Olimpio Fusco

John Singer Sargent's Olimpio Fusco is one of my very favorite works of art. Just thought I'd share it so you all could enjoy it as well.

ROADKILL!!

Last night I ran over three baby raccoons. I am in denial and don't want to talk about it. Here's what happened: I was driving back from town with my mom. It was late, and I was tired. I was within a couple miles of my house, heading up a hill, my highbeams were on, when I saw a car approaching. I flicked my high beams off and there DIRECTLY in front of me was a family of raccoons waddling across the road. We just went over roadkill in Drivers Ed., so I checked my rearview mirror, prepared to step on the brake. There was no one behind me. I was going to brake, but then I saw that there was just no chance of not hitting them, so I didn't bother braking too much. There was no way I was going to swerve to avoid the critters. There was dirt to my right and oncoming cars to my left. Sigh. Then I hit them. THUNK. I didn't run over any with the wheels, but I believe I hit the back of one with my undercarriage, and possibly got two of the other five or so raccoon kittens, cubs, or whatever you call them. I just started wailing, not crying but wailing, and it was all horrible horrible horrible!!! I drove by the place this morning, and didn't see any dead animals nearby, so I'm hoping all I did was stun the raccoon. Aaron said that we should go and get it for dinner. Daddy said, well, I'm not going to say what he said. It was sad and cruel, not to be repeated.

That is my terrible story. I can't believe I've already contributed roadkill to the already "roadkilled-out" country, before I've even gotten my license.

Thirty Days of NO BLOGS!

I'm back! I've had a month with NO blogs or xangas or myspaces or livejournals or any other cyberspace stuff. It's been refreshing and enjoyable. I didn't swear off internet all together, I still had to use it for school and such. Anyway, a few things that've happened in the last month:

• I caught on fire. Actually, my sweater did. (It was just yesterday!) I am amazed at how quickly I started thinking once I realized my sweater was burning. HeywhudjaknowI'monfire,perhapsIshoulddosomethingaboutit,
  thisisjustlikelastyearwhen mymom'ssweatercaughtonfire,hmm,maybeIshould
  stopdropandroll. I was about to stop, drop, and roll, but the fire went out. It lasted only about two seconds, thankfully. I liked the sweater I was wearing, and wanted to keep it blue without large brown spots. Although my sweater wasn't burnt, I reeked of burnt yarn all evening. Yick.
• I am over halfway done with Drivers Ed.!

Oh dear. I had so many grand adventures to mention, but I can't remember them now. It doesn't help that it's kind of late and I'm exhausted. Maybe my memory will be refreshed tomorrow.

Be back later...

This is Aaron hacking Cara's blog to tell you all that she is taking a break from blogging and will be back to amuse and gratify her audience in about three weeks. In the meantime, here's another cool blog you can check out . . . .

Click here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Guess what I just realized? Cara is a four letter word.

"The African Letter " Sounds like a murder mystery or something.

The other day I was sorting our mail-we sort my Dad's office mail from our home mail-and I came across a letter addressed to me. It was a small envelope, there was no return address, and about five stamps labeled "Burkina Faso" were on it. Huh. The address was handwritten. I wondered if it was from a missionary? Naw, I never get that kind of letter. An old pen-pal writing me again? It couldn't be that, my two pen-pals I've had were both from Thailand. Well, I guess they could be in Burkina Faso now, but it seemed kind of unlikely. Then I figured out what it was. "It's Anthrax!" I yelled, and Aaron grabbed the envelope and held it up to the light in mock fear. No such luck, we weren't going to die after all. Everything was as it should be. The only contents of the envelope were a few sheets of paper.

This makes me remember something from a few years ago when the Anthrax scare was, um, a scare. It was a crisp morning in fall, actually that's not important but I put it in for effect. I don't think it did much for the story, though. Anyway, a bunch of my family was standing around the table as we sorted through the mail. When the mail comes we all hover about the person sorting it, ready to pounce on World or Anthropologie or Readers Digest. Mama, who happened to be the "sorter", picked up an envelope from some unknown company in some random Asian country. It's not quite clear how the idea got into her head, but somehow she decided the envelope contained Anthrax. She had us leave it on the steps outside, then we all had to scrub our hands in bleach water. We were going to wait till Daddy got home to see what he thought about the letter, but it flew away so we never found out what really was in it. I think it was a missionary group asking for money. I bet they never thought it would be mistaken for some bio-chemical-whatever they're called.

Back to "The African Letter." I opened the envelope, took it out, and was really surprised to see a letter ALL IN FRENCH! Eh wot? I could translate a few words here and there but not nearly enough to get the gist of the letter. I called Bria, but she was working at Fairwood, and there was no way I could read the letter to her. (My French accent is atrocious) Aaron worked on it for most of the afternoon, and managed to translate most of it.

It turns out it was a letter from a girl I sent a shoebox to through Operation Christmas Child. Every year our church participates in Operation Christmas Child, which is organized by Samaritan's Purse. People fill a shoebox with small fun gifts for a child in a particular age group. They wrap the box and drop it off at an Operation Christmas Child box drop off place, where the volunteers who work there send them out to all over the world to needy, poverty stricken people. For the past few years I've filled a shoebox at each Christmas, and it has become one of my favorite parts of the Christmas season. I usualy make a box for a girl in the 5-8 age group, filling it with hair accessories, play jewelry, hard candy, and art and school supplies.

I filled a box as usual last year, had it dropped off at the right place, then promptly forgot about it. I'll post the translated letter once I get the complete thing back from Bria who is working on it.

From what Aaron and I translated, the letter was from a five year old girl saying she was sorry she hadn't written sooner, she thought I was the nicest girl in the world, she can't wait for me to send her more presents, and she is five years old. Saying her age twice seemed to be a very five-oldish touch to the letter. I think it must have been written by her mother, because the handwriting was definitely not that of an average kid her age. Maybe they have really good handwriting in Burkina Faso.





And as to the Red Sox game, yes we lost, but we had an awesome time there. Fenway seemed so huge and small at the same time to me. To read reports of it visit Aaron's and Ryan's blogs. Here are the people who ended up going to the game: Daddy, Bria, Aaron, Ryan, me, Doug, Elizabeth, Katherine, Uncle Dave, Ben, Andrew B., and Katie A. It was such a party!!!

Look For Me On TV...

We're going to a Red Sox vs. White Sox game tonight! Pray the game doesn't get rained out and that the Red Sox don't lost too badly tonight. (And if it's not too much, pray that maybe they'll actually win and get out of this disgusting slump. At least we haven't been doing too bad against the White Sox.) Someone gave us two tickets (Thanks Mr. L!) and we bought five more tickets for very cheap. A lot of Red Sox fans seem to be pretty discouraged right now. It was unbelievably easy to ge t good seats. So if you want to go to a Sox game before the season's out, today's the day!

New Hairstyle!

Impulsive. Sometimes I get in this impulsive mood where I just want to do something crazy. 999's blog gave me ideas, and here's what happened:

Black and White

For black and white day, here's my most recent drawing.

Blue

For lack of time, I'm posting a picture from Girls' Week as well as a picture from last year, but I was playing with it recently and inverted to the colors. I'm also refraining from blue quotes. Time, time, where is the time?

Red (My Favorite Color)

Another twirling picture.


And a picture of the writing on my shirt in case the skirt picture isn't red enough.

Some quotes for you:

When in doubt wear red.
Bill Blass

Red is the ultimate cure for sadness
Bill Blass

Artists can color the sky red because they know it's blue. Those of us who aren't artists must color things the way they really are or people might think we're stupid.
Jules Feiffer

Color Week Is Da Bomb!

I'm so into this color week. Not as much into my own pictures, but into looking at everyone else's. Keep up the awesome picture-taking, everyone! I'm very excited to see everyone's amazing talent. It's not too late to start color week now, if you want to...

And Steph just started posting color pictures. Hurray!

Green

Hurray for color week! I am having muchos fun taking pictures and looking at everyone else's fabulous color shots. Thanks, Liane, for getting us all to do this!

And now, for some green quotes!

Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises.
Pedro Calderon de la Barca

When you're green, you're growing. When you're ripe, you rot.
Ray Kroc

Absolute green is the most restful color, lacking any undertone of joy, grief, or passion. On exhausted men this restfulness has a beneficial effect.
Wassily Kandinsky


(I've decided I enjoy putting in a random quote, even if it doesn't have much to do with the color green.)

Yellow

I've changed my mind. I'm going to do color week! Or at least yellow day...

A few random "yellow quotes" for your enjoyment.

Yellow usually means it's not that serious.
Bobby Unser

I'm frightened of eggs, worse than frightened, they revolt me. That white round thing without any holes have you ever seen anything more revolting than an egg yolk breaking and spilling its yellow liquid? Blood is jolly, red. But egg yolk is yellow, revolting. I've never tasted it.
Alfred Hitchcock

Some painters transform the sun into a yellow spot, others transform a yellow spot into the sun.
Pablo Picasso

There is no blue without yellow and without orange.
Vincent Van Gogh

(The Alfred Hitchcock quote is my favorite...)

What a horrible thing yellow is.
Edgar Degas

How lovely yellow is! It stands for the sun.
Vincent Van Gogh

Quote of the Day

If at first you don't succeed, then skydiving definitely isn't for you. ~Anonymous.

Girls' Week Pictures

I finally had my girls' week pictures developed. Usually, I take tons of pictures at Girls' week and have them developed right away. However, this year I only took one and a half rolls (within fifteen minutes). But here are a few of my favorites. The rest will be on Webshots as soon as I get my laptop's internet working.

Toad Mauler

Call me locust squasher, cricket mangler, toad mauler, snake shredder...Or just Cara-who-likes-to-mow-the-lawn.
Mowing the lawn is one of my favorite summer things to do! Just don't look too closely at our lawns next time you come because even though "someone" did a beautiful job cutting them, they're starting to turn brown, copper, orange--the grass is dying. Crabgrass is starting to dominate. Anyway, enough about the grass. More about the wildlife in the grass: there were toads hopping every which way to avoid being shredded by the mower. Once I saw one fly belly up about three feet to the side of the mower. I wonder if he had been hit by the lawn mower or just jumped out of the way. Hmm. This makes me think of Katherine's Toad (or frog?) story. The one about running over it and its guts spraying everywhere. I tried to find it in her archives but I didn't. :) I also ran over a few crickets and grasshoppers, the poor creatures. I would hate to be a little jumping insect and have to get away from the mower. It would be a nightmare. Maybe I should stop mowing so I don't scare them so much. I watched the grass to the side of the mower as I pushed it, and all the grass in about a foot wide area next to the part I was mowing would move with creatures franticly hopping away from the blades of death.

Enough about mowing. Time to go do some more work.

A Thing of Beauty...and Luxury...and Comfort...and Money...and Power...

World's Most Beautiful Dog...Hands Down

I watched "Angels in the Outfield" for the first time this evening. Although it's not on my favorite movie list, I got quite a few good laughs out of it.

It was strange to see Matthew McConaughey not being cocky!

Baseball just doesn't seem to be up Adrien Brody's alley, but he was fun to laugh at.