On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 13 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

The eclipse was amazing, I hope you had a chance to enjoy it. Hopefully it was an omen marking the beginning of the fall of trump.

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 68 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

So today’s an eclipse – groovy! Make sure to protect your eyes and enjoy this cool thing. In this age of omnipresent cameras and distribution tech, I expect lots of aamzing videos of animals and plants reacting to the eclipse. I can’t wait!

 

So, in honor of the great Jack Horkheimer, I encourage you to “keep…looking up!” And to encourage this, let’s take a different look up at the stats and things celestial.

 

Oh, and mom’s back home, recovering from the aborted surgery (which turned into an old-school biopsy, in effect) and beginning the Great Fight. Fuck cancer, fuck it all to hell.

Do keep Immanetize and Impkid in your thoughts and prayers as they piece together a new life.

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 43 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

My mom, with me hiding inside, 1970, Les Dents de Midi, Canton de Valais, Switzerland, though the view could be in Vaud, as that’s where my dad was from.

I recently discovered a stash of slides of my mom from that summer, when she was pregnant with me, her only child. They were taken by my dad where they lived in Kinshasa, when they visited his family in Switzerland, and then hers in the US. He collected and sequestered just these few slides into a cool cigar box, and it/they survived the house fire. It was almost like my dad’s ghost pushed me to select and look at this specific set, right as her health took a turn.

ps – all image enhancing suggestions welcome via email. I have PaintShopPro and am not really graphically skilled. I am scanning in old slides from the 40’s-70’s, many with fire/water/chemical/atmospheric/mold residue. Most were processed in top-class, professional-service labs in Switzerland, NYC, Houston, Bogota, Lima, Tulsa, etc. – oil towns, if you will (though I doubt my dad trusted the local outfit in Cochobamba, TBH). The oldest have very washed out colors, but many from the 50’s are surprisingly good. It’s so neat to see pics of Manhattan that my dad took to then take back to his family in Switzerland to show – he was very academic, in a totally Swiss way.

 

Pro tip: when 1 hour into a 4.5-6 hour surgery of a loved one, the phone rings, and it’s the surgeon, don’t lose focus – it’s not necessarily dire, and good question and listening skills are critical. But it wasn’t good news either – the cancer has spread onto my mom’s liver and surgery is thus off. Chemo will be scheduled tomorrow, likely beginning in two weeks. Not good, but I’m not preparing a funeral for next week, thankfully. I’ve been there, since my father didn’t tell us he was (non-cancer) terminal and his death was a shock (well, just the timing was for me, but that’s another painful confession for another day).

 

So I needed some joyful pics, and luckily we have a wonderful bird expert who also has a way with words. No – not Betty!

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 27 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

On a personal note, it was 10 years ago this morning that I awoke in a hospital in Santa Fe, having had an emergency appendectomy for a burst appendix the night before. I turned on my cell phone to call my mom and tell her I was awake, and was surprised to see that I had a voicemail from a unfamiliar Maryland phone number. It turned out that, during the night a lightning bolt had hit the family house, going through the roof and hitting her bed and catching the house on fire. The house was burned, though not completely, but luckily, she was with me in Santa Fe.

And to show you that life’s timing is mysterious, she is undergoing surgery today and can use all the help she can get, so should you have some good thoughts or a kind prayer, I know she’ll appreciate it!

Finally a pro-tip: if you have a pain in your right front/side/abdomen, run – don’t walk -to seek some medical advice. I thought I had food poisoning, and was in loads of pain afternoon and all night. I remember when, in the middle of the night, my right interior felt like someone had heated a bundle of metal wires with a torch and plunged them into my insides. I was sure it was food related, and was so focused on seeing my mom the next day that I ignored all of this until I arrived in Santa Fe and she asked why I was using a cane, and then insisted we go straight to the hospital.

Good thing, another 6-8 hours and I’d’ve been a goner. The surgeon asked me a few diagnostic questions; the final one was when he asked me what I’d do if he poked me hard in that area. I calmly explained that I would hurt him – stop him in any way that I could from causing me any more pain. 10 minutes later, I was wheeled down the hall for scans and pre-op prep.

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 31 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 17 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

 

First up, pictures from valued commenter No One You Know.

July is for Stargazers and cattails.

Taken on 2017-07-30

Stargazer lilies burst into fragrance as well as color in the front yard.

Stargazer lilies and cattails.

 

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On the Road and In Your Backyard

by 5:00 am. It has 20 Comments.

Good Morning All,

This weekday feature is for Juicers who are are on the road, traveling, or just want to share a little bit of their world via stories and pictures. So many of us rise each morning, eager for something beautiful, inspiring, amazing, subtle, of note, and our community delivers – a view into their world, whether they’re far away or close to home – pictures with a story, with context, with meaning, sometimes just beauty. By concentrating travel updates and tips here, it’s easier for all of us to keep up or find them later.

So please, speak up and share some of your adventures and travel news here, and submit your pictures using our speedy, secure form. You can submit up to 7 pictures at a time, with an overall description and one for each picture.

You can, of course, send an email with pictures if the form gives you trouble, or if you are trying to submit something special, like a zipped archive or a movie. If your pictures are already hosted online, then please email the links with your descriptions.

For each picture, it’s best to provide your commenter screenname, description, where it was taken, and date. It’s tough to keep everyone’s email address and screenname straight, so don’t assume that I remember it “from last time”. More and more, the first photo before the fold will be from a commenter, so making it easy to locate the screenname when I’ve found a compelling photo is crucial.

Have a wonderful day, and enjoy the pictures!

After such a horrible weekend,  I know we can all use some nice pictures. I’ll be catching up on lots of the emailed submissions; because of family reasons later this week, I’ll be scheduling Thursday, Friday, and next Monday (at minimum) off of them.

 

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