SHADOW SHOT SUNDAY #45

Sunday has arrived and time to post my shadow shots. In case you have trouble guessing the first shot than the second will supply the answer.



Have you got the answer?

Sun shining through the blinds and leaving stripes on the drapes.

Hope you all have a great Sunday.

For more great shadow shots click the camera badge to visit Hey Harriet and join in the fun.

Photo Hunt --- Hands

Saturday is upon us and it is a cold and very rainy day in my part of Missouri. Fortunately, for me I have my blogs to keep me busy. I came across this meme called Photo Hunters where you post original photos on a weekly theme each Saturday. Today's theme is hands. Having never joined this meme before I did not know what to expect and since it has hundreds of followers I figured I would have a tough time trying to be unique, so I decided to just post all the hands that we met last Wednesday while the Old Salt and I were out running our errands.

First we had to get the oil changed in the car so we met Bob, the manager. Joe the mechanic and Rebecca the cashier.


Then we took a lunch break were Angie made our sandwich. Carol was in line if front of us and she had just come from the hospital where she had surgery on her arm. Randy was behind me in line and seemed very relaxed about the long wait.



This is me waiting at the dentist office followed by Jane who was in the next chair and was nice enough to let me photograph her tension and next is the receptionist Donna. Last is my dentist Kim working on Jane.










Next we have the Old Salt as he gears up to work on our bathroom redo followed by both of our hands showing solidarity.

To join in the fun or just enjoy all the hand shots visithttp://tnchick.com/

Theme Thursday--- Mineral

Welcome once again to Theme Thursday. This weeks theme is mineral. Not surprising considering it follows after animal and vegetable. I picked the mineral calcite which is the main ingredient in limestone. Limestone is my home state of Missouri's most abundant commercial mineral. It was created 320-500 million years ago by the deposition of calcium and magnesium on ocean floors. Almost all limestone formations in the state contain fossils of animals that lived in the ocean, providing evidence of the interesting land-sea changes which this part of the country has undergone in the geologic past.

I live in a small country town. The nearest freeway is a ten-mile drive along a narrow two-lane road. The road travels through areas cut into limestone bluffs. The cuts give you a feeling of driving through a natural gorge in an ever changing array of browns, reds and oranges. For months now the highway department has been working to expand those limestone canyons to create a new five-lane highway. While slowing our drive to the freeway, the roadwork has allowed us to watch as new cliffs of limestone are exposed to the sunlight after millions of years in darkness. Huge amounts of Missouri limestone are being removed during this expansion to find its way into other uses.


Limestone's unique physical and chemical properties allow it to have many uses. Hundreds of beautiful, historic structures in Missouri were built with it, including Daniel Boone's home, the Old St. Louis Cathedral near the Arch, and even the State Capitol Building! Limestone is mined in 92 of Missouri's 114 counties, and the industry employs more than 2,500 people with a combined payroll of more than $70 million. More than 75 million tons of crushed limestone products are produced in Missouri each year -- roughly 10 tons for each resident. Today, it has extensive use as one of the raw materials in Portland Cement. Specialty uses include the manufacturing of pharmaceuticals, toothpaste, paint, paper, caulking and glass. Common antacids are virtually 100% finely-ground limestone. Farmers use limestone to neutralize acidity in their soils. Counties use crushed limestone to provide an all-weather driving surface on unpaved roads. However, it is most commonly used as construction aggregate.

In our area there are many caves that have been left behind in the limestone bluffs from the mining of limestone. One of them recently made the world news when its owners offered it for sale on ebay. This particular 15,000 sq. ft. cave in Festus, Mo, was formerly used as a roller-rink and concert venue that entertained the MC5, Ike and Tina Turner and Ted Nugent. It has been converted into a three bedroom home. Check it out here
http://blog.foreclosure.com/2009/02/cave-house-for-sale-on-ebay-to-avoid-foreclosuren-missouri

To see more of the posts on minerals or to join the fun visit Theme Thursday
http://themethursday.com

Ruby Tuesday--Behind the red door

Welcome to the latest edition of Ruby Tuesday where we try to capture that perfect touch of red in our camera lenses. Just down the block from my home is a building that the Old Salt and I often walk past on our nightly romps around town. I just love the colors of the door and often wonder what use to be in the building because it has a window that seems out of place. Seldom do we see anything but the young boys heading into their martial arts class. But, recently I thought I saw something unusual and started snapping pictures as I approached the sidewalk. So, my entry this week comes with a question? Can you make out what is hiding behind the red door?

We are a bit too far away at this point.

Is this a little better?
NO? Perhaps this will help.

Have you figured it out now. Hiding behind the Red door is a very cute little girl with a RED telephone

To visit more Ruby Tuesday entries or to join the fun visit Mary's blog at WORK OF THE POET http://workofthepoet.blogspot.com/

Shadow Shot Sunday #44

Oh! How the time flies when you are playing more than one photo meme. The old clock on my desk tells me ten thousand and eighty minutes have passed since last Sunday. That means it is time once again to post my Shadow Shots. My shot this week is of one of my favorite things.



The cause of this shadow is the frame of our deck canopy holding my wind chime

The author of the following certainly captured how I feel about the sound of chimes. I have had several near my kitchen window in every home I have lived in and I have always left them behind when I moved hoping the new occupants would enjoy them as much as I did. Regrettably, the Old Salt does not feel as I do about them so, now we have just this one perfectly tuned chime that he chose.

Wind Chimes
By Dorothy K. Fletcher

The sound usually comes to me on the soft Florida breezes, but in the spring that sound almost comes in blasts as the winds roar through the trees--my neighborhood--my wind chimes.

I can't even remember who gave me my first set of wind chimes--who first set my heart soaring with the magical tinkling sound that they made, but I suspect that it was my father. I believe that he brought them home to me from Japan that he had visited when he was serving in the Navy in the Korean War.

These wind chimes were made of a handful of glass pieces about the size and shape of microscope slides. Each had been cheerfully painted with red and white paint by a worker somewhere in the Orient. The pieces were then strung from little strings from concentric circles of red bamboo. Then we hung them from the ceiling of a corner in our screen porch. I was truly mesmerized by the sound these little wind chimes made. It was such a happy sound, unless, of course, a thunderstorm threatened. Then the sound became a little hysterical, and I worried that they might disintegrate on the spot. They never did, though, until we moved. Then they mysteriously went the way of all "things lost" during great migrations.

When we moved to Florida, I discovered a new kind of wind chime, ones made of beach shells. These chimes were usually strung with strings of mollusk shells suspended from an interesting piece of driftwood. I would like to think that the natives made these chimes indigenous to Florida, but more than likely they too were made in Japan.

Although these chimes did not produce the same sound as my first set, the sound they made was still delightful. They were cheerful in timbre and tone, and their earth colors and origins made for a sixties kind of back-to-Mother-Earth-mentality that I was beginning to espouse back in those days. Whatever happened to these chimes, I don't remember. More than likely they are in a box in the attic along with my bell-bottoms and dashiki shirt and are best left to the past.

My most recent set of wind chimes was made of metal pipes of varying lengths. Supposedly, these pipes were carefully designed by Buddhist monks to create tones that are soothing to the soul. Since I got this set of chimes at Ace Hardware, I seriously doubt my soul was a factor in their design. I have to admit, though, that listening to them sing in the breeze while I sip my iced tea in the summer or a mug of hot cocoa in the winter has been most soothing to my sensibilities.

Of course, I probably am one of those obnoxious neighbors that Ann Landers' readers write about, ones who keep the neighbors up all night with their eccentricities--like wind chimes. What I have noticed about the chimes that hang right outside of my bedroom window is that they have just become a part of the sounds of life out there. They have become like a mantle clock or those grandfather clocks that chime every hour on the hour. At first they keep the family up all night with their noise, but then, as time passes, they become part of the surroundings. Unless a person makes an effort to hear them, he or she usually doesn't.

I guess it is my soul that listens to the wind chimes now. My conscious self rarely hears them anymore, except when the wind really kicks up. Then I am flooded with a variety of wonderful impressions that will surely make me see to it that wind chimes hang always in the corners of my life.

For more great shadow shots click the camera badge to visit Hey Harriet and join in the fun.

Round Robin Photo Challenge --- The Old Place

I recently learned about the Round Robin Photo Challenge, a twice monthly photo meme where challenge topics are chosen from a pool of suggestions contributed by the challenge participants. I found the topics to be exciting and decided to participate. This weeks challenge is to post a photo of someplace that's been around 50 years or more.

I have chosen as my challenge the Quonset Hut. I supose the Quonset Hut could be considered a thing instead of a place. But, since most of the ones still around actually have an address I think that justifies calling them a place. I became attracted to Quonset Huts many years ago after reading an article on how the buildings were ingeniously converted into all types of uses after WW-ll . I began to notice one or two everywhere I traveled. Then my parents moved their business into a building on Old Route 66 and directly across the street sat two Quonset Huts. Before long I had located two more in the area on that same famous old road. That was over thirty years ago and until recently all of them contained a thriving business. Sadly, only one is still going strong today.

This hut was used as a restaurant for as long as anyone can remember. It was the first to close up shop and is now for sale. Back when I was in the restaurant business my place was just down the road a short way and this was my biggest competitor for the early morning breakfast business. I still think I made the better biscuits and gravy though.


These are the two that sit across the street from my mother. The owner died a few weeks ago, but, he lived in the smaller hut for over fifty years. Until his retirement he operated a machine shop out of the larger hut.



The only hut still in operation is Phil's Bar-b-Que. Phil added the brick fire pit and opened his restaurant 26 years ago. Before that it had contained a auto repair shop and another restaurant. It has been in continuous operation for sixty years.

Per Wikipedia: A Quonset hut is a lightweight prefabricated structure of corrugated galvanised iron having a semicircular cross section. The design was based on the Nissen hut developed by the British during World War I. The name comes from their site of first manufacture, Quonset Point, Rhode Island.

In 1941 the United States Navy needed an all-purpose, lightweight building that could be shipped anywhere and assembled without skilled labor. The George A. Fuller construction company was selected to manufacture them. The first was produced within 60 days of contract award.

Between 150,000-170,000 Quonset huts were manufactured during World War II. After the war, the U.S. military sold the surplus Quonset huts to the public for $1,000 each. Many are still standing throughout the United States, primarily used for commercial buildings. Visit http://www.quonsethuts.org for more information on Qunset Huts.

To check out other Photo Hunt Challenges or too join the fun visithref="http://roundrobinphoto.blogspot.com

Theme Thursday --- Vegetable

This is my second week of posting to theme Thursday and I must confess that I messed up. I forgot to check the host site for the current theme until yesterday. Upon seeing the subject was vegetable I felt lost. What in the world could I possibly find to post on the subject of vegetable? No amazing vegetable stories immediately came to mind. So I have been thinking about what I could post for the last 24 hours.

The first thing I thought of was the adorable picture of my daughter sitting in her highchair with her bowl of beets turned on her head with beet juice dripping from her chin. Next I thought about that great photo of my grandson at age two standing in front of a statue of a big gold peanut. Is the peanut a vegetable, I ask myself? A quick check of Wikipedia told me that a vegetable was any edible plant, so peanuts do count. But, then I remembered I could not get to either photo. They are not digitalized and still unpacked since our move.

Then I remembered an article I read about a lady who made jewelry out of fresh vegetables. That reminded me of the vegetable art we made in a food class once. Next, I recalled a book I once saw containing some wonderful pictures of the Thai art of Vegetable and fruit carving. Finally I remembered the giant catsup bottle. Is ketchup a vegetable I ask the old salt. He then reminded me of all the fun that late night talk shows had with the Reagan administration stating that as far as public school lunch programs were concerned ketchup was a vegetable.

So I went on a web search to find images of the things in my memory.

Simple vegetable art taught in most culinary classes.


Now the really fantastic vegetable art by the real artist. Thai vegetable carvings.


The World's Largest Catsup Bottle® located just west of St. Louis in Collinsville, Illinois. This unique 170 ft. tall water tower was built in 1949 by the W.E. Caldwell Company - bottlers of Brooks old original rich & tangy catsup.

Lastly, a vegetable joke that I saved from a e-mail.


To see more of the vegetable post or to join the fun visit Theme Thursday
http://themethursday.com