New and old.

Here are a few pictures of what is going on. New.....











My Shop gets a face lift along with the bowling alley. Quite an overhaul for the 50+ year old center. I swear there was nothing nice cool or vintage that was destroyed in this project. For an alley as old as this there was surprisingly nothing vintage to be found aside from the sign(which stays!). I believe this is because the focus has always been on the bowling and with 42 lanes we sure hear allot of that(through the wall). There is way more to be done but our shop is done except for signage which has yet to be determined. The whole building is getting color changing LED lighting which is going to be awesome! I cant wait.
OLD...
In the plaza we are attached to there is a vacant(or abandoned) supermarket and several small businesses which cling to life in the vast wasteland of asphalt. The bowling alley renovation is made possable in part from TIF money which is in theory going to help improve the looks of the area and generate traffic and income. I am up for that and boy this plaza needs it!
I have been meaning to photograph this light pole that is in the plaza for some time but the recent Ductape addition to the sculpture was the thing that truley motovated me to go get the camera.









Also of note is the post apocalyptic stop sign that is also in the plaza mere feet from this pole. This photo is of the front of the sign which has entirely faded along with the sticker that was on it. I thought the dead tree was also a nice touch.












NEW AGAIN...
We spent a week up at Retreat finishing the siding on the West side of the house. It was good weather then it was bad then it was awful. We at one point decided to work into the night because it was not raining. All in all it was a success and I have to say even though it was rainy and foggy the temperature was very nice.











The "fixit" ray isn't quite as powerfull as it needs to be.





















We had to do the rest by hand..... Next up... the kitchen!

House warming ...w/ Jello

A housewarming gathering is a perfect jello opportunity! Matt and Barbie are now raising a few chickens and so I thought this mold would be appropriate. Hard to see are the 3 nuts that are the brains. Gummy worms and a red chicken hart complete this editable delight.

Patio and Garden Expansion

It has begun!
Of course it may take some time. These trucks don't hold as much dirt as I remember.

Glowing Grubs!

When you work 3rd shift, sometimes you have to do your gardening in the dark...Like Mary was doing. She was digging up a spot at the end of the new stone walk I put in for some very nice looking hosta when she saw something glowing in the dirt. Why she didn't discount it for some glow crap I had cast off beats me. I am so glad she scooped it up and put it in a glass for future inspection. It was 2 days later when she remembered to tell me and It wasn't looking too good for the little guy. I poked at him but he was all curled up and didn't move. I thought it was all over for him and I would not see the glow she was talking about. I figured it was worth a try and stepped into the back hall and closed the door. WOW still glowing, he must be alive! I quickly covered him in dirt and put him up out of the sun and harms way. I am still looking for my bug zoo so we can see what he will emerge into. The glow is of course hard to capture with a camera because as I discovered tonight he will not play possum and there for ruins the long exposure. This photo captures the glow nicely. It seems to come from between the segments of his body and at dots along the sides. I shined him with a white light, UV light and a red light but did not notice any change in his luminessence. I looked a bit on line but was un able to find this type of glow worm. Seems to be many types but they all seem to have there glow spot at there tail and not all over like this fellow. I gotta find my bug zoo......

Error..Error..Error

I love my computer.
I am so happy It has
successfully completed
it's error of fatality!
And that it needs me to
agree? WTF?

Marquee Madness

I was stunned at this marquee as I drove past on my way home from work.
Speaking of marquees....
have a look at Don Carter's

Philatelic Scumbags Need a Foot Bath

One dark night a few weeks back I found myself at the bottom of a long and deep ebay search and explore session. At some point along the way I stumbled across an auction for some unusual space stamps. These "stamps" were 3d lenticular prints of images from the Apollo moon project. They were minted by the country of Bhutan in the late 60's in commemoration of the moon landing. Of interest to me was that several of these images weren't photographs of the real events but re enactments with models! The starting bid was .99 and shipping was a couple bucks so I bid. I bid 5.50 which I thought was fair. I had never seen these before and what the heck it's history, vintage cheesy re enacted 3-D history! So days go by and I am the only bidder. This is a sort of calming feeling where you know that you are the only freak in the world who would actually pay for something like this. This is a sort of disturbing feeling knowing that you are the only freak in the world who would actually pay for something like this. So now it's getting down to the final 24 hrs and there is 1 more bidder who bids me up to 1.05. Wow a whole 6 cents! I at this point feel something fishy is about to go down. The next bid comes from another bidder and bumps me up to 5.00. I think this may be an honest bid but feel the ride isn't over yet. Minutes before the end of the auction the first bidder drops a bid pushing me up to 5.50. This is my max and by this time I had actually found another seller who was offering these and more stamps from the same series for much less than I would be obligated to pay if I won this auction. OK it is only $5.50 and not really a big deal but I am really hoping now that this .06 joker who pushed me up to $5.50 is going to get greedy and try to push me up higher. If he does He will win the auction because I am at my max. Well sure enough right before auction end he bids another .50 and wins it for 6.00. I am happy because I get to buy the better lot from the other seller. The day after the auction I receive an email from the first auction that I had lost with a "second chance" offer of $5.50. Well that was very interesting I thought...and quick. Is there that much money to be made in cheesy foreign stamp auctioning that you need to employ a shill? I just don't get it.
So my stamps arrived Saturday from the Netherlands! They are everything I expected and then some! The icing on this cake however were the stamps on the envelope I received them in. Evidently sausages and foot bathing are so popular they get there own stamps! Maybe the first auction guy needs some nice smoked sausage and a soothing foot bath to cure him of his evil ebaying ways.