Storms and Movies

I know I've been scarce with posting. I've had a few extra things going on in the background and I've had trouble getting adjusted to the anti-depressant I've been taking. I am starting my third month on it and I'm still not sure the benefits are worth the side effects I seem to have. Month one was okay. Month two, all I wanted to do was sleep when I came in from work. The medicine has calmed my thoughts down somewhat and has made me a bit more mellow, but the truth is, I am already pretty darn mellow. But the price for the calmness is my creativity. It just seems to run out the door when I get on this stuff. I thought the cost of coping with the depressive thoughts was too high on me physically and emotionally. It was hard work, but I was coping. Now I don't have to work at coping with depression, but it comes at the cost of expressing myself creatively. I'm not so sure that is a worthwhile investment for me.

In other news, if any of you get the chance to see an independent film called Little Chenier, go see it. The brother and sister team who wrote the screenplay and produced the movie are from here. It does a fairly good job of giving a peek into Cajun life and the story is a good one. There are a couple of places where the plot turns in directions that you just can't imagine. The ending turned out so totally unexpected that I walked out of the theater madder than an old wet hen about it all! I saw the movie again with my mother and daughter and all is now well, since I already knew what was going to happen!

Always when I see a movie like this, (or a movie about Southerners) the first thing to irritate me is the accent. Cajun accents sound different depending on what area of the state they are from. Be forewarned, the accents in the movie sounded slightly off to our ears, especially to the ears of the woman I work with, who is Cajun. I think part of the problem is that they tend to exaggerate it a bit. One of the quirks of Cajun pronunciation is that many of them can't (or don't) pronounce the "th" sound, so that "three" sounds like "tree", or "third" sounds like "turd" (which was always entertaining to us as youngsters). In the movie, I noticed it a lot with the word "think", as in "Ya tink we'll ever get rain again?" Anyway, in real life, the Cajun accent is melodic and beautiful to hear, especially from the older folks.

I've lived and worked around Cajuns all my life, but I am not Cajun. I was pretty much unaware of the lifestyle depicted in the movie before the last few years, when my son was staying with my Cajun father-in-law and crabbing with him. He was staying in Pecan Island which is up the road from Grand Chenier. Little Chenier is somewhere in there, close to Grand Chenier. The map shows the route we would take to go visit him. All the area along the coast was devastated by Hurricane Rita. They had finished filming the movie a month before Rita came through. At the end of the movie there is a before and after photo of Little Chenier Road.

This is a photo I'd taken of the post office in Grand Chenier, about a month before the storm.

Sand Hill Crane Birth

This series of photos was taken by a Florida dentist. He did not actually catch the hatching, but he took some gorgeous photos and put them in a slideshow. Even if you don't normally like nature photos, these are worth seeing. Go take a look, enjoy the sheer beauty and relax!

Sand Hill Cranes

Angel Trumpets

Great beauty can be found when traveling through darkness, but you must first have eyes to see beauty in hidden places.

Soon enough, blue skies will shine again.

Happy New Year!

I tried to take photos of the fireworks but that is difficult, as most people with any photo sense at all know. I stood out in the street in the cool night air and never did even catch an interesting blur of color in the sky. While I was waiting, I shot a few night time tree portraits. This is one of the ones I liked best. I also entertained myself by taking a few self portraits in which I looked rather goofy so I won't be showing those.

I don't usually make resolutions but I have been mulling over the blessings of 2007. There were many, and I am grateful.

A Wii Christmas Story

Or: Another Lesson Learned the Hard Way

Before I begin, there are a couple of things I should tell you. We celebrated Christmas Eve’s at my daughter’s. My parents were there, my sister and brother-in-law, one nephew, and us. My sister brought my daughter a hostess gift. It was a life-sized pineapple on a pedestal, the symbol of hospitality. It was a bit heavy. It looked lovely on her coffee table. I provided the gumbo and I also received a pineapple.

The second helpful bit of info is that I played in a tennis league when we lived in Houston. I absolutely loved playing but when we moved here, there was no place to play other than the country club or the racket club and we could not afford the dues for that so I have not played tennis in over ten years. I am not a very competitive or aggressive person in everyday life, but something about being on a tennis court brings out my competitive and aggressive side.

So, the story is, my daughter got a Wii for Christmas. One of the college girls in the office was also getting one and she was so excited. We had the discussion about how older people are enjoying the games as a way to get them up and moving around a bit. All this time, I just did not get it. What was the big deal? But when we arrived early on Christmas Eve (to start heating up the gumbo), she had the game on and was playing tennis. She looked so funny swinging that little game paddle thing around, dipping and swooshing to hit the ball. Did I tell you that I love the sound of a tennis ball hitting the sweet spot on a racket? Oh I do.

Well of course I had to try my hand at this silly game. I played several matches before all the other guests arrived. My husband coached me from the couch (on all the things I was doing wrong!) until I asked if he wanted to try it and my daughters wished they had a video camera to catch all my action. It was fun! I played again before I went home and told my daughter I would return on Christmas evening after all the relatives had gone home (I thought they would never all leave!).

The second day of my tennis career revival, we laughed about how they have all the warnings about making sure you have plenty of room to play and said things like “I am so sure. All you do is stand here and wave the wand towards the ball on the TV set.” And “They have to put warnings on everything these days. Common sense will tell you how much room you need.” She got me all set up and man, I was doing great. My skill level was moving up and I had figured out how to guide the ball away from the players on the other side.

My only weak spot was in returning the serves of the other team. For some reason I could not consistently return their serves. I was determined to master this. I was moving around and shuffling my feet in preparation for receiving the serve. I was even getting slightly winded from all my enthusiasm. I was improving. But I did not notice how close I had gotten to the coffee table, the coffee table with the big, heavy, hard hospitality pineapple so prominently displayed in all its regal glory. The last serve came at me very fast. I dipped slow and backhanded the ball with a great swing and followed all the way through with my “racket”, straight into the pineapple. My middle finger of my left hand was smashed between the pineapple and the game controller. The pineapple finally moved and fell off the table. There was a big hole in it and when it hit the table’s edge, it cracked wide open. I looked down to see blood gushing from my finger and then it started throbbing. I ran to the sink to rinse it off and put some ice on it. My daughter was having a hard time trying to decide whether to laugh or to worry about my finger. It hurt. I sat down for a few minutes and being the warrior that I am, I bravely tried to play another match. I just could not return the serves so I gave it up for the night and sat and visited with my daughter. I told her I would give her my pineapple to replace her broken one.

Boys and girls, if you play Wii, make sure you always have plenty of room to play the game. If you are not careful, you could sustain an injury.

(Don't read if you are squeamish!! Today the swelling has almost disappeared but the ugly bruise is still there and I just noticed it is oozing blood around my cuticle. I hope that does not mean my nail is detaching right there.)

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to All

I made Christmas cards using this image. I was a little slow finishing my job. I hope to get them in the mail tomorrow!

Flawed Economics

We had a truck towed in today, a 2008 Chevy Silverado, with bullet holes. The owner stopped by to sign an authorization to repair and our young boss said, “I have to ask, why did you put bullet holes in your truck?" The only part of the customer’s answer I heard was, “Well, you know, I’m a coonass*…” I did hear him say at the end of the story that he had not been in a wreck in six years and he’d only had this truck five months.

When the customer was gone, and my young boss was bringing me the paper work, I had to ask him what the story was. He said “The guy got drunk and shot holes in his tailgate because he did not want to buy the decals.” I asked him, “What decals?” and he answered, “You know, those bullet hole decals like Dad has on his truck.”

Some people will to great lengths to save a few bucks.

*Some Cajun people refer to themselves as "coonass". It is a slang term, I believe, one that is sometimes insulting depending on who uses the word and how it is used. I don't often use it, since I am neither a Cajun or a coonass.