In many, if not most, cities authorities are not fond of graffiti art – even though some of it is quite striking. But in Milan, Italy they have come to admire the realistic 3-D work of Osimo Caiffa, aka “CHEONE”.
Cheone was born in 1979 in Gallipoli, a southern Italian town in the province of Lecce. At the age of 11 he moved with his family to Germany and began his career as a graffiti artist.
But after he moved back to Milan he transitioned and limited his paintings to “figurative realism”. He incorporates the location of his “canvas” into every creation. And he does not limit himself to just walls, but his art spills out onto sidewalks and roadways.
(He seems to limit his easel to abandoned industrial areas, but I couldn’t be sure because I don’t speak Italian.)
A good deal of his creations are 3-D, and in that sense viewing perspective means everything. Here’s a perfect example of that:
I had a very interesting topic all picked out, and then when I started researching it yesterday it kept growing and growing. Since I want to do it justice, I decided today to put it on the backburner, and throw a few Odds & Ends together.
But if *Rump was actually “chosen by God”, then it’s obvious God got last pick.
Now that the Impeachment Trial has begun, it’ll be interesting to see if there are any witnesses. We all know that *Rump will refuse to testify. That’s because he doesn’t want anyone to see his tiny Subpoenis.
How about a poem?
The Donald went to heaven to ply the Pearly Gates,
But couldn’t pass Saint Peter, who said: “Your crooked mates
Are waiting for you, Donald, way down below in Hell.
There you’ll be warmly greeted because you’ve done so well
Encouraging corruption, dishonesty and sleaze
That Lucifer’s retiring and handing you the keys.
So take your golden mirror and lacquer up your hair
Because you needn’t worry – it never rains down there!”
Or if you prefer a limerick …
In the White House there lives quite a jerk
Who states he does nothing but work.
His continuous tweeting,
Berating and bleating
Makes us view such a claim with a smirk!
And finally, over the Holidays Melania told a Fox news reporter how difficult it was to get Donnie a unique Christmas present. So she decided that, as she wanted to know a little more factual information about his family history (since he’s falsely claimed for decades to be Swedish), she got him one of the ancestry DNA kits, like “23 & Me”.
Well, his DNA helix readout finally came back this week, and she admitted that she was not a bit surprised by the results:
It’s not terrible – just going to be time-consuming. So no “Friday Fun”.
On January 2nd I got a notification from one of my credit cards that there was activity on my account that they didn’t recognize & looked suspicious.
On review, I didn’t recognize it either – so I called. They decided that “out of an abundance of caution” they would terminate that card & send me a new one.
The next day when I logged in, it was clear that the unrecognized action was an online donation on 12/31 to an organization I had previously always written a check.
But the die was cast!
I got my new card the other day and activated it today. And I decided that since it’s been a while, I would go ahead and change my User & Password.
Unfortunately this created a HUGE snafu requiring three f/u (the medical “follow-up” … NOT the other f/u) phone calls and over 2 hours to straighten out. (*sigh*)
But now I have to contact 15 “Merchants” who I setup as automatic payments and notify them of my new card number, expiration date & CVV/CVC number.
In the rolling hills of Paso Robles, CA there is a most amazing art installation: Field of Light, by British artist Bruce Munro.
Consisting of over 58,800 spheres on 2.5′ stems and lit by solar-powered fiber optics, they illuminate the countryside in every color of the rainbow – and gradually change their hues.
It’s part of a larger series of Field of Light installations that stretch across the globe. You can view more of his installations at the Munro Website.
His inspiration for the projects came from a camping trip in Australia’s Red Desert to Uluru Rock (also known as Ayres) where he was struck by how the desert appears barren and infertile – until a rainfall makes the flowers bloom.
Munro envisioned a field of lights like dormant seeds in a dry desert that would “bloom” when darkness fell. This inspiration was realized in Munro’s installation at Uluru Rock in Australia – which uses 326 miles of optic fiber to create. It is on display indefinitely.
The Paso Robles installation covers 15 acres of Sensorio – an interactive garden and art center owned by Ken Hunter. It took five weeks for 20 staff members and other volunteers to construct the exhibit. Over 2,000 people visited it on just the first weekend it was opened.
The Field of Light display at Sensorio is open Wednesdays through Sundays from 7 to 11 PM until June 2020. Adult admission is $27 on Wednesday and Thursday and $30 Friday through Sunday. Tickets for children age 12 and under are $9 on Wednesday, $18 on Thursday and $19 Friday through Sunday. Children under age 2 get in for free. To learn more and reserve tickets, visit sensoriopaso.com or call (805) 226-4287.
Needless to say, it’s been a magnet for photographers – so let’s enjoy some of the ephemeral beauty. And I’ll admit I’m going a little overboard. But they were all so gorgeous (not sure you could take a bad picture) I couldn’t decide what to eliminate – so I didn’t!
It’s the time of year that lots of folks spend family-time together creating Gingerbread Houses. Even if yours is not one of them, no doubt you will still be “WOWED!” by the entries at the 27th Annual National Gingerbread House Competition™. It was held on November 18th at the Omni Grove Park Inn in Asheville, NC; and after the Awards Ceremony, the entries remain on display at the resort until January 4, 2020.
Over 220 people entered the competition this year, and employed everything from power tools, mechanical parts, melted sugar plus a huge dollop of imagination to craft their creations. The only rule is that at least 75 percent of the entry must consist of gingerbread, and it must ALL be edible. The judges actually check this! (I’m not sure I’d want to nibble on a project that’s taken months to create. But maybe that’s just me.)
The entries are judged by a panel of experts from the culinary, visual arts and media professions based on appearance, originality, difficulty, precision and consistency of their chosen theme. And there is $25,000 in cash prizes awarded to winners in different categories.
Here’s a very quick overview of a few of the entries:
So let’s take a more detailed look at the winners!
Grand Prize – and a check for $5,000 – went to Gail Oliver of Johnson City, TN for her creation, “The Water Hole”. While some projects took up to 600 hours of work, Oliver said she didn’t keep track – but it took several months!
Second place was awarded to Beatriz Muller from Innisfil, Ontario, Canada for her mind-boggling modern home design.
Third place went to a husband and wife team of Larry and Julia Vorpahl from Ellijay, Georgia for their Gypsy wagon in snow.
First place in the Teen Category was a collaborative effort by German language students at Courtland High in Spotsylvania, Virginia. And it’s the sixth consecutive win for the school! (Maybe they need to spend more time in the Language Lab and less in the kitchen. Just kidding!)
A sister duo, Sarah and Jenna Rhinehart from Columbia, Tennessee, took second place with their Vegetable Truck design.
But to show how tough the competition was, let’s take a look at some of the creations that did NOT win:
If this has whetted your appetite, here’s a much longer (8-minute) video of the competition:
(I should note that while there is no charge to view the Gingerbread Creations, the Resort charges $25 for self-parking and $30 for valet. But half of the parking proceeds will benefit local charities.)
Personally, I would award an Honorable Mention to Travis Casagrande’s “Gingerbread House” – which comes complete with a Christmas tree, snow-covered roof and even a wreath for the door.
But he would never qualify for this competition because there’s not a crumb of gingerbread in it. In fact, a crumb of gingerbread falling on it would be like an avalanche!
That’s because Casagrande, a research associate at McMaster University in Ontario, created the World’s Record TINIEST “Gingerbread House”. It’s less than one-tenth the width of a human hair and is 20,000 times smaller than the average store-bought gingerbread house. Plus it’s half the size of last year’s previous record-holder for TINIEST Gingerbread House which was made in France.
Casagrande, at the Canadian Centre for Electron Microscopy, used an ion beam microscope aiming charged gallium ions which acted like a sandblaster to forge his masterpiece out of silicon. It even has a door, windows and the logo for the university.
His creation sits on top of a winking snowman (which I think actually looks a little spooky) and then he placed a strand of hair next to it that looks like a felled birch tree.
The only YouTube video I could find for it is in Italian – but it’s still fun to watch. Unfortunately it doesn’t load – maybe because it’s foreign. But it’s only 43-seconds long, so here’s its Link:
Reduced-size photos as reminders, so you don’t have to click back-and-forth.
[A]
1. Jingle Bells
2. Walking in a Winter Wonderland
3. Santa Claus Is Coming to Town
4. Joy to the World
5. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
6. O’ Come All Ye Faithful
7. I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas
8. Oh, Christmas Tree
9. What Child Is This?
10. We Three Kings
11. Deck the Halls
12. I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In
13. O’ Holy Night
14. Noel
15. Away in A Manger
16. The Twelve Days of Christmas
17. I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus
18. All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth
19. Chestnuts Roasting on An Open Fire
20. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear
21. Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow!
22. Silent Night
23. O’ Little Town of Bethlehem
24. Silver Bells
[B]
01. White Christmas
02. We Three Kings
03. Santa Baby
04. Away in a Manger
05. Noel (No-L)
06. Silver Bells
07. Little Drummer Boy
08. The Twelve Days of Christmas
09. Blue Christmas
10. The Night Before Christmas
11. Jingle Bell Rock
12. All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth
[UPDATE NOTE: I put an enlarged one for “A” in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there it might help. Although enlarging tends to make it even fuzzier. Try to imagine it as just a plain pencil drawing w/ no color. They were tough to figure out, especially back then.
UPDATE #2: I went back and found the original BW one – and it is MUCH CLEARER! Hopefully this helps. And why they colored the middle item in #18 green I’ll never know.]
We can thank JD for inspiring today’s theme. A “REBUS” as defined by Merriam Webster:
: a representation of words or syllables by pictures of objects or by symbols whose names resemble the intended words or syllables in sound
also: a riddle made up of such pictures or symbols
You might have noticed I posted one the other day in a reply to JD. As an example I used the Rebus she had posted in another blog …
Which would be solved as “Straighten Up and Fly Right”
As a nod to the Holiday Season, a couple of decades ago I remember enjoying a Christmas Song themed Rebus game at a party. In fact I found that very same puzzle online – although now it’s in color, but a bit fuzzy. (I suppose time does that to all of us.) And a newer, but briefer version.
So I’m going to post two Christmas Song Rebuses for you to solve. Some of them are a bit of a stretch of your imagination, and there will be overlap – but that’s OK. You can either post your answer in Comments or keep an answer list. But I won’t be posting the Official Answers until Saturday, in order to give everyone time to take a guess. (Sorry – but there are NO prizes.)
