Distracting weekend and a new photo storage

This weekend I tried to distract myself from the computer, my craft room, anything that would take my mind off art. Usually I can do one of several things to bring my art back up to speed: organize or go to blogs of friends I admire. This time I did neither. Instead, on Saturday, I went with my friend Sally to Old Cowtown Museum. Also on Saturday, my friend and computer guru Scott came by and attempted to upgrade my photo storage on the web, then on Sunday it was off to Scott's to see how he was coming on his remodel, then back to my place for chiminea and a meal I spent part of Sunday fixing. Sunday's and today's posts are from photos I stored on the web. I wanted better clarity from my photos, since my blogger storage has nearly reached its max. Geeze, you say. I wonder why, since all her blog posts have a ton of photos attached to them!

I can't seem to find that happy medium between good photos and how to display them on my blog. I've tried saving them smaller this time (as opposed to yesterday's post), but that doesn't seem to help, either. I'll continue to play with it, but photos in my studio or while drinking tea will probably still come from my computer, since they aren't as important to view as some of the lovely places around town I am visiting.

However, I checked the post in draft and saw that only snippets showed unless you click on the photo. Then you can see the entire photo. If you double click, you get the entire photo in stunning detail. Remember, this style of post will be for photos that I take while I'm out and about.



It was overcast when Sally and I began our trip to Cowtown. I took over 300 photos and went through 4 batteries (thankfully they are rechargeable), so you can see why I would want to store these off site. I've always been big on taking photos and I didn't even bother cropping these. What you see is what I took through the camera lens.


We didn't get much past the parking lot and I was taken by this Remington.


I've always been fascinated by his highly detailed sculptures, and this time was no different.


Sally didn't even notice the statue. As she ambled off to the admission desk, I continued to take photos


from all sides.


Close-ups, too. By this time,


Sally was inside the building, where it looked like every school child and adult had decided to come out that day. Julia would have been in heaven. There were lots and lots of people enjoying the cooler weather and overcast skies. You can see all the people in line to get their tickets.


By this time, Sally was already outside and I was still taking photos, this time of the dining room that looked out over the grounds. Could that be some Nebraska sports team banquet they're setting up for?


I knew I could quickly catch up to Sally, so I stopped long enough to take a few shots of the bike/walking trail that ran by the river, which also showed our feeble skyline.


A bit farther on, I was able to better see one of two rivers (this one the Big Arkansas) that run though our town. For those of you who live in the US, this one comes from the Colorado, which originates somewhere way out west (Oregon, I think), and flows to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi.


You can see that there is barely any water in it after our long dry summer. The sand bars are quite prominent in the above photo.


As I walked the path of this many acre outdoor museum, I stopped to read the signs.


I even took close-ups.


The signs were located about 200 feet apart. That was a rough estimate, since I was "guestimating" a car length was 20 feet.


Lots of rich detail and these might be of interest to some who may not know much about Kansas, the center of the US.


It didn't take long at all to catch up with Sally, who was wondering where we were and how much further we would have to walk. In the background is the first house, which is a split log cabin. I went inside, Sally did not.


I will show the various houses and such in future posts, many of which might show up on Silent Sunday. There was an entire town yet to be discovered, so I hope you will enjoy coming along with me when I explore it again in photos.

But, on to Sunday:


I know it doesn't look like my friend Scott has done much, but he had a major setback recently when ALL his thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars of tools were stolen from his yard when his grandmother died and he went out of town for her funeral. He has just now started getting new equipment, which will include a trip to Harbor Freight sometime this week with me tagging along.


The dome of his workshop roof is complete, as are the walls and insulation. Part of the roof is not.


The same can be said for his house roof, although he now has the roof structure cut, installed, and roofing paper on. The last time I took photos, his roof was nothing but framed beams.




After about an hour of inspecting the progress he had made both inside and out, we headed back to my place, where I had veggies cooking in the chiminea. You can see it was getting dark. I took many, many photos along our trip to my place, but I could NOT get a good shot of the dome on the hospital, which both of us thought was new. Sitting in the passenger seat, I tried to get a shot from the moving car as we went by. Had I been able to crop the car interior out of the shot, it would have been about the size of a pin!


So then I decide to try from the front window, but whatever was attached to the rear view mirror obstructed my view!


Scott was laughing so hard, his whole body shook. When I decided to get a photo, he quickly turned away, still laughing.


Back at my place, it was now dark as we prepared our plates inside in preparation of taking them to the patio where the chiminea was now putting off much needed warmth. Scott chose to put his cottage cheese and homemade broccoli/carrot slaw (which I much prefer to cabbage slaw) on his turkey/Swiss sandwich. The corn bread and veggie bean soup were left over from the day before, but he really wanted it to go with the rest of his meal. He insisted upon taking a photo of his "masterpiece" by placing it on my washer and taking a photo of it, along with his size 14 boots. Needless to say, we were both unable to make room for a dessert of smores, which I had all ready for the chiminea.

Since I won't have time to play with the size of the any photos before my Tea Tuesday post (think Harbor Freight), I will try to make manageable sized ones the rest of the week. Thanks for sticking with me. I just hope the photos didn't take you too long to enlarge, which is a misnomer if I ever wrote one.

Now some of you might think today's blog post was a crime! But the real crime (writers of course) can be found at Working Stiffs, a blog written by several crime writers. Since these blog authors are . . . well . . . authors, they write well. More words than photos, their stories are funny, heartwarming, and unique. More life experiences and folksy fun than writing techniques and methodology, this is one sweet site for anyone who have ever considered writing a mystery novel or even for anyone who has read one. Each week (or it seems like it) they profile a new mystery, too. You'll be blown away by how a book cover is chosen, or what type of font is used, too. It's all in fun and it's all about Working Stiffs.