Tuesday Morning

This evening is the first Flash II class. I am so looking forward to that. I bought a cord for my flash but it is short. Hope it will do until I can get something longer.

This morning the sky was filled with lovely clouds edges lit by the sun. There was a beautiful sunset last evening...I didn't see it here...my daughter called me from her work and asked me if I could. She said it was amazing. We live in an area surrounded on three sides by hills. My only real view is east. I do get to see sunrises in the winter months that rival any sunset.

This house began life as a two room shack with a cobble stone fireplace. Later it was added onto several times. I am in the latest addition...the master bedroom with bath my dad and stepmom had built on. The original house was built of redwood and the first additions also used redwood. The back bedroom was added in 1940 I think. That is Hailey's room now. My dad and stepmom took the dividing wall out of the main house and opened it up to make a larger living room. Then my dad added on to the front porch and enclosed the whole to make a large room for a pool table. He put in a sliding door out to the pool area. The sliding door was put in backward. When we saw that it was worn out and needed to be replaced. We ordered one from Home Depot. E.R. and I put it in ourselves. He did most of the lifting. That was a hard job. Not only that in thirty years standard door sizes changed so we had to do some work on the door frame.

My step mom after my father passed away had the posts taken out and the room truly opened up. She had two large beams installed to hold up the roof. When we got the place that roof was sagging so we put in a large post to hold it up and two smaller posts. Basically putting back the original porch posts. Then made a separate small room out of that area. E.R. stays in that room. We live in a strange sort of peace.

Mostly because of our son David. It is hard to think of David as almost 43 years old. In some ways he still seems like the teenager he was. I read up on schizophrenia and tried to learn all about it. It has been over twenty years since then. When my parents trust was settled I bought this place from the trust to make sure David had a place to live. E.R. had rented the little house from my stepmom after my father passed away. She didn't want to be on the property alone. Her mother moved from LA to live with her. David began staying with E.R. then.

For several years, I was alone at the storage. Just me and my cats and the dogs. The first time in my life that I was ever alone. I found out that I liked it. I took classes at the community college and started painting. Sometimes John was there. When John married, and Lynn was expecting Hailey they lived in a trailer in a trailer park in Lakeside. Since it was our travel trailer, the manager called me and told me to remove it from the park. John and Lynn fought all the time. That is when they moved into the RV storage lot. I had said never! A lot of good that did me. I saw a lot of Hailey as a baby never dreaming that I would be raising her. And then my life would be changing again forever.

Sunday at the Park

We went to Balboa Park this morning for the Flash I class. I really enjoy the classes we have there. Today was learning what our pop up flash can do and also what it can't do. We spent time in the Zoro Garden and then walked over to the Rose Garden. Such a lovely place. Then finished up in the Cactus Garden.

Elizabeth, Cody, Dennis, and Ashleigh went to LA over the weekend for a trip to visit the Museum of Tolerance and a visit to Universal Studios. E.R. is in LA too. He picked up some family members at the airport here and drove them up for a family party then will bring them back on Monday for their flight back. Hailey spent last night with friends and church today so Dave and I were here alone for a quiet weekend.

We had a good talk last evening while sitting outside in the cool evening air. Nice. He has his problems but he has a good heart. A large empty area of Eucalyptus Hills was home to two Mexicans that Dave became acquainted with. They have been moved out by the sheriff's, their makeshift house and possessions destroyed and removed. Dave worries about them. Hard to convince him that they will be all right. Dave has been picking up the trash and removing it from that area for years and collecting the bottles and cans dumped there. He will have to stay away from there from now on.

Passing

Farrah Fawcett the loveliest angel is flying free. Cancer is a tragic way to die. I saw what it did to someone I loved...most of us have. I feel so sorry for the people that loved her. She will be remembered.

The other death in the news is also sad. Sad for his children. The world has double standards. Why should we mourn a known child molester because he is said to be a kind gentle person and a talented performer? We vilify priests that molest children. We send them to prison. Are the victims any less damaged because their molester was someone rich and famous?

It's Wednesday...

Middle of the week and I feel like I'm drifting again. Not in a photo class at present but will start again next week. It is morning and the sky is cloud covered. Hoping it will burn off early. We wake up to cloudy skys and I think where is sunny California? David and I had a nice talk this morning. I enjoy talking with him on good days. My son John turned 40 on Monday. He is my youngest We live in a stressful situation. John is staying in our travel trailer when he isn't up in Valley Center. Elizabeth lives next door with her son Cody and her boyfriend Dennis and his daughter. E.R. and I have been separated since 1983.

E.R. rented the little house from my stepmom and David lived with him most all those years. I knew when I got this property that there would be stresses. Though I didn't know how bad. E.R. and David moved in here with me and Hailey, and Elizabeth moved into the little house. E.R. is at the other side of my house from me thank goodness. Elizabeth and John are not talking to each other. Lots of anger between them. I have to remind them both that they are both my children and that I love them both. So there is a edgy truce. Dave has bad days where he upsets everyone. Getting this place seemed a good thing at the time and maybe it was. We needed a place where David could live and he was already here. It isn't easy finding a place for someone that is schizophrenic. He couldn't live in an apartment or where the houses are too close together. He yells and rants sometimes and it is better to have some space around I miss being in my own house...just me and Hailey.

I lived alone at the storage for several years. Though John was nearby and then when he was first married to Lynn they lived at RV storage in a trailer. Hailey was born in 1994. In the late 1980s I started taking classes at the community college and getting back into painting. I don't mind living alone...so what happened? We make choices and we wonder if we did the right thing. Hailey is happy and she wasn't lost to her father as she could have been in foster care. I love her very much.

Sunday

We had some sun today after a cloudy morning. Hailey and I went to Walmart. She saw her friend Haley and Haley's sister Tyler. Told them that they will have to come over and swim in the pool if it ever gets done!

Here are some photos of the empty pool. The deep end is at least nine feet maybe nine and a half. The shallow end dips down pretty fast and then it just drops off to the deep end. I never saw the pool with water in it. My Dad had it cleaned out and used it for a few years. At the time he and my Stepmom were mad at me. So we didn't see each other during those years. When my Dad moved here the pool was full of gold fish and water lilies. Then by the time we were reconciled my Dad had filled the pool with dirt.

Saturday Evening

Sometimes life sucks...my son David insisted that his dad drive him over to Borrego Springs. Dave has bad spells with his illness and instead of telling him "no" when he wants to leave, E.R. will take him wherever... It began with Dave just leaving and calling from some faraway place wanting a ride home. That was years ago when Dave first became ill. Now he will act up until his dad just drives him somewhere. Dave used to stay gone for months and then weeks. Now it is usually a few days. This time it was overnight. E.R. is over in Borrego Springs to get Dave. And he can't find him so E.R. calls me and rants to me. I stay by the phone in case Dave calls and I can tell him that his dad is looking for him.

Yesterday the sun was shining and I thought that maybe summer was here at last...not so fast. Today it was back to gray skys and June Gloom.

Back in May Elizabeth decided to dig out the swimming pool. My father filled it in back in the 1970s. Then used it as a planter. Later my stepmom planted roses and a couple of trees. A few years ago we installed an above ground pool for Hailey. That was fun and I wasn't worried about it because it wasn't all that deep.

E.R. got a lot of the dirt out with our little loader.

Then when it got too steep for the loader, the kids tried...they had a lot of fun anyway.

Then we got a backhoe and finished the job. The pool was homemade back in the 1950s and is very big and very deep at the deep end...about nine and a half feet. It was painted. It is also very cracked up. So Elizabeth and Dennis are working to patch the cracks and then they plan to sand blast and repaint it.

Summer Vacation

Hailey has been out of school a couple of weeks and for me that feels like I am on vacation too. Not having to get up at 6am! Driving her back and forth in the miserable traffic jams at El Cap! That is my vacation! Also, I am on a diet and lost some pounds at the start of the diet. My system wants to keep the weight so need to add some more activity to my days...move it and loose it...no pain no gain...no pain will gain...weight that is.

Yesterday I revamped my blog page. In '95 I had a web page and added graphics...some roses by making the background color of the roses the same as my background color of my page. I was making computer graphics before I found the web. As soon as transparent background gif files were possible I did the roses again and added a textured background to my page. I learned how to make seamless textures. I started another page for my rose photos and made that one black with red text. Someone wrote to me saying that red was hard for some people to read on black so changed my text to green. Hailey was little back then so once she was down for the night I would get on the computer.

Hailey is probably the reason I turned to the web. I've mentioned this before. I was painting both oils and watercolor...taking classes...then Hailey came into my life. She was 18 months old and that meant a child proof house. Oil paints are not safe for a child and I needed the time to spend with her. I managed a mini storage and lived there so worked at home. So computer graphics was my creative outlet. First with CorelDraw and then Photoshop. I had taken classes in Digital Photography and in CorelDraw too. The Digital Photography class was learning in black and white how to scan and edit photographs. The classroom did have a black and white digital camera and we each got to snap some photos in class...my first time touching a digital camera. I wanted one so badly. I used to dream about the Minolta...I think it sold for about $4,000. When the first low price digital came out...I bought one...I took some photos and then took it back to the store. It was dreadful.

I made a page of country music web site links and called it Country Stars. I made a special background for it and the title with two transparent stars. Right after that animated gifs were possible so made my red stars turn. That was fun because five point stars are not square and I did a lot of adjusting to keep them from bouncing as they turned.

My rose photo began to show up on other people's pages...mostly in graphic collections. Graphic collectors were people that searched web pages and lifted the graphics that caught their eye and then made their own page of these lifted graphics. That didn't make me a happy camper. I found a program that turned my rose photos into class files and made them harder to steal. As the years passed there are fewer and fewer graphic collection sites.

Another Blog

Started another blog earlier this year. So decided I would put the posts here too. Not too many of them so it wasn't hard to do. They are mostly about my photo classes. I will be adding some photos.

My current cameras are an Olympus E-520 and an E-3. I have found that I can use my old Minolta Rokkor lenses on the Oly cameras. I took this one with my Oly E-520 and a 135 Rokkor lens. This is manual shooting. Lately I have been doing less with auto focus anyway. The Rokkor lenses are fast and lighter to hold than the Oly Zuiko digital lenses.

Last Sunday we went up to Mount Palomar and I practiced my black and white shooting.

Posted: 05/12/09 06:46:49

Haven't been keeping up on this...but am back for a few comments on our trip last Saturday to Catalina.

Wish we had a longer time to spend. Had to catch our boat back at 2pm. We got there early and took a taxi drive...a very fast taxi drive in a mini van. The girls and I sat in the back seat and ER was in the passenger seat. The middle seat was empty. The taxi driver wanted to show us the most in the half hour the ride lasted. We did get to see wonderful views of the harbor. I managed to snap a few photos through the window. The driver was a character and talked through the drive while missing people on golf carts and whipping around curves. We learned that he was originally from Guadalajara and that had lived in Catalina over 20 years. We saw a lot in that half hour trip including his house and small garden. He would like a bigger garden! I think he enjoyed the trip as much as we did...maybe more.

These are from our amazing taxi ride. He would pull up at a location and say it was a great view for picture taking and then put the van in gear and take off. These were quickly taken through the window.

After our taxi ride we walked back to the ferry landing. ER, Hailey, and Ashleigh, decided to walk back to town. So I didn't see them again until we met up to take the boat back.

Posted: 03/23/09 19:43:24

Last Friday Jackie and I had lunch in Alpine. Then we drove to the Summer's Past nursery. It is really a lovely place to visit. They have tables and chairs and benches along the pathways and lots of plants to see. They have a waterfall, no photos of but there are always other days...anyway the water fall is part of a stream of water that winds through that part of the nursery. I did get a photo of one of the small bridges that cross the stream. Makes me wish I could have something like that in my yard.

I bought some amaryllis bulbs...pink lady...which is old fashioned and hard to find. My mother grew them, and then later I had a large brick planter at the storage filled with them that I had planted. I meant to take some of the bulbs when we left the storage, but with all the stress forgot. This morning we did a quick trip to Home Depot for some large pots and potting soil. I planted two more roses that I got at Walmart the other day and some lily bulbs. I started planting roses in large pots when I was at the storage. Except for the large brick planter there was nothing. So I filled up the area in front of the house and office with roses in pots. My rose pages are full of photos mostly of those roses. After we came here...while I have lots of space there doesn't seem to be anywhere to plant roses. They are still in pots...

Yesterday it rained and I didn't do my homework for In Focus 3...shame on me. I haven't decided yet if I will catch it up or forget about it. It is a beautiful day today. A friend I've known since college is out from Iowa for a short visit. She moved there last year. We had lunch and then went looking for candy bars. Not just any candy...U-No bars. Pronounced "You Know" they were my mama's favorite and Janey's favorite too. Sometimes they are hard to find and over the years after we would have lunch we would go on a candy hunt hopefully to find U-No bars. Janey says they don't have them in Iowa. Today we got them at the first store we went to and not only they they were buy one and get one free.

Went to pick up Hailey after school and got busy...finally back to finish this and it is now dark out...One thing I did do was take my blur photos for Sunday's assignment. Only got five shots but that is better than none.

Posted: 03/20/09 11:14:01

Last Sunday was our Sharp Shooters trip to the Zoo. Had a great time though did get a bit tired. I got some wonderful shots of the elephants and giraffes. Was glad to see that area, since it will be changed when the new Elephant Odyssey will be opened soon. The giraffes will stay and have more room. Elephant Odyssey is not going to be about Africa etc. It is going to be about decedents or relatives of animals that once roamed over southern California. So there will be elephants, lions, and pronghorns and more.

We saw lots of pronghorns the summer we spent in Wyoming back in 1975. I took lots of photos of them and also painted a landscape with pronghorns from my photos. We stayed in a small travel trailer while E.R. worked out about 30 miles away during the week. While I was painting the picture there was a sandstorm outside and the grit came into the trailer and covered the table. My painting fell over onto the grit and so while it doesn't show, the thing has real Wyoming dirt mixed in with the paint.

I have started the In Focus III class. All about composition. So will see how well I do with that. I love taking photos and have most of my life. I don't know about messages...I have been thinking about that. Mostly my message is showing something I have seen and want to show others. Sometimes it is a scene...like a landscape. Sometimes it is people...my children growing up and then my granddaughter. Sometimes it is about how the light falls on something. I started taking my rose photos for painting reference but it was all about how the light fell on the petals and made them glow in the sunlight. The light is always changing. From day to day and season to season. You might see the perfect view only to have it gone in minutes and not to be seen for months or ever again. After we came back from Wyoming we lived another year in Lakeside and then moved to a little old house in Ramona. Across from our house was an old white water tower with a large palm growing next to it. One day I noticed that the sun fell across the tower and palm in a certain way for only a few minutes in the afternoons. The next day, I set up my camera on a tripod and waited for the sun to move into place. I got several photos and later used one to paint a small oil painting. Later I did a water color of the scene that I loved and then let my sister talk me out of it. Darn. As the season changed the sun moved and the light didn't fall across the water tower anymore in exactly that same way. We moved away from Ramona and in a windstorm the watertower fell. So my old faded snapshots are the only real evidence of, to me, a wonderful scene as it was. My paintings were not exactly like the scene...artistic license changes what we do to real life.

Posted: 03/08/09 11:13:38

Well it still is, though we lost an hour. I hate the time change. It is sudden and messes with our inner time schedule. I think it is what is wrong with the US...everyone has to get used to a new time schedule twice a year. It is totally bad for us. Yesterday we took another trip to Borrego Springs. Hailey and her friend Haley T came with. E.R. drove and I think he drove too fast. We were not over there very long but I did get some nice photos. We saw the other end of Borrego Springs Road where the other metal sculptures are. We saw some last year and wondered what they were for...actually this is the one I saw first.

Standing out in the desert like some sort of Godzilla or something. This year seeing more works and reading about them they make sense. They are like animals that actually walked the floor of the valley back in prehistoric times. Bones of these animals have been found there. This one is a giant sloth. Mother and baby giant sloth.

So many people stop an see the sculptures. I think they are a lot of fun. Yesterday we went up Coyote Canyon a little way. Lots of flowers...quite a few people too. Then when we stopped to see some of the sculptures I found desert lilies. Some of these flowers bloom for such a short time that it is not easy to see them when we only make a couple of trips over there in the spring. I had never photographed the desert lily before.



Jackie and I might drive over again on Friday...

Posted: 03/05/09 08:34:15

It is very wet out this morning and overcast...was it raining? Good for gardens...my husband planted veggies yesterday. We have had warm days the last week or so. On Saturday Jackie, Hailey, and I went over to Borrego Springs with a stop at the Santa Ysabel mission. Jackie's daughter, Jocelyn, wouldn't come with. Typical teenager. My car said the temp was 80 degrees. Not bad for the desert. It wa hotter here the next day. We had breakfast at the Mall...nice restaurant and great food. Then we went to the Visitor's Center at the Park. Lots of people there...not too many photo ops. We drove into town and then out Borrego Springs road to see the metal sculptures.

I hadn't seen these before...they seem new as they are not so rusted. It was great to get some photos before that happens. I had read about these. They were commissioned by the land owner and created by an artist in Perris California. The work is similar to what is done down in Mexico...though there they are recycling the metal. And the works are much smaller. We drove around and I took several photos of the different sculptures.

It is very wet out this morning and overcast...was it raining? Good for gardens...my husband planted veggies yesterday. We have had warm days the last week or so.

On Saturday Jackie, Hailey, and I went over to Borrego Springs with a stop at the Santa Ysabel mission. Jackie's daughter, Jocelyn, wouldn't come with. Typical teenager. My car said the temp was 80 degrees. Not bad for the desert. It wa hotter here the next day.

We had breakfast at the Mall...nice restaurant and great food. Then we went to the Visitor's Center at the Park. Lots of people there...not too many photo ops. We drove into town and then out Borrego Springs road to see the metal sculptures. I hadn't seen these before...they seem new as they are not so rusted. It was great to get some photos before that happens. I had read about these. They were commissioned by the land owner and created by an artist in Perris California. The work is similar to what is done down in Mexico...though there they are recycling the metal. And the works are much smaller. We drove around and I took several photos of the different sculptures.

Am back from driving Hailey and Jocelyn to school. Got the paper and see that wild flowers in Borrego feature on the front page...going back over this weekend for sure.

Posted: 02/26/09 15:24:54

No photos but enjoyed watching the egret visiting our woodpiles. Actually hunting lizards and he got several before flying away. The kestrals flew over too and the humming birds are flying back and forth to the feeder. Would think it was spring all ready. Our trip to Borrego is planned for Saturday morning. I love it over there and always planned to move to the desert when retired. Now am here in Eucalyptus Hills and it is not so bad.

Yesterday I planted five roses. Planted in pots so they can be moved around...know that sounds silly but the only way to get them close to the house. I got started planting roses in pots when I lived at the mini storage. There was nothing but concrete and blacktop surround the place. I brought them all up here when Hailey and I moved. I sometimes get depressed and I let them go for a couple of years. I may not get bored often but I can get really depressed. Part of the reason was my daughter moved back from Colorado with her children. Was supposed to be temporary so bought her a travel trailer to stay in until she found a job and place to live. She left lots of boxes around the trailer and I couldn't water my roses without getting her stuff wet. Then she moved into my little house where ER and Dave lived. They had been renting from my stepmom and were here when I bought the place from the estate. So ER and Dave moved out of the little house and Elizabeth moved in. That meant lots of changes for Hailey and me. Lots of stress. I went back on Prozac. Elizabeth's daughter went back to Oklahoma to live with her father. I miss her but she was not happy here. I love my daughter but she would sometimes stress Megan so much over nonsense that I was glad to see Megan leave. My daughter reminds me a lot of my own mother personality wise.

David is a sweet kind person, but he also is a paranoid schizophrenic. That makes things difficult at times. I admire Hailey so much because she loves and understands her Uncle Dave. It might be hard for some teens to deal with. She just takes it in stride. Anyway I am looking forward to seeing the new roses grow and bloom.

Posted: 02/24/09 19:25:58

Made it to class on Thursday night and Sunday morning. I did miss a lot missing the two classes in Flashworks. Will probably take the class again if I can. I did learn about remote flash. And I got a Wein remote for an old Olympus discontinued flash...a flash that doesn't work for my current camera. What fun. I've also ordered a new flash that has built in remote and I have my smaller flash too. If I get a Wein for it will have three remotes. More fun. I want to go over to the wild flowers this weekend. From what I've seen on the net they are blooming early. Hopefully I will get over there the next weekend too. I never get tired of seeing the wild flowers in Borrego. Well they don't last long enough to get tired of anyway. I used to be able to hike and now am taking a good long look at my weight and thinking I really better do something about it! When I was young my mom would organize a trip to Borrego Springs at least once every spring. Usually Easter Sunday. That is a little late for the seeing the good flowers. We would hike up to the palms in Palm Canyon and enjoy the flowing water. It was like a desert oasis. Over the years it got crowded and not so much fun. Then they had a fire and the palms were fragile...also they had to be roped off to keep the ground from being trampled and the earth packed hard. Bad for the palms. I took a wonderful b/w photo of the palms when I was in highschool. I printed it very large while in my Photography Class at Grossmont. Then matted it for display. I haven't seen that photo is so many years I probably remember it better than it really was. At first I loved the photography class. My mother had taken photography at Grossmont when she went to highschool there. The students had to take turns in the darkroom waiting for the timer to go off so the film could be moved from one tank to another. One of the boys in the class came into the dark room and made a pass at me. At first it was just talk and I told him to leave. He wouldn't! Then he tried to find me to touch me. So I left. I tried to watch who came back to class but too many kids were wondering back and forth. The room with the enlargers was between the classroom and the darkroom. Someone told the teacher I was not in the darkroom. Probably him! So the teacher told me to go back in. I was too embarassed to tell him why I'd left. Then after a few minutes the boy came back into the darkroom. He wouldn't tell me who he was...though I had a pretty good idea...I couldn't say for sure. Anyway I left again and this time I told the teacher and I would never go back in that dark room again. And I never liked being in that class anymore either. Thank goodness it didn't put me off wanting to take pictures.

Posted: 02/18/09 00:21:47

The roses from Valentine's Day are history. Someone on another forum said that they were sick and tired of seeing flower photos. I bet they are younger than I am and I am not tired of seeing flowers or photos of flowers. I've said that I seldom get bored. And it is true. So when people say that they are bored with taking or seeing photos of flowers or landscapes or whatever I feel sad for them. We can find ourselves in boring situations. I sure have...but never taking photos or painting or seeing what there is to see. Being creative is not being bored. Seeing what other people create is not being bored. Maybe some things are less and some more, but that is a judgement made by ourselves or by others. Some criticism can help us grow. Some criticism can kill our souls. We need to know the difference. We look for approval, but in reality we don't need it. Art is like a kaleidoscope that changes and reinvents and keeps on changing. All we need to do is see and we can own the light.

Posted: 02/14/09 11:02:54

White roses for Valentine's day. Feeling a lot better today I went out to take some photos. I set the vase on our brick wall and was happily snapping away when Tuxie came to see what I was doing. She spilled everything. They fell onto a wooded glider. The vase didn't break but three of the roses were broken. They are now floating in a plate.

My mother's younger half brother was born on Valentine's Day. He was named Valentine because his parents argued over what to name him. We called him Uncle Tiny, but he went by Val to his friends. His father was Italian from the old country and married my grandmother when she was a divorcee with three daughters. That didn't turn out to be a happy marriage. My grandmother died when she was 41, and Uncle Tiny joined the Merchant Marine.

He was sixteen. He was on a ship in Dutch Harbor when they were bombed. Over the years of his life he was in several auto accidents and mostly never got a scratch. My mother called him accident prone. Uncle Tiny died in a construction accident when he was 39. He was running a scraper building Interestate 5, and was run over by the back wheels when he fell off the earth mover. The radio called him Valentino when they reported the accident. My aunt was pg with her fourth boy. My husband and I adopted the baby. I always feel a little sad on Valentine's Day.

Posted: 02/10/09 20:20:07

Hailey turned 15 and my daughter got a year older since my last post. We did the last day of the black and white class at the Wild Animal Park. Lots of walking and I was having a hard time keeping up. So on the way out I took my time. I sat and watched the gorillas for awhile and got a couple of pretty good photos of them. I enjoyed my slow walk back to the entrance. Some taking photos and some just sitting and enjoying the surroundings. By the time I got back to the entrance I was feeling good. I need to do more walking. Sunday we started a new class...Flashworks. I really don't like using flash very much so I have a learning curve ahead. I have an external flash for my camera. Actually I bought it for my last camera. I haven't used it more than once or twice. I dug it out and checked it out and realized that it needed batteries...duh! Anyway it wasn't needed on Sunday. We used the popup flash. I don't use that much either. Though I did use it for the black and white Hailey photos. I have a dreadful cold. It wasn't just the cold day on Sunday...I was already coming down sick. So now I don't think I will make the Wednesday night class for flash. Darn. Maybe I will feel better tomorrow...