Category Archives: Uncategorized

What Would We Do Without Friends? for Johnbo’s Cellpic Sunday

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Click on Photos to Enlarge!

What Would We Do Without Friends?

*From my neighbor Sergio, who interprets confusing Spanish messages from my insurance company for me and

*David (peeking out the door) who along with Sergio shares his latest culinary triumphs with me via care packages sent over from next door,

*to Pepe who has been  coming by weekly for 11 or more years to give me a massage,

*to Brad and Eddie who came to cook me a delicious breakfast a few days ago,

*to my friend Blue who spent the afternoon driving me around on errands yesterday as I am carless while the insurance company holds my car hostage in Guadalajara.,

*to Doug (Forgottenman) who has been sending me links all week long (including this one) to remind me to post to them—

my past week has been filled with the blessings of favors done by friends. Bless them!!!

See Johnbo’s Cellpic Sunday HERE.

Tick-Tock, for The Sunday Whirl Wordle 729

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My Grandmother’s clock

Tick-Tock

Back when there was magic,
before the world was broken,
in my childhood’s comfy nest,
the major language spoken
is remembered as a ghost of words
blown in on a breeze.
Life was one great treasure,
set out for us to seize.

The last war newly over, 
the news of the time
seemed to tell of happenings
peaceful and benign.
No need for bomb shelters
or ICE or interventions.
My childhood passed most peacefully,
mainly free of tensions.

Time seemed to drag on slowly
from birthday to Halloween.
There seemed to be a hundred years
between toddler and teen.
But now that I am 78, life whizzes by as though
it’s making up for all those years when it passed by so slow.
And peace that in my innocence I thought would always last
has become just a memory of an idyllic past.

 

 

 

for The Sunday Whirl 729  the prompt words are: magic back broken nest seems drag news breeze life ghost need tell

What Won’t He Seize Control Over? $300 Million Dollars to Ruin the White House!!!!!!

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The White House Wrecking Ball

President Trump’s demolition of the East Wing has struck a nerve in Washington and beyond.

An excavator, right, reaches toward the East Wing of the White House and claws down part of the structure, which is in a state of near destruction during the demolition.
Demolition this week at the White House.Credit…Alex Kent for The New York Times

By Jess Bidgood

You’re reading the On Politics newsletter.  How Trump is changing Washington, the country and its politics. Get it sent to your inbox.

Wednesday was breezy, bright and autumnal in Washington — the perfect backdrop for a stroll to the White House to watch the swift demolition of the East Wing.

I heard it before I saw it: the thrum of construction equipment and a loud rat-tat-tat that could have been digging or drilling. As I weaved through a group of schoolchildren posing for photographs in front of the main residence, I could see the arms of two excavators bobbing around, too tall to be hidden by the thick white fence erected around the fresh construction site. Behind them, a cloud of dust obscured the clear air.

It wasn’t so long ago that Trump was promising his plan to build a 90,000-square-foot ballroom on the grounds “won’t interfere with the current building.” In fact, my colleague Luke Broadwater reported today that the entire wing, which is historically the domain of the first lady, will be razed in the project, and the price tag would increase to $300 million, $100 million more than initially estimated.

Images of the demolition, which began on Monday, have rocketed around the globe, swiftly becoming political fodder and a perfect Rorschach test for a deeply polarizing presidency.

“This is Trump’s presidency in a single photo,” wrote Senator Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat, on X, above a picture showing roof tiles and windowpanes cascading from the facade of the wing, having fallen victim to the excavators’ jaws. “Illegal, destructive, and not helping you.”

The project has left historians and architects deeply alarmed. The National Trust for Historic Preservation on Wednesday urged officials to pause until it could go through the “legally required public review process.” Last week, Trump seemed to suggest to donors that “no approvals” were required for the project.

Trump’s allies insist that the images show a president shaking up Washington, just like he promised. In a sign of awareness that they could not entirely ignore the criticism of the project, though, administration officials called the uproar “manufactured outrage” in a release that detailed other renovations on the building over the years.

“He’s the builder-in-chief,” the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said brightly on Fox News on Tuesday. “In large part, he was re-elected back to this People’s House because he is good at building things.”

Trump, ever the developer, has certainly spent a lot of time building things at the White House. He paved over the lawn in the Rose Garden to create a patio. He has added gold filigree to the Oval Office and ornate chandeliers to the Cabinet Room, remaking the White House with an indelible imprint of Mar-a-Lago maximalism that is all but certain to outlast his presidency.

Image

An image of the White House showing the five areas that Trump is changing.

Hello, NaPoWriMo

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If it’s April, it must be:

Hello, NaPoWriMo

Good morning, NaPoWriMo, and good night.
Whether I have written or will write,
you tend to fill my day with obligation
for rhymed and metered concentration.
Social engagements––a thing of the past.
No time for conversation and repast
except for sandwiches and coffee quickly quaffed
in glow not candlelight (but just as soft)
that shines from my computer screen
from morn till night, with no relief between
as I strain for yet another rhyme.
For this is how I spend my time,
NaPoWriMo! With fourteen days to go,
it is impossible to just say, “No.”
No matter how I yearn to just resume my life––
to end these rhymes with which my days are rife––
I have to finish what I started
lest I be branded fickle-hearted.
I read somewhere that half the poets who first committed
to write a poem a day have by now quitted
the task they took an oath to do;
but still a few
plod on with me. We’ll never meet,
though we walk down the same blank path with metered feet.
Perhaps one day we’ll meet in poetry heaven or hell
knowing we did this task completely if not well!

In conclusion, I have heard
That in Hawaii, there’s one word
that means both hello and good bye.
It means love, affection, adios and hi!
That word, “Aloha,” covers all from dark to light;
and so, Aloha, NaPoWriMo, and good night!

For dVerse Poets, the prompt is “Make up your own name for a micro season.”

The Numbers Game #95. Please Play Along! Oct 20, 2025

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Welcome to “The Numbers Game #95”. Today’s number is 217. To play along, go to your photos file folder and type that number into the search bar. Then post a selection of the photos you find that include that number and post a link to your blog in my Numbers Game blog of the day. If instead of numbers, you have changed the identifiers of all your photos into words, pick a word or words to use instead, and show us a variety of photos that contain that word in the title. This prompt will repeat each Monday with a new number. If you want to play along, please put a link to your blog in comments below. Here are my contributions to the album.

***Click on  Photos to Enlarge and View as Gallery.***

half-and-half, off-and-on
Sisters, Tucson
Some denizens of my garden are fauna, not flora. This colorful insect is a large cow-killer ant (actually a female wingless wasp with a very painful bite, thus the name.)
Another day, another finger injury

Art Show Finery for Cellpic Sunday

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Some photos taken at the Artists of Lake Chapala Show yesterday. Lots to look at in addition to the art!!!

For Cellpic Sunday

I must pose an indelicate question….

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With all of these nationwide No Kings rallies..up to 200,000 strong, what do folks do when they need a restroom? Were portapotties provided? Must have been a formidable task…

“Bad Sport” for SOCS

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Bad Sport

I don’t do sports, nor watch them, either.
A one block jog? I’d need a breather.
At volleyball, I don’t excel.
Touch football is a sort of hell.
For passing time, by hook or crook,
Jog on alone. I’ll read a book!!!

The Stream of Consciousness Prompt for Oct 18 is “Hook.”

Poolside Picnic

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Click on photos to enlarge.

Lately, my water delivery has begun any time from midnight to 5:30 A.M.  I drain the hot tub and remove about 1/3 of the water from the pool the day before as by then the water is cold.  It streams into my cistern to be used for watering the garden and spare lot/sculpture garden below (no water wasted) and the nearly boiling-hot thermal water from Colima vocano 80 miles away comes streaming into my pool and hot tub to cool down a bit so I can actually make use of it by evening or the next morning.

Today I got up at 5:30 when I heard it streaming in. By 8, I noticed the hot tub was full and running over into the pool and when I went down to turn off the water, I noticed dozens of tiny black ants swarming over the 2-foot wide surface of the edging around the pool. Unable to see the purpose for their swarming, I nonetheless was able to see that a number of wasps were also swooping down to the stone surround. Then I realized that the wasps were actually feeding on the ants!  I ran in to get my phone to take photos to document this surprising event, but alas, when I returned, only ants remained. No wasps.  I then returned to the house to try to find something on the internet to back up what I’d viewed and Meta Al informed me that:

Yes, some wasps eat small black ants, while others do not. Some wasps are predators that hunt and eat insects, including ants, which can be a protein source for their larvae. However, other species are either parasitoids that lay eggs inside ants, or they may attack ants defensively when competing for resources, rather than eating them. (Info derived from AI)

“Boogaloo” and Other Mysteries Solved, for Fibbing Friday

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(Image created with help from AI)

The Fibbing Friday task-at-hand is:

1. Why is there no ‘three quarters back’ in American Football (you have a quarterback, halfback and full back) ? Because you already have one quarterback. It would redundant to have  two more.
2. What is a stickleback? A French back-scratcher.
3. What is a boogaloo? Quarters for an Eskimo ghost.
4. What is Victoria’s Secret? Falsies.
5. What is in a Victoria sandwich? Coins kept in a tiny coin purse tucked into her cleavage.
6. What is the secret of the Black Magic Box? All of its magic leaked out long ago.
7. Why do mice squeak? Not enough oil in the cheese.
8. Where will you find a TRV? Usually, right after a TOPSY.
9. What is a Demo? Someone who didn’t vote for Trump.
10. What is a toadstool? A poorly-placed stool often run into in the dark. Ouch!