Emergence of A

Since I haven't gotten to post any new finished paintings, here is one of my favorites. This is a painting of my daughter (she was about 13). This was an actual class assignment. I had to divide up a large canvas into 16 sections. I underpainted each section with a different color. I then started the composition over the 16 multi-colored sections. I was supposed to use a different technique or approach in each of the sections, which I actually did, but it is hardly apparent in the final painting. This is quite large 30x40 or (something of the sort). Shazza, I know you've seen it. I have been struggling with the title. It was originally Entangled Adolescent, but I've been thinking that she really wasn't entangled, she was just emerging from the winter branches. Any suggestions would be appreciated. I will never sell this piece, but I will probably give it to daughter A some time in the future.

Too busy to breathe

I have been so ridiculously busy that I have not had time to post anything. I had "back to school" night from 7:30 -9:30 on Monday night. I started a graduate "online" class Tuesday. I had to go to my kids' Back to School nights on Wednesday and Thursday while checking in on my online course every night. I am working on a commissioned portrait painting in my "free time" . My youngest daughter auditioned for and was accepted into the York Junior Symphony Orchestra. She is one of four flutists in the county. (Thank you Shazza for appreciating her efforts). My oldest daughter qualified for National Honor Society based on her grade point average but she is not involved in extra curricular activities. She joined up with my school's art club to monitor the moonwalk bounce at a Septemberfest . My awesome art club was the only group well represented and the community thinks my art kids are the nicest in the world, despite their piercings, blue hair, etc. I have art to post, but my photos are not as good as they should be. I will post them when I have time.

Question: Have any of you taken an online college course? I thought it would be convenient, but I think it is more work than going to a class. I would appreciate any thoughts or opinions..

Mammatus Mia!

The inspiration for this post came from Shazza's amazing storm clouds. We were driving back from a family reunion in August and I spotted these cloud formations. I am such a weather geek that I ordered Doug to pull off the exit so that I could snap more photos. I recalled seeing these beauties way back in a Meteorology 101 textbook. Yes, they were named mammatus because they were thought to resemble mammary glands, as in a cow's udder. (I personally think my mammaries are cuter than the average cow udder, even with the devastating effects of age and gravity). The mammatus are an indication of severe weather. We certainly went through it about 30 minutes down the highway. Click on the photos for a large view.

The Ex Mrs. McCain (Article I read online)

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Now that Hillary Clinton has at last formally withdrawn from the race for the White House, the eyes of America and the world will focus on Barack Obama and his Republican rival Senator John McCain.
While Obama will surely press his credentials as the embodiment of the American dream – a handsome, charismatic young black man who was raised on food stamps by a single mother and who represents his country’s future – McCain will present himself as a selfless, principled war hero whose campaign represents not so much a battle for the presidency of the United States, but a crusade to rescue the nation’s tarnished reputation.
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Forgotten woman: But despite all her problems Carol McCain says she still adores he ex-husband
McCain likes to illustrate his moral fibre by referring to his five years as a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam. And to demonstrate his commitment to family values, the 71-year-old former US Navy pilot pays warm tribute to his beautiful blonde wife, Cindy, with whom he has four children.
But there is another Mrs McCain who casts a ghostly shadow over the Senator’s presidential campaign. She is seldom seen and rarely written about, despite being mother to McCain’s three eldest children.
And yet, had events turned out differently, it would be she, rather than Cindy, who would be vying to be First Lady. She is McCain’s first wife, Carol, who was a famous beauty and a successful swimwear model when they married in 1965.
She was the woman McCain dreamed of during his long incarceration and torture in Vietnam’s infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison and the woman who faithfully stayed at home looking after the children and waiting anxiously for news.
But when McCain returned to America in 1973 to a fanfare of publicity and a handshake from Richard Nixon, he discovered his wife had been disfigured in a terrible car crash three years earlier. Her car had skidded on icy roads into a telegraph pole on Christmas Eve, 1969. Her pelvis and one arm were shattered by the impact and she suffered massive internal injuries.
When Carol was discharged from hospital after six months of life-saving surgery, the prognosis was bleak. In order to save her legs, surgeons
had been forced to cut away huge sections of shattered bone, taking with it her tall, willowy figure. She was confined to a wheelchair and was forced to use a catheter.
Through sheer hard work, Carol learned to walk again. But when John McCain came home from Vietnam, she had gained a lot of weight and bore little resemblance to her old self.
Today, she stands at just 5ft4in and still walks awkwardly, with a pronounced limp. Her body is held together by screws and metal plates and, at 70, her face is worn by wrinkles that speak of decades of silent suffering.
For nearly 30 years, Carol has maintained a dignified silence about the accident, McCain and their divorce. But last week at the bungalow where she now lives at Virginia Beach, a faded seaside resort 200 miles south of Washington, she told The Mail on Sunday how McCain divorced her in 1980 and married Cindy, 18 years his junior and the heir to an Arizona brewing fortune, just one month later.
>>>Who do you want to see as the next US president? Leave your views below...
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Golden couple: John and Cindy McCain at a charity gala in Los Angeles
Carol insists she remains on good terms with her ex-husband, who agreed as part of their divorce settlement to pay her medical costs for life. ‘I have no bitterness,’
she says. ‘My accident is well recorded. I had 23 operations, I am five inches shorter than I used to be and I was in hospital for six months. It was just awful, but it wasn’t the reason for my divorce.
‘My marriage ended because John McCain didn’t want to be 40, he wanted to be 25. You know that happens...it just does.’
Some of McCain’s acquaintances are less forgiving, however. They portray the politician as a self-centred womaniser who effectively abandoned his crippled wife to ‘play the field’. They accuse him of finally settling on Cindy, a former rodeo beauty queen, for financial reasons.
McCain was then earning little more than £25,000 a year as a naval officer, while his new father-in-law, Jim Hensley, was a multi-millionaire who had impeccable political connections.
He first met Carol in the Fifties while he was at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis. He was a privileged, but rebellious scion of one of America’s most distinguished military dynasties – his father and grandfather were both admirals.
But setting out to have a good time, the young McCain hung out with a group of young officers who called themselves the ‘Bad Bunch’.
His primary interest was women and his conquests ranged from a knife-wielding floozy nicknamed ‘Marie, the Flame of Florida’ to a tobacco heiress.
Carol fell into his fast-living world by accident. She escaped a poor upbringing in Philadelphia to become a successful model, married an Annapolis classmate of McCain’s and had two children – Douglas and Andrew – before renewing what one acquaintance calls ‘an old flirtation’ with McCain.
It seems clear she was bowled over by McCain’s attention at a time when he was becoming bored with his playboy lifestyle.
‘He was 28 and ready to settle down and he loved Carol’s children,’ recalled another Annapolis graduate, Robert Timberg, who wrote The Nightingale’s Song, a bestselling biography of McCain and four other graduates of the academy.
The couple married and McCain adopted Carol’s sons. Their daughter, Sidney, was born a year later, but domesticity was clearly beginning
to bore McCain – the couple were regarded as ‘fixtures on the party circuit’ before McCain requested combat duty in Vietnam at the end of 1966.
He was assigned as a bomber pilot on an aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Tonkin.
What follows is the stuff of the McCain legend. He was shot down over Hanoi in October 1967 on his 23rd mission over North Vietnam and was badly beaten by an angry mob when he was pulled, half-drowned from a lake.

War hero: McCain with Carol as he arrives back in the US in 1973 after his five years as a PoW in North Vietnam
Over the next five-and-a-half years in the notorious Hoa Loa Prison he was regularly tortured and mistreated.
It was in 1969 that Carol went to spend the Christmas holiday – her third without McCain – at her parents’ home. After dinner, she left to drop off some presents at a friend’s house.
It wasn’t until some hours later that she was discovered, alone and in terrible pain, next to the wreckage of her car. She had been hurled through the windscreen.
After her first series of life-saving operations, Carol was told she may never walk again, but when doctors said they would try to get word to McCain about her injuries, she refused, insisting: ‘He’s got enough problems, I don’t want to tell him.’
H. Ross Perot, a billionaire Texas businessman, future presidential candidate and advocate of prisoners of war, paid for her medical care.
When McCain – his hair turned prematurely white and his body reduced to little more than a skeleton – was released in March 1973, he told reporters he was overjoyed to see Carol again.
But friends say privately he was ‘appalled’ by the change in her appearance. At first, though, he was kind, assuring her: ‘I don’t look so good myself. It’s fine.’
He bought her a bungalow near the sea in Florida and another former PoW helped him to build a railing so she could pull herself over the dunes to the water.
‘I thought, of course, we would live happily ever after,’ says Carol. But as a war hero, McCain was moving in ever-more elevated circles.
Through Ross Perot, he met Ronald Reagan, then Governor of California. A sympathetic Nancy Reagan took Carol under her wing.
But already the McCains’ marriage had begun to fray. ‘John started carousing and running around with women,’ said Robert Timberg.
McCain has acknowledged that he had girlfriends during this time, without going into details. Some friends blame his dissatisfaction with Carol, but others give some credence to her theory of a mid-life crisis.
He was also fiercely ambitious, but it was clear he would never become an admiral like his illustrious father and grandfather and his thoughts were turning to politics.
In 1979 – while still married to Carol – he met Cindy at a cocktail party in Hawaii. Over the next six months he pursued her, flying around the country to see her. Then he began to push to end his marriage.
Carol and her children were devastated. ‘It was a complete surprise,’ says Nancy Reynolds, a former Reagan aide.
‘They never displayed any difficulties between themselves. I know the Reagans were quite shocked because they loved and respected both Carol and John.’
Another friend added: ‘Carol didn’t fight him. She felt her infirmity made her an impediment to him. She justified his actions because of all he had gone through. She used to say, “He just wants to make up for lost time.”’
Indeed, to many in their circle the saddest part of the break-up was Carol’s decision to resign herself to losing a man she says she still adores.
Friends confirm she has remained friends with McCain and backed him in all his campaigns. ‘He was very generous to her in the divorce but of course he could afford to be, since he was marrying Cindy,’ one observed.
McCain transferred the Florida beach house to Carol and gave her the right to live in their jointly-owned townhouse in the Washington suburb of Alexandria. He also agreed to pay her alimony and child support.
A former neighbour says she subsequently sold up in Florida and Washington and moved in 2003 to Virginia Beach. He said: ‘My impression was that she found the new place easier to manage as she still has some difficulties walking.’
Meanwhile McCain moved to Arizona with his new bride immediately after their 1980 marriage. There, his new father-in-law gave him a job and introduced him to local businessmen and political powerbrokers who would smooth his passage to Washington via the House of Representatives and Senate.
And yet despite his popularity as a politician, there are those who won’t forget his treatment of his first wife.
Ted Sampley, who fought with US Special Forces in Vietnam and is now a leading campaigner for veterans’ rights, said: ‘I have been following John McCain’s career for nearly 20 years. I know him personally. There is something wrong with this guy and let me tell you what it is – deceit.
‘When he came home and saw that Carol was not the beauty he left behind, he started running around on her almost right away. Everybody around him knew it.
‘Eventually he met Cindy and she was young and beautiful and very wealthy. At that point McCain just dumped Carol for something he thought was better.
‘This is a guy who makes such a big deal about his character. He has no character. He is a fake. If there was any character in that first marriage, it all belonged to Carol.’
One old friend of the McCains said: ‘Carol always insists she is not bitter, but I think that’s a defence mechanism. She also feels deeply in his debt because in return for her agreement to a divorce, he promised to pay for her medical care for the rest of her life.’
Carol remained resolutely loyal as McCain’s political star rose. She says she agreed to talk to The Mail on Sunday only because she wanted to publicise her support for the man who abandoned her.
Indeed, the old Mercedes that she uses to run errands displays both a disabled badge and a sticker encouraging people to vote for her ex-husband. ‘He’s a good guy,’ she assured us. ‘We are still good friends. He is the best man for president.’
But Ross Perot, who paid her medical bills all those years ago, now believes that both Carol McCain and the American people have been taken in by a man who is unusually slick and cruel – even by the standards of modern politics.
‘McCain is the classic opportunist. He’s always reaching for attention and glory,’ he said.
‘After he came home, Carol walked with a limp. So he threw her over for a poster girl with big money from Arizona. And the rest is history.’
Additional reporting by Paul Henderson in Virginia Beach and William Lowther in Washington k
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(Sorry from Neetzy - I think I fell asleep while trying to copy and paste some of this article) I didn't realize I posted the entire magazine)
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Birthday Rant - Sarah Palin, RNC

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to. Thank you Blogger for updating my age on my personal profile today. You could have sent me a card. Thank you Dad for sending me two birthday cards. Thank you Dr. Dentist for sending me two cleaning appointment cards. Thank you hubby for a delicious dinner at the Moonlight Cafe.

According to the semi-conductor, I am one year from geezerhood. I am already receiving solicitations from the AARP. This is the last year of my forties. Ah, youth.

I watched part of the Republican National Convention last night. Why? I have no idea. I could not stay up long enough to watch Sarah Barracuda Palin. I watched a convention center full of idiots in cowboy hats in Minnesota. Minnesota? We're not in Texas anymore. Last I checked, Minnesota was on the northern border of the USA, Texas was on the southern border. Cowboy hats?

Did you ever hear the joke? What is the similarity between a cowboy hat and a hemmorhoid?

Sooner or later, every asshole gets one. Ta-dum.

They were carrying signs that read "Prosperity" . Prosperity? More Americans are losing jobs, are without healthcare, are losing their houses than ever before. Prosperity? What the F.

Oh yeah, prosperity...John McCain knows prosperity.

There appeared to be several "token" black dignitaries and supporters speaking. One riled up the audience to a chant: "Drill, Drill, Drill. We need to drill Alaska. We need to drill the Oceans. We need OYHL, OYHL, OYHL." If you add phonetic spelling, you can get all the illiterates to pro-nounce it. We need everyone to drill every inch of the earth so that we can fill our SUVs. We need the votes of the stupid, the illiterates, the marginally educated.

Sarah Barracuda Palin. The "family values" vice presidential candidate. Her husband works for BP. (and owns a commercial fishing business). Alaska is an "OHYL" state. She does not want the polar bear on the endangered species list because it would prevent oil exploration.

What are family values anyway? As far as I can tell, the "American conservatives" have only two things in mind when they tout "family values". Those two things are anti-abortion and anti-gay. Oh,yeah and anti-public education. McCain HATES public education. That's great. I hope you have extra money to afford that private education for your family. Save up those gas pennies!

Tomato Harvest

Today we harvested most of the tomatoes from our garden! We planted loads of tomatoes in May but lost about 40% of our early crop due to blossom rot. We had a very dry August and a resultant bountiful Labor Day harvest. I spent my entire school holiday cooking! I borrowed some recipes from several cultures! Today I made a lovely Italian tomato sauce. (Jeff Smith's recipe) I slowly pot roasted a beef chuck roast and and added this to the sauce. (Now I have some very rich beef stock for a future meal) We enjoyed an excellent dinner with shredded beef and pasta. I made a delicious Tabouli salad last week with Arrowhead Mills Organic bulgur wheat, my own homegrown tomatoes, onions and mint. I had to purchase lemons and scallions. The tabouli was so good last week that I made a double batch today. I also made a delectable Gazpacho. The tabouli and gazpacho recipes came from the original Moosewood cookbook ( the hippy cooking bible). We still have lots of tomatos around for tomato sandwiches. Whatever remains goes into a plastic container with garlic, basil, and olive oil for bruschetta. I am looking for more tomato recipes! If you have any, please comment!