WORTH TRAVELING

This is our family safely landed at the San Diego airport, waiting for our rented shuttle to take us to La Jolla for a super special vacation. See that white Azazi bag? Inside is my daughter Mollie’s wedding dress! Who would have ever dreamed Keith and I with our small family of two daughters would grow to 16 people. Yes, I’m in heaven. And how fun is it to travel across the country together? We had a whole section of the plane to contain our mayhem. This photo covers my very favorite people on the planet (plus the photographer, Mollie).

Aside from the wedding, the family also enjoyed our stay in California which included a whale watching tour, bachelor/bachelorette parties, site seeing, a spa day for the girls, crazy delicious restaurants, and lots of swimming. Our hotel was right on the Pacific ocean just a few feet from the sand. It is situated on a swimming beach, so there was lots of body surfing fun. Our trip also included our first visit to a pot dispensary. One of the duties of my sister Samantha when she worked for the City of Telluride in Colorado was to chair the Pot Council which regulated and inspected the dispensaries there. Keith is reminding us of her admonition, “watch out for the edibles.”

The hotel where we stayed was built in 1928. The Kellogg family of cereal fame, owned it for decades. (I’m not sure, they still might). It’s called the LaJolla Shores. Up until the early 1980s, W.S. Kellogg was still a familiar sight at the Club, taking children for rides on the beach in a 1915 Packard, known affectionately as the “Old Black Goose.” Children who rode in the convertible became members of the Old Black Goose Club, swearing an oath to never become litterbugs. Today, locals will often see W.S. Kellogg’s grandson behind the wheel – and children still take the oath after each ride, patrolling the grounds to pick up litter! This is quintessential California, right?

We unknowingly showed up at the most spectacular time of year. What an adventure. Leopard sharks can live as far north as Oregon and as far south as Mexico, but La Jolla is the only place in the world where they have been observed breeding. Every September hundreds of leopard sharks gather in the warm waters of La Jolla Shores. They typically reach around 5 feet long, but some can reach up to 7 feet. Hundreds of sharks crowd the shallow waters and swimming with them is as easy as walking into waist-deep water. Fins everywhere. They say leopard sharks ignore humans for the most part, but that’s hard for your brain to believe when you’re sidled up next to one. The kids thought it was the greatest thing ever but creepy. Learn more HERE

WORTH DRAWING

I knew when I got Keith a good drawing app (ProCreate), he’d have some exciting interaction with his new iPad. Here is his first doodle. You can see the sketch is like an embroidery sampler. He’s playing around, getting a feel for the different brushes, pressures, line thicknesses, blending, etc. Aside from sketches, you can illustrate, paint, and animate with this baby. Did I say animate? OOOOOh ya! Won’t this be fun?

There’s over 200 different brushes and any color you can imagine on this infinite palette. You can also add typography. In addition, there’s a time-lapse feature so you can record every stroke you make and playback at amped up speeds. It won’t be long until Keith has this mastered (once some of our pre-snow projects are done). I can’t wait to see what evolves. What a magnificent gift for artists everywhere of every age of every ability. I love technology. Its power sometimes leaves me breathless.

”Technology is a useful servant, but a dangerous master.” — Christian Lous Lange

WORTH LEARNING

As much as I love to write poems, I haven’t ever really approached it as a serious skill. It has always been more of a hobby that I took lightly. But as I’ve been writing and reading more poetry these last few years, I realize the power of this art form and what can be communicated if you understand the tools and techniques. Since I don’t understand, I decided to learn what I can in the hope it will make my poems better. I am taking the online class taught by Billy Collins, former U.S. Poet Laureate. He’s the most popular American poet since Robert Frost and extremely prolific. I am humbled by his work and brilliance. Exceptional poet Marie Howe will be joining Collins for several of the classes coming up later in the course. I am so grateful for the internet. It allows an obscure old woman in Wisconsin to sit at the feet of a master like Billy Collins. We live in magical times, friends.

”One of the ridiculous aspects of being a poet is the huge gulf between how seriously we take ourselves and how generally we are ignored by everybody else. — Billy Collins

WORTH SCARING

Every year I drag up this old scarecrow from the basement, always a little more tattered than the year before. Planting him in the ground is always my favorite part of launching into fall, the grand finale to a day of decorating our yard for autumn. Keith made faces on both sides of the scarecrow so as the wind twirls him in circles on his pole, he’s always looking at you. The expression Keith painted for him makes me smile. Such a dumb and happy fellow (the scarecrow, not Keith).

It’s funny how we come to appreciate these things that are utterly worthless to everyone else. I believe so much of life is simply about the story. That’s the part we fall in love with, I think.

Silhouetted at night, this scarecrow continually startles us throughout the fall season. We gasp and clutch our chest, then laugh when we remember it’s just this empty-headed old friend. He’s gotten Keith twice and me once this year already. Cheap fun is always the best!

”Scarecrows weren’t made to scare the crows, they were made to
scare the corn.” — Laura Ruby

WORTH PAINTING

This month’s painting by Keith is this acrylic of a misty morning at the railroad yards where he worked when we first moved to Fond du Lac. It features a portrait of our daughter Maggie as a young girl. We have it hung over his desk in our little shared project room. We name a lot of the rooms in our house and this one was named by Maggie decades ago when it was an art studio, play room, and learning lab for her and Mollie. She called it “Deep Thought.” We’d always get a chuckle when they’d say, “I’ll be in Deep Thought.” So strange to hear that from little kids. I’m so grateful to have these many paintings and sculptures of my children and grandkids. It is a big part of Keith’s legacy to his family. I know they’ll cherish them someday as much as he and I do today.

Deep Thought was a supernatural-computer programmed to calculate the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. This was Maggie’s inspiration.

WORTH READING

Although I admire and adore everything I’ve read by Ryan Holiday, this book is my favorite. Here’s a few quotations that help you get the core and essence. This is a very worthy read and I heartily recommend it. If you’re at all like me, you’ll want to highlight everything.

“The ego we see most commonly goes by a more casual definition: an unhealthy belief in our own importance. Arrogance. Self-centered ambition.”

“When we remove ego, we’re left with what is real.”

“What is rare is not raw talent, skill, or even confidence, but humility, diligence, and self-awareness.”

“If your purpose is something larger than you—to accomplish something, to prove something to yourself—then suddenly everything becomes both easier and more difficult. Easier in the sense that you know now what it is you need to do and what is important to you. The other “choices” wash away, as they aren’t really choices at all. They’re distractions. It’s about the doing, not the recognition. Easier in the sense that you don’t need to compromise. Harder because each opportunity—no matter how gratifying or rewarding—must be evaluated along strict guidelines: Does this help me do what I have set out to do? Does this allow me to do what I need to do? Am I being selfish or selfless?”

“The question to ask, when you feel pride, then, is this: What am I missing right now that a more humble person might see? What am I avoiding, or running from, with my bluster, franticness, and embellishments? It is far better to ask and answer these questions now, with the stakes still low, than it will be later.”

“It’s not about beating the other guy. It’s not about having more than the others. It’s about being what you are, and being as good as possible at it, without succumbing to all the things that draw you away from it. It’s about going where you set out to go. About accomplishing the most that you’re capable of in what you choose. That’s it. No more and no less.”

”The only real failure is abandoning your principles.”

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As I said in the photo block above, instead of a
high school diploma, we should give kids this book.
You can buy Ego is the Enemy on Amazon by clicking right HERE.

WORTH DOWNLOADING

RIVER RUNNER - FREE
I’ve really been enjoying some free links/apps you might find interesting. The first is called River-Runner (no cost) and I think you will be transfixed. You touch the map where you want a raindrop to fall, and then you go on a wild ride (photo-realistic drone-like aerial view) along the downstream rivers and creeks until your raindrop either leaves the country or flows into an ocean. It is a virtual tour of the U.S. watersheds. One reviewer said you get the longest rides starting anywhere in Wyoming. The earth is amazing! If you’d like to try for yourself, click the link to the website HERE
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MERLIN - FREE
The Cornell Lab has put together the best birding app ever and it’s also FREE! We haven’t even opened a field guide since we got it. Sound ID listens to the birds around you and shows real-time suggestions for who’s singing. You can compare your recording to the songs and calls in Merlin to confirm what you heard. Photo ID allows you to take a photo of a bird, or pull one in from your camera roll, then it gives you a short list of possible matches. Bird ID asks you three simple questions about a bird you are trying to identify and Merlin will give you a list of possible matches in your area. Merlin offers quick identification help for all levels of bird watchers to help you learn about the birds across the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. If you ask me, phones should come with this app installed. You can learn more about the Merlin app HERE

SEE A SATELLITE TONIGHT - FREE
A Google engineer designed this awesome tool to find satellites that will be in view over your location. It tells you the names of the satellites and the times they’ll be viewable. As I write this, tonight we will be able to see the International Space Station (ISS) over our house starting at 6:38 pm. It not only tells us where in the sky to look for it, but it will even set a reminder so we don’t miss it. FREE again. And you can take a peek at what will be flying over your head by visiting the website. Just click right HERE

”When I was young, people used to take naps, now they use apps.” — Unknown

"Where they’re out there having fun in the warm California sun."

— California Sun performed by The Ramones
Leave Home - 1977
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