Board and Batten

I love the look of board and batten, and it always catches my eye when I’m out and about. And, apparently, I comment on it, every time, to the annoyance of some people.

One of those annoyed people was my husband, who tired of my “I love board and batten”.

My son knows I like a country drive and he and his family often take me on day trips through the rural areas.  He must have inherited more of my sense of humour as it has become a joke, my constant reference to a building with a board and batten exterior.

Yesterday, I was out with my brother and his wife and we took a drive to a country store we’d heard about. Not as country anymore as the city has grown over the years and this once isolated store is now surrounded by the urban spread. But, it still has that ‘country’ look.

I stopped just outside the door and laughed. “I’ll say this once and get it over with.  Look, board and batten.” My sister-in-law laughed in return and opened the door.

Who knows the number of friends and family I’ve annoyed, or down right irritated, by pointing out this particular style of exterior wood siding.

If I ever won the lottery, I’d build myself a house, on the water, and it would be covered in board and batten. Oh, and it would have a porch. A covered porch, front and back, maybe a surround porch. I just love porches with sink-into big wooden chairs.

I think I can be annoying with my predictability. Maybe I need to surprise everyone and mix it up.

“Oh, look. The lilacs are in bloom.”

Paint Shirts

I have been on a painting spree these last few weeks, completing five paintings in a series called Feathers. All done in my mixed media style.

This week I’ve been trying something different...still abstract...but a landscape.

I liked the first effort, but felt it needed something more, tried the something more,and something more again and basically ruined it.  The nice thing about abstract is that I can paint over the canvas and start anew, the remnants of the previous work add to the texture.

After watching a number of art tutorials I had a triptych in mind, something very mixed media but found myself working on another landscape.

I wear my old not-to-be-worn-in-public pants  and a T-shirt when I paint as Acrylic paints are permanent once they dry and I’m  tired of ruining my clothes. But today I looked at my shirt and it now joins the pants as my painting uniform.

I tend to hold my paint brush in my mouth when I need my hands free, like to twist the cap off a tube of paint. This is okay, unless I turn my head and accidentally clean my brush off on the shoulder of my shirt. Then there are the paint marks across my stomach from holding the canvas as I work.

I think, the way I work, I’ll have more painting clothes before I’m done. Oh, the price of creativity.

A Lesson on Stealing

When my granddaughter has her weekly music lesson, her Mom stays with her and I get mother and son time, for about forty minutes before we all meet up again for dinner.

Tonight I was driving and told my son I had something to show him.  Something related to a new craft I saw on Pinterest. This did not meet with a lot of enthusiasm from my son. I always seem to find new crafts I want to try.

This craft involved wood, the older and more beaten up the better. Sort of like the wood you see on pallets, but they are too heavy for me and I’d need help to take one apart. So a separate piece of wood would be better. Nothing fancy, something about 3-4 inches wide, 1 inch thick and 2-4 feet long.

I took him to the new subdivision currently under construction. There I pointed out the piles of building material, heaped into what looked, to me at any rate, like discarded supplies.

“If I was to take a couple pieces of that wood, would it be stealing?” I asked.

“Yes,” he replied. “It’s on private property and it doesn’t belong to you.”

“But it’s just sitting there in a scrap pile.”

I felt I had to defend my question, but really, who did he think taught him about stealing.  He did explain that the builders would go to that pile if, for example, they needed a shorter piece of wood, so it’s not really scrap.

He did have me stop so he could check a small pile of wood, but they were all 2x4’s and I didn’t want anything that thick.

He did tell me that a contractor friend of his has a scrap pile, and he could most likely get me some wood.

I told him not to bother, it’s not like I need another craft. I have enough yarn stashed away to get me through this summer into next winter. I have a painting, as yet unfinished on the table and remnants of other projects, started yet incomplete, hidden around my house.

It’s that damn Pinterest. Too many ideas, too little time. And my daughter wonders why I hoard art and craft supplies. One of these days, I’ll find that new craft I’m dying to try, and oh look, I have everything I need.

Spider Battle

l hate spiders, and, I admit, enter into a battle to the death when I see one.

The other night I was reading in bed and noticed a dark spot in the corner, at ceiling height. A spider. This presented a problem because there was no way I could go to sleep and leave it there.

I couldn’t sweep it away, and chance it falling in my bed, so I needed a weapon.  I pulled out the tape and stuck a blob of it to the end of my broom handle. This might sound strange, but I have had success with this method.

I must have been tired, my aim was off and all I did was cause the spider to run down the wall. I made several valiant attempts, but in my own defence, the end of a broom is not very big. I lost sight of it for a moment, then found it on my pillow and responded bravely.

I shrieked and grabbed the pillow to get it off. That send the spider to the wall again. I needed a new strategy if I was to be the victor. I needed a new weapon.

Stepping into the bathroom, luckily close enough I could keep my eye on the spider, I leaned down to grab a wad of toilet paper. It took me a moment, as the stars I was seeing from smashing my cheek on the towel rod had to clear. Big ouch.

Finally, with the toilet paper I captured that spider and, after carefully verifying my success, I vanquished it down the toilet, gone in a flash and a flush.

Alex Kava...the Ryder Creed Series

I have been a fan of author Alex Kava for many years. She writes a series of books whose central character is an FBI Profiler named Maggie O’Dell.

Maggie is a complicated character, driven to find and stop serial killers. But the demons she chases are not all killers. She has issues, to say the least, and demons of her own.

There are many secondary characters, her boss at the FBI, her partner, and her friend, a psychologist she met at Quantico.

And then there are the men she meets along the way. First, the husband who makes her chose between him and the FBI. End of marriage ensues.

Then there’s the Sheriff she met on a case and sparks flew. He makes an appearance in several books, but the timing never seems right for these two. Exit the Sheriff.

Next there was the army doctor. Things looked promising, but he had issues of his own and through a number of books, their relationship seemed doomed for failure.

I’m rooting for Maggie, hoping she will find someone. Not that I think a woman has to have a man in her life to feel complete, but Maggie is young, and given what she does for a living, she deserves to have someone there for her.

Enter Ryder Creed. A wounded soul with a painful history. He operates a canine search and rescue operation and meets Maggie on a case when he is called in to do a search. Now I’m excited, because Ryder is just the man Maggie needs. And talk about instant attraction and heat. But nothing happens.

Next thing I know, Ryder Creed has his own series of books. I’m thinking No, not possible, he’s meant for Maggie. I buy the book and what do you know, Maggie is there. But so is the doctor, as he and Maggie are still uncertain friends, at the will they or won’t they stage.

But the first three Creed books had me frustrated. I wanted these two wounded souls to be together, and they aren’t.

I’m having a flashback to other books, movies, television shows, that drag out the sexual tension between characters. I know there is a risk, that once these characters...come together...the tension is lost and the readers/viewers will lose interest.

I did the preorder on book number four, anxious to see what happens, especially as this book promises answers to Ryder’s past.

After reading it, I was left in a quandary. Yes, Ryder and Maggie altered the dynamics of their relationship, but it was a bit of a let down. Not that I’m a peeping Tom kind of person, but I did expect to be party to these characters’ feelings, if not the details of their sexual exploits.

I suppose I should just give Alex Kava a high five for a job well done. As a reader I want more, I want to know how this will roll out in the future. Will these people ever find happiness?

What happens next, Alex? It better be good.