Ruby Tuesday

Take a look at our new badge for Ruby Tuesday. I hope you like it and use it.

I desaturated the photo then used the erase filter to bring back the RED of the roses. what did you do for Ruby Tuesday?

You'll find Mr. Linky below.

Shadow Shot Sunday

A leaf and shadows at Greenwood Cemetery, Brooklyn, NY

Fascinating Book Covers

A cup of tea is the most ordinary thing in the world, yet Zen changes it into an extraordinary experience. The tea ceremony is an example of how to bring a different quality of awareness to one of the simplest acts in life. Osho shows how the art of tea is a form of meditation in this beautifully designed box contains a l44-page book, illustrated with forty pages of colour, along with a beautiful set of two tea cups and a bamboo mat.

Framed for sale at my Etsy shop

Yard Art on Thursdays and Happy Thanksgiving!

I found this pretty little girl sitting in the front yard of a home in Whitestone, NY. I felt the need to colorize her clothes in various pastels. What do you think?

My wish for you on Thanksgiving! Enjoy good food, good friends and family!

Wordless Wednesday

Ruby Tuesday

The RED side door of Grace Episcopal Church in Whitestone, NY and some extraordinary shadows!

I'm a little late this afternoon but here I am! I'm hoping you'll come around and sign Mr. Linky to show me you're playing this week!

Also I'm working on a new Ruby Tuesday badge...

Fly No More

Well, this is it. I'll never fly again (unless it's absolutely necessary).

I refuse to walk through scanners or be subjected to a "grope" down so that I might fly. It's too bad, I used to love going to other countries or states to visit beautiful sights or my relatives.  But no more.

We have been manipulated into standing for such security manoevers by the TSA that involve nude body scans and extensive pat downs by TSA officials using their fingers and palms.

We have been frightened into accepting such actions because we think it will make us safer.  I must agree with Benjamin Franklin who said:

He who gives up freedom for safety deserves neither.  

Who gave the TSA the go ahead on this? I don't know, I think they are acting on their own. 

Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda have won. They've scared the bejesus out of us.  We believe we have to be afraid, very afraid of the terrorists. We've had a few little incidents since 911 (and they are little compared to 911) but we've kept up the hysteria so everyone allows this crap to continue.

We have to refuse to fly any more until this is stopped.

A New York City lawmaker on Thursday introduced legislation to prohibit the TSA from using its advanced body scanners at New York airports, including JFK, the busiest international airport in the country.

Critics of the screening have already called for a National Opt-Out day on Nov. 24, traditionally the busiest travel day of the year, to protest the scans, and privacy groups like the Electronic Privacy Information Center are seeking a federal court order to halt the use of the scanners.


But if the scanning is halted, then what, "grope" downs become commonplace?

U.S. Representative Jason Chaffetz, Utah, has been quoted as saying, “I want to have as much safety and security on an airplane. I fly every week. But there comes a point in which in the name of safety and security we overstep that line and have an invasion of privacy. This happens to be one of those invasions of privacy.”

 The letter below, which is addressed to Sen. Amy Klobuchar, of Minnesota, was posted by James Fallows and used with permission of the author, James Ehrler of Stanchfield, MN.:

 Let's be clear, explosives have destroyed aircraft, as I well know. And they have been smuggled onto aircraft by the shoe bomber and the underwear bomber. But let's note a few things. First, because of the change in passenger and crew responses neither of the smuggled on-the-person bombers succeeded. Second, the amount of explosive that can be smuggled on-the-person is limited. Third, aircraft, while vulnerable, are not made of glass. As the Aloha "topless" incident demonstrates, they can withstand a large amount of damage and still fly. There have also been many incidents of cargo doors coming open, engines disintegrating and causing holes, etc. where the aircraft has been able to land safely. Fourth, the most devastating bombings have not been caused by bombs on persons, but in cargo holds (see Pan Am 103). It is easier to pack a large amount of explosives into suitcases than on a person so intensive scanning of the luggage/cargo makes perfect sense.

For all these reasons, while bombs on the person are a concern, they should not so concern us that we are unwilling to make reasonable judgments about what threats and responses are appropriate.... Stepping back, if I were to tell you that 30,000 people were dying every year in the air you would be appalled and demand something be done. I can already hear the calls that, "Whatever the 4th amendment says, we need to strip search every passenger to stop the bloodshed."

Now, obviously, this is not happening in the air but it is happening on the roads *every year*. And we *can* stop that bloodshed! How? By limiting vehicles to no more than 10mph. ... Yet we, as a society, are *not* willing to do that because we *are* willing to make cost/benefit tradeoffs.

Fascinating Book Covers

Secret Rendezvous by Kobo Abe

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: July 9, 2002
• Genre: Fiction

Design info:

• designer: Ned Drew
• designer: John Gall
• Typeface: Alternate Gothic 

When I saw this book cover I wondered why the designers would decide to decorate the book with the back end of a horse. And then I read this blurb at Amazon:

From the acclaimed author of Woman in the Dunes comes Secret Rendezvous the bizarrely erotic and comic adventures of a man searching for his missing wife in a mysteriously vast underground hospital.
From the moment that an ambulance appears in the middle of the night to take his wife, who protests that she is perfectly healthy, her bewildered husband realizes that things are not as they should be. His covert explorations reveal that the enormous hospital she was taken to is home to a network of constant surveillance, outlandish sex experiments, and an array of very odd and even violent characters. Within a few days, though no closer to finding his wife, the unnamed narrator finds himself appointed the hospital’s chief of security, reporting to a man who thinks he’s a horse. With its nightmarish vision of modern medicine and modern life, Secret Rendezvous is another masterpiece from Japan’s most gifted and original writer of serious fiction.

Yard Art on Thursdays

I found the fountain hanging on the wall of someone's house in my neighborhood and the tree with the face (missing an eye) in the yard of the same.

I think the fountain is pretty but the tree is a bit scary, no?

Join us for Yard Art this week won't you?

Wordless Wednesday

 

Ruby Tuesday

Grace Episcopal Church, Whitestone, NY

"There is beauty in such simplicity."

                                                               ~ mtomaselli

HAPPY RUBY TUESDAY

Strong Shadows

Such perfect shadows on a very sunny day. The weeping willow made me stop and then... there were the shadows.

Tracy is the host of Shadow Shot Sunday

Fascinating Book Covers

So how's this book cover? Kudos to the publisher and the cover designer! All the bright colors catches your eye! And that title - WOW!

Budnitz (Flying Leap; If I Told You Once) creates her own hybrid brand of stark, dystopian reality in this impressive collection, working an odd jumble of fantastical, historical and contemporary detail into stories that comment obliquely on the current state of human affairs.

What have you got for us today?

Yard Art on Thursdays

A little Buddha meditating in the same garden as the big Buddha I posted last week.

I haven't gone back to look at the garden to see how it's coming along. I hope I get back there by next week.

Christmas card on Etsy

Is it too early to show you one of my Christmas cards for sale on Etsy?  Inside it says:

"May Peace be your gift at Christmas and your blessing all year through"

Ruby Tuesday

 

Did I ever post this lovely French girl here for Ruby Tuesday before? She was sweet enough to stop and pose, can you imagine that?

Let's see what you've posted for Ruby Tuesday.

Sign Mr. Linky so we know who's stopped by...Thanks!

Would you visit a post that I wrote last Friday/Saturday called "Fascinating Book Covers," and see if you'd like to join in... I'd love to have you.

Sunset in Port Washington

Sunset in Port Washington, Long Island

Shadow Shot Sunday

Tracy is the host of Shadow Shot Sunday. Visit Hey Harriet to see all the participants in this meme.