercise plan, telling myself anything is better than nothing. I’m trying not to overdo it the first week as I usually do, just a little, just around the block, just park farther away at work or at the store, ignore the elevator, take the steps. It remains to be seen whether or not I can continue.

Who knew working for a large corporation could be a matter of life and death? Who knew the bureaucracy and fear of liability might stand in the way of someone getting help in a medical emergency?

My co-workers and I found out the hard way this week when one of our own began having severe chest pains a few days ago. Someone called 911, but no one realized the company phone system was programmed to connect to the building’s “loss prevention” department instead of the local emergency hotline. Apparently “loss prevention” only has to do with theft of merchandise, not loss of life. While someone waited at the front of the building, expecting paramedics to arrive at any moment, loss prevention was busy NOT calling them. “No,” they said, “we need to assess the situation ourselves to determine if there’s really an emergency.” In the meantime, our coworker was cold and clammy, lying on his side, writhing in pain. Five to seven minutes later, after loss prevention had walked across a warehouse, up two flights of stairs, and down a long hallway, the ok was given to call 911. By the time the paramedics arrived, the spasms of pain had subsided, and our co-worker just wanted to go home, even though the medics advised he go to the hospital. Someone offered to drive him home, but they hadn’t gone more than a mile or two before he vomited blood in the vehicle and passed out. It was rush hour in Dallas. It was raining. Traffic was clogged for miles on the freeway, so who knows how long it took for the person to get him to a hospital. It’s been 3 days and no one knows if he’s going to live.

Now word has come down that no one is to speak about this co-worker, not even to ask how he’s doing. He is not a human being, he is not our friend; he is a lawsuit waiting to happen.

So make a pact with your co-workers, those of you who work for these things called corporations, these entities who think they’re more important than the folks who work for them: If someone’s in distress grab a cell phone immediately and punch 911. Don’t use a company phone. Don’t believe the company will take care of you. They won’t. They don’t understand. They can’t have heart attacks because they have no heart.

“How strange! Some kid has been sticking their orange M&Ms in an old seed pod. What a perfect waste of chocolate.” These were my thoughts as I bent to collect the pod on the sidewalk. “No, not M&Ms. Tiny alien creatures camouflaged in a hostile environment, biding their time until their fearless leader sounds the ‘forward, charge’ battle cry.”

But, No, they are seeds. Magnolia Seeds. This is where the trees come from. All these years and this is the first time I’ve seen a seed pod that wasn’t just brown and shriveled up. Apparently the squirrels love to eat the seeds and most of them have been consumed by the little rodents before they ever drop from the tree. I don’t know how this one survived.

Above: Ruby Throated Hummingbird (female or immature male) — Below: Asian Tiger Mosquito

The hummingbirds don’t seem to visit our feeders when they’re stationed close to the house, so I don’t often get a chance to photograph one. This little cutie pie stayed motionless just long enough for me to get a couple of shots, and the light was perfect. (Maybe someday I’ll be able to afford an extremely long lens to shoot birds.)

Wandering around with a macro lens is always an adventure, as shown by this accidental capture of one of my worst enemies. These tiger mosquitos are particularly vicious biters; and usually I’m trying to kill them after they’ve drawn blood from my arms or ankles. I’m never safe when I go out in the morning. Today I was looking for a toad my mom found under the spearmint plant, but since I couldn’t find it I started shooting the tiny blossoms on the mint plant. My camera suddenly focused on this mini-monster and I snapped it.