Existing In BFE

With the temperatures falling a bit this Fall it seemed good to be able hit the walkways of  one of the best nature preserves around here, Sawgrass.  These pictures generally need no comment, so I'll remain quiet.   That last shot was a poor attempt at shooting the wispy webs that seem to stretch all over the place.    I have more shots that, while redundant from other past trips to the place, are still kind of neat.  But those will wait for another day.   

Nothing is all good nor all bad.  Most states have their plusses and minuses.  Illinois is a corrupt bastion of Chicago politics.  Iowa has the Hawkeyes.  Florida is a different breed of state.  It's mostly bad. Hot, stupid and the home of weird.    Hey ladies, get on your high high heels and grab your rifle.  "Stand Your Ground", birthed right here basically means you can shoot anything that moves if you are fearful.   Wal-Mart, home of falling prices, personality-dead check-out clerks and long lines, will cheerfully sell you this dead plant I saw for 50% off.  I don't know if this is a reflection of Wal-Mart or Florida, but since this Wal-Mart was in Florida, its a twofer. In Illinois you swat at flies in your house.  Here, you corral lizards. This driver thought a silly Zombie style tire cover was cute.  At least I hope it was tongue-in-cheek.  But upon further inspection, on the license plate is the Tampa Bay Bucs NFL football l

1.  Neighbor Tim has healed well enough to resume work.  Sherwin-Williams, his many friends in Northlandia and at least one in Florida, and family breathe a sigh of relief.  Now if his Bears could just win a game.  2.  I am a proponent of online banking.  Paying bills on the internet probably saves me close to $40.00 a year in postage.  But there is one thing I don't get.  I use Billpay for a couple of bills from my bank.  We know banks are stingy, blood-sucking parasitic ass worms who are every bit as evil as much as they are tightwads.  Who pays for  Billpay? 3.  I was extremely saddened by Illinois' dropping the Millionaire Raffle from their lotto lineup.  It had become a bit of a tradition with the Wombie and I having our raffle tickets and dreaming of untold wealth.  We never did win anything but found it fun nonetheless.  Pretty good odds, too.  It was something they did twice a year along with St. Patrick's Day.  Hopefully that one is still in the works.   4.  

I am not given to hysterics.  In all my stargazing I have never seen a UFO (well, maybe one).  I have read the calculations of how far an advanced alien civilization would have to come to find us in the vastness of space and have ruled out the possibility. The technology for traveling such distances seems daunting even for the most advanced.  And there is the question of why.  Surely there must be millions of worlds more suitable for whatever they need, and thus, the third question.  If they need something why not take it?  Why just the endless spatial drive-bys?   Anyway, after having had breakfast with the clan at the Egg Platter  I noticed a small round washer driven into the parking lot by a small nail.  I asked if anyone had noticed them before and wondered what it was for.  No one knew.   And then I started to notice them everywhere.      On sidewalks. In roads. In parking lots. Some have been highlighted. OK, l

Back in college, whilst in the bubble of liberalism and free-thinking, I became enamored of three things:  Kahlil Gibran, the Report from Iron Mountain, and Jonathan Livingston Seagull.  All three, hopefully, have faded from the consciousness of past disciples and college campuses. Since I was a sponge seeking to soak up everything, and to echo Holly's "thirst for knowledge" quote, I was particularly susceptible to all forms and types of philosophical-theological thought.   Kahlil Gibran was a Lebanese poet, writer and artist and rather than go into a long tortured biography I will leave it to you to explore on your own if you so choose.  There are probably better ways to spend your time, but I was surprised to see that he is the third best selling poet behind Shakespeare and Lao-Tzu of Chinese fame.  Not so surprising I guess when you corner the Arab and Chinese markets, respectively.    His The Prophet was one of my first purchases when I was a freshman, and

BFE REPORTER THURSDAY My friend and BFE neighbor, Tim, took a series of pictures while traveling on the job a while back.  I forget if he said these were in Iowa or not, but it was early morning and he had just started his day on the road. I thought they were pretty darn good and I think he used his phone camera.  It gave these an ethereal look,  landmarks in the mist.   I'm no expert on cell phone cameras.  Mine takes either very very good ones, or is singularly bad.  There is just so much you can squeeze into a thin sardine tin and still make it commercially viable.  In these pictures I don't know if they are poor which enhances their qualities of mystery, or if they are excellent.  Whichever, these are little mini-canvasses of art - of a mystical landscape that existed for that moment.  Mr. Stage had an eye for the scene, which most of us walk through thinking of other things.   Sometimes we need to detach ourselves from the usua