The Girl Can't Count

Do you know what? I can't count. I forgot a whole day. In fact, the day I forgot was the ACTUAL day 4 of the photo challenge. Prompt: Favorite color.





GREEN! I love green. Green is growth, and life, and spring and summer, and never ending seas of twelve foot tall silken corn stalks in August. Well, most Augusts, but not this one. We've had so little rain here in the parched Midwest, that the corn kinda puttered out around six feet (or less). Breaks my little heart!





Now, because I forgot the REAL day four, that means you're caught up to day six. Day seven was 'something new.' Well, I wanted to take a picture of something new that is ALSO something I love.





Hello, Millie! How on earth this "little" brown dog (we've started saying, "How now, brown cow?" when she comes up begging for food) has decided that the most awesome place ever in the middle of a 103 degree afternoon is on the concrete in the sunshine--I'll never know. She spends half an hour out there, and then when she comes in her "hur" is so hot I can barely pet her. What a nut!








Day eight's prompt was technology. And, for me, this was an incredibly easy one as there are TWO pieces of tech that I love-love-love. One is my iPhone, which I've been using to take pictures. The second is my iPad (slave to Apple--guilty), which I photographed open to my favorite game!






Cut the rope! WOO-HOO! I don't know if you've ever played Cut The Rope, but it is my favorite thing after my husband, doggies, immediate family, a couple of friends, and Baxter the Jeep. The thing is--I'm GOOD at it. And it's challenging, but I can do it--unlike, virtually all other technologically advanced games since Super Mario Brothers on the NES. Yes, I'm that pathetic at gaming. But, then along came Cut The Rope and I feel like it was magically made for me.









Day Nine, that's today! Today's prompt was a 'Faceless Self Portrait.' Again, for me, this seems easy.



Who am I if not a redhead? It's the first thing people say about me when trying to place me for someone else. Kate Dowd/Morrison? She's the redhead. That's me. I'm the redhead. And, with a couple of horrible phases of black hair (one on purpose, one accidental) that's always been me. I hope that'll be me for a very long time, though a lot of redheads lose their luster and start turning brunette around baby-having time. COULD I ever forgive a kid for stealing the copper from my hair? Oooh, I just don't know. I just. don't. know....

Baking Bread and Breaking It

First, because I'm still laboring under the pretense that you might possibly be interested in this photo challenge, pictures from days Three and Four.

Day Three. Prompt: Clouds.









Luckily the Kansas sky was willing to cooperate with my picture-taking agenda. For several days previous we'd had an endless blanket of bright blue. So, thanks for your help, Western Kansas!








Day Four. Prompt: Someone I Love.




Because that husband fellow wasn't cooperating with my photographic needs, I had to turn to a couple of OTHER someones that I love very much!








And today is Day Five. Prompt: Childhood Memories

Well. My childhood is a vast and strange place. A place full of planes that dance through the sky, and giant hulking wrecks that sprout from the ground like rusty weeds. A place where propellers outnumber people roughly 50:1. A place where silence is so revered that Child Bug gets frequently bundled away to another house, a magical place filled with magical people. Old people whose knowledge is boundless, stories mesmerizing, music either twanging and driving like a locomotive or blazing trumpets and howling trombones laced above a harmonic rush of woodwinds and the pushy, playful syncopation of the drums. These old people, endlessly loving, unquestionably supportive, constantly interested in a solitary little girl's ramblings--they are the true heroes of all my best childhood memories. And, because I couldn't take a picture of driving along dirt roads with Grandpa John listening to Johnny Cash, holding hands and imagining that I could see the love flowing from his heart to mine through our intertwined hands--mine so very small and white, his so very big and brown--I turned to my second favorite memory. Baking with my Nannie.

Now, for those of you new to my blog, or perhaps not well acquainted with me, I will tell you now that baking is very, very important to me. It has always been this way. I used to cherish the days when my mother would bake, and I longed to be underfoot when Nannie was kneading dough. I felt a connection, even when I was so young, that I struggle to explain. I could see myself in my mother, in my grandmother, and I pictured their mothers and grandmothers before them--all in a beautiful, flour-covered line that lead right to me. Baking is a thread for me, a life-line to generations past and generations to come. Mostly though, it has become for me the way I honor my grandmother now that she is unable to bake. She is unable to make her own toast now, because she can't remember how.

And so, armed with the memory of standing on a step-stool in Nannie's kitchen, watching her hands disappear into the flour, and emerge sprinkling it like snow on the countertop, and her long fingers pushing into the dough--I began to bake.


Bread. Can you smell it? The house smells like love and flour and butter and happiness. I'll be sharing, don't you worry!

Day Two--The Haitian Revolution and The Rise Of New Orleanian Voodoo

And here is a picture of my voodoo doll:




No! No, I kid. That is the picture for Day Two of the photography challenge.



Today's challenge: What I Wore.

I'm assuming the prompt is referring to what I wore today, and because today is just another day in the life of this writer/student/researcher I got to wear my loungey clothes! And yes, that does make me happy!


As you may have surmised (because you're a very clever reader, I know you are), my morning has been largely spent doing research into the migration of slave owners and their remaining slaves after the revolution on Saint-Domingue (later Haiti) to New Orleans, and Louisiana. Mostly if and how this impacted American slaves in the practicing of their religions throughout the South, and in particular the Mississippi Delta region. Vodou becomes Voodoo, and DOES it spread out like tendrils of smoke from the ruins of Saint-Domingue? And DOES it change and stretch and grow and creep into something new, and strange, and wonderful? Well, for that you'll just have to dig up my doctoral dissertation... when I finish it... which shouldn't be a terribly lot longer.

Bug, you are saying to me, why are you doing all this work if you don't want to be a professor? I don't know. No, that's not true. I do know. On the long list (the ridiculously long list) of things that I do not like, in the top five is "Quitting." That and I'm really, painfully, idiotically stubborn. Probably those two things are related somehow.

And, one day, if I ever finish this thing and they decide to get rid of me by awarding me a doctoral degree, I'll be quite content to open my bakery every morning with a sign that reads: The Doctor Is IN. Or, you know, figure out what it is I want to do that seems also plausible to do. I'm feeling sick just thinking about it.

OH! And SPEAKING of feeling sick:

Dear Main J-City American Food Eatery,
a word, if you please.
WHY ARE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME WITH CHICKEN STRIPS?
A few months ago I ate your chicken strips they were perfect--light, buttery breading with, most importantly, NO PEPPER. Today I decided to order out and--SHOCK! HORROR! BURNING PAIN IN MY MOUTH! Pepper everywhere. I mean, come on fellas! Give a girl a break here! I had an hour for my lunch and you've bloody ruined it. Thanks for the Dr. Pepper, it was the best part of my horrible meal. Henceforth that is all I'll be having at your establishment.

Yours Disgustedly,
Little Bug

Re-Begin

Well, alright then.

I'm back. Things went slightly haywire after a couple of cake-related posts mysteriously disappeared. As I had put quite a lot of time into the posts and felt very happy with them, I really wasn't looking forward to redoing them. So I put it off for a day, and then a week. And all of a sudden a week turned into a month, which turned into quite a few months. My apologies.

Today two things happened. Well, that's not entirely true as quite a lot of things happened today. I'll say this instead: two things significantly blog-related happened today.

One, my Aunt (my only aunt, but she'd be my favorite even if I had bunches) posted to her facebook encouraging people to read my blog. This reminded me that people DO read what I'm writing, and there are actually people who miss it when I go on hiatus.

Two, I was invited to partake in a photography challenge--30 days, 30 prompts, 30 pictures. As the world's worst photographer (no, seriously, I really am), I've decided to use this time to try my very hardest to take the best picture I can... during my lunch break each day. Today's prompt was a self portrait.


So this is me.

Cleverly done (in my humble opinion) to avoid having to put makeup on.

*bows*

Thank you, thank you, I'll be here with no makeup on all week!