First Blood

 

It was going to happen some day; Robin actually caught- and killed!- an animal. Robin chases everything: squirrels, birds, leaves, shadows... seemingly she is a born hunter. (*1) But despite many heroic attempts at catching anything, it has taken Robin almost six years to achieve the status of Official Hunter.

She had been pursuing the above rodent (a shrew.. similar to mice and moles and voles) for several days. It apparently lived in the patch of lirope beneath the Tiger Eye Sumac. Certainly, it attracted her attention whenever she was in the vicinity. 

She finally nailed it one day last week and proceeded to "play" with it and one last toss in the air dispatched it to the Great Shew Beyond. (*2) However, once it was dead, a look of anguish seemed to cross her face. She sat and stared at it and all I can say is she seemed to experience some sort of existential remorse. Bob noticed this, too. (*3) Robin was no doubt analyzing the impermanence of life and considering what happens "afterwards". It affected her profoundly!

This is how Robin typically hunts. She up ends her toy box- which need frequent replacement as she chews the box apart as sport- and selects one toy to terrorize. (By the way, she totally ignores that pink camouflage alien in the front of the picture. Not sure why) She then shakes it and tosses it and eviscerates it.

Look at that face! You would never know that I had just spent twenty minutes performing surgery on this poor thing. Robin promptly pulled it's nose off, stuffing every where! I don't think she experiences and remorse about "killing" stuffed animals. I'm sure she knows the difference.

Although who knows? Maybe now that our little angel has tasted blood, and contemplated the loss of life, she'll reconsider her approach to hunting artificial game. She does look a bit contrite in the picture above...

(*1) And you would expect this as both her parents were field hunting dogs. You will perhaps recall that her mother, Chloe, was a Long Haired Weimaraner and her father, Gunnar, was a Llewellyn English Setter. 

(*2) I'm really glad she killed it as our previous dog Ricky used catch things but never figured out how to kill them. I followed her around with a shovel, finishing off what she had started. It was not the most fun I've ever had!

(*3) Yes, I know: many will find it anthropomorphizing and "inappropriate" to assign "human" emotions to dogs, but believe me, Robin the Good seemed bummed and confused.

Already Waiting for Spring

 

I don't know about you, but I'm ready for spring.The days have been getting shorter and darker, I'm still in a state of continual re-adjustment to the time change and suddenly it's cold. But tell that to the above primroses. These flowers are usually a tell-tale sign that spring has arrived; these crazy plants seem to bloom all year long. It's November, it's 23 degrees over night and they're like, "Perfect weather!" The kicker is that they came from Stop and Shop or Shop Rite- yes, I guess the variety is Super Market Mix. I buy them (marked down, of course!) in February so as to have color in the house and then plant them outdoors when spring finally arrives. Originally I thought we'd get a season's flowers and then they'd die but boy did I get a tremendous surprise when they came back, year after year. Truly perennial! 

I've got quite a few of them now. Last year, they were blooming in the snow so go figure: they must be some new mutant variety dreamed up in some horticulturist's perverse lab. But they're pretty and cheap so you gotta love them!

Okay but the main reason for my post is that I finally planted all the bulbs I bought:

As I've said before, bulbs are great; if you plant them and if they don't come up, no big deal! No one knows you wasted your time and money on them... not like some fancy-pants, over-priced perennial that looks swell at the nursery but immediately withers and dies when installed in your garden. So I planned on obtaining some bulbs. I have a spot where I plant tulips every year and then yank them to plant annuals. (Most tulips being not-too-perennial but soooooo lovely!) While bob and I were in Vermont recently, switching out his remarkable sculptures, I requested that we visit the Bennington Home Depot to see if they had marked down bulbs. Yes they did! And good colors! So for 50% off, I got Pink Impression and a beautiful mix called "Pride" (purples and pinks and reds). Also a bag of deep blue hyacinths for the Blue Garden.

I didn't stop there, however. Enthused by my luck and lured by the sales from nurseries that filled up my email in-box, I ordered petite miniature daffodils (Jack Sprite and Tete-a-Tete) and aliums (Bulgaricum and Christophii) and more tulips! Just you wait 'til next spring! Our gardens are going to be jumping! (*1)

(*1) I was fortunate that I encountered several warm sunny days to stagger around our vast estate, pushing a wheel barrow full of assorted bulbs, looking for spots to tuck them all in. It wouldn't have been fun had it been as cold as it was this morning!

The Junque man Cometh

 

Or go-eth! Poor Bob! He lived for almost twelve years with this ridiculous hot tub outside of his studio door. Not only was it an eyesore but it is/was big, heavy and well... an eyesore. When we first looked at the house- lo! these many years ago, the hot tub was on the rotting back deck, off the living room. When we came to inspect the house for our closing walk-through, it was gone. Somehow, the previous owner had hauled this monstrosity down to most recent location, by Bob's studio door. 

To be honest, I never entertained the idea of taking pictures of the hot tub in situ because it wasn't exactly photogenic. I knew how badly Bob wanted to get rid of it, though. He entertained several options- none easy- because this thing was massive and made of all manner of nastiness, including fiberglass and spray insulation. He debated making a "heat grabber" for his studio but the size and shape were unworkable. Friends suggested simply dragging it off into the woods, where it probably would have resided for eternity.

(Don't ask: I was simply photographing "hose arabesques".) Bob decided his best course of action was to haul that sucker away to the dump. Bob spent several days deconstructing the monstrosity and revealing all sorts of weird insulation, pipes, wood frame complete with nails... just awful stuff. Our good friend Joe agreed to come over and assist Bob in the heroic undertaking of getting it up onto the truck and help get it to the dump. It proved to be no small task as the unwieldy shape of the tub resisted being loaded and kept sliding back off the truck, and there was no way to lift it up as it was too heavy. (I wisely missed observing all of this fun,leaving it to the men folk to figure the logistics out.) Bob and Joe finally resorted to sawing the fiberglass body in half and then loading it on. 

Off to the dump it (finally!) went. A loud cheer was heard through out the land as Bob was free of the burden of the accursed hot tub. Additionally, Bob discovered he had a whole new area of open space beside his back door. Victory was his!

Big 33

 

Hey look! The basil finally got zapped by a (rather late) frost! That mean that Bob ad I celebrated yet another trip around the sun together. Yes, 33 years of un-anniversary. In a nod to non-tradition, Bob makes an attractive (!?!!) arrangement of the deceased, now rotting basil.

I haven't much more to say than I can think of no one else I'd rather spend a year in COVID lock down with; we had fun! Now on to another 33... of course that's make me 98 and Bob 101 or something so I don't know if that's a good idea. 

So, yes, I look forward to this next year. Hopefully, we can crawl out of our quarantine isolation and once again show art in real spaces and maybe even risk taking a train into NYC to see some art. But let's just get through the upcoming winter first!

Politics as Usual

 

I hope it is easy enough to read ("Eat The Rich"). I photographed it quickly and the bottom is darker than the top, which made the letters harder to read. Obviously, the name of this piece is "A Modest Proposal". Possibly the rich are tough and stringy as they mostly seem to be pretty scrawny (*1), but this could solve some of the dilemmas facing our country at present. The President's (*2) proposed budget keeps shrinking as filibuster and renegade Democrats refuse to fucking raise taxes on the hideously wealthy and meanwhile "we the people" are still reeling from the pandemic and want free college and expanded health care, baby! So tax the rich and then eat them. I wouldn't miss Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos one bit...

My work is morphing from the last president's constant infuriating idiocy compelling me to immortalize his bizzarre rants(*3) to more measured ravings on my part about income equality and social justice. I should be busy for quite some time to come, as none of the societal ills we're plagued with are in danger of being solved any time soon. Call me a Socialist but I'd like to see some redistribution of wealth. (*4)

See what I mean? Plenty of raw material to go around! I know some philistines wondered where my work would go after "He Who's Name Shall Not Be Mentioned" (Thanks Stephen Colbert!) was expelled from the White House, but he was a symptom of some of these persistent dilemmas. Hell, COVID is still as major factor in our daily lives (whether many people would like to ignore this or not!), things are hardly "back to normal" and I'm still on unemployment. What kind of crazy job do I want to risk my life for? I'm content to make art and cause trouble. Revolution now, baby!

(*1) I think they're thin because they have private, at-home chefs that fed them exclusive omelettes comprised of egg whites and kale. And then their personal trainers boot-camp their sinewy muscles and force them to do a thousand squats. 

(*2) And for god's sake, how can Biden's current rating be lower than the Orange Buffoon's ever was?!??! I ask you?!?!? Things are a slow-go for Biden (again: filibuster, recalcitrant turn-coat Democrats in thrall to big money and obstructionist rethuglicans. I don't agree with everything Biden presents, but he's waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyy better than The Orange Menace- even on a bad day!!

(*3) Remember "Person, Woman, Man, Camera, TV"?!?!? Here's my piece "Cognitively There" for old times sake:

(*4) Of course this reminds me of the time that Bob and I were driving home from Home Depot (where we had gone in pursuit of N 95 face masks) when a man in a pick-up pulled next to us and- no doubt admiring our Bernie Sanders bumper sticker- screamed "Socialism Sucks" as he roared away. I assume he doesn't like, oh, I don't know, hospitals and schools and roads and libraries and fire departments and Social Security...

 

A Pleasant Diversion

 

I promise! This is a nice posting full of the colors of autumn; no blood-engorged ticks, or ailing animals. Just pleasing fall color... It all started when Bob bought the lovely chrysanthemum pictured above. Stupendous! It brightened our doorway and replaced the blown-by flowers of summer...

As I gazed on that delightful chrysanthemum, I realized that straight ahead was a maple tree, blazing the same orange color...

And all along the top of our fence was the exact same shade of orange! I was surrounded by the brilliance of fall! (*1)

Close up of those dangerously beautiful leaves! And lastly, as I walked back to the house, I spied the burnished orange of the tall marigolds in our large container:

It seems to be the color of this season, alright! And I for one welcome all the burning brilliance I can imagine as all too soon, we'll have the whiteness of frost and snow.

(*1) The discerning among you will correctly identify that last flaming plant atop the fence as (yes!) poison ivy! This is why I come down with it every couple of weeks; we're immersed by it. But you do have to admit that it's got glorious fall color!

A Strange Post (Aren't They All?!)

 

I admit to being not the worlds most organized individual. Paperwork and almost anything that smacks of bureaucracy sends me scrambling in the opposite direction. This is why I frequently find myself procrastinating and creating vast piles of paper and odd folders full of random (often not-completely read) medical forms, insurance brochures, Chinese restaurant menus and the like.You can only imagine the "fun" that I've had attempting to decode the vast quagmire that is Medicare...

So the illustrations presented here are bleak evidence. These pages of cryptic scrawlings are reside next to the "home phone". (*1) Bob and I are both guilty of haphazardly adding to whatever chaotic piece of paper is lying atop the pile. Messages from friends, potential toppings for pizza, passwords to various accounts, hastily scribbled notes attempting to understand the arcane instructions delivered by a  computer servicing representative, phone numbers of government offices... you get the idea. Boy, do they make for one big indecipherable tangle! 

Here's a particularly fine example, looking for all the world like a Cy Twombley shopping list. (*2) Sometimes, we are actually able to find the number or name that has etched it's way onto the latest top sheet. Occasionally, we're not so lucky. (*3) 

Right now, we have stack I modestly estimate to be thirteen or fourteen sheets thick. At a mysterious level that I have not been able to anticipate, one of us (typically Bob) decides to "go through it" and two piles emerge: a "his" and "hers". Bob identifies a few bits of data salient to him, and the rest gets floated towards me. I then (very carefully) re-shuffle the heap and place it in one of my folders. Pity my poor archivist!

(*1) Yes, we still have this arcane communication device. Soon it will be worthy of a place in a museum.

(*2) For those of you unfamiliar with the name Cy Twombley, he was a mid-20th-Century artist that, well, scribbled all over his canvases. Someone had to do it!

The above isn't even his scribbly-est!!

(*3) But generally, two or three weeks after the information was needed, the now out-dated and useless number or password reemerges as the stack of papers is shuffled.