My jumbled rambling thoughts...

I altered the photo below in my Paint Shop Pro program and created the image above. I don't know why, but I can't bring myself to post a blog entry without some kind of photo or image.

Do you sometimes have so many things on your mind you don't know where to start when you sit down to blog? When I blog, I try not to ramble on about too many different subjects. Lord knows, there is only so much of me I can ask you all to put up with in one sitting! But tonight I just have so many things bouncing around in my brain.

I'll start off with Isabella's yearly vet visit... She got a clean bill of health, all her booster shots, and blood drawn for her heartworm test, but I forgot her poop sample. It's humbling enough following your dogs around daily and picking up their poops- but driving around with a bag of dog doo (double bagged, of course) in your purse is downright gross and nasty. But Bella has to return to the vet's on Friday so I will take a stool sample then- and hope I am not in a fatal accident and the emergency workers find a bag of shit when they look in my purse for identification. Bella has to go back Friday to have her teeth cleaned due to tarter build up because she refuses to eat dry food, lordy that dog is frustrating. She's lost 6 lbs since storm season has started. Oh- and she now has a new prescription for her xanax to get her through the summer storms. Such a weird experience to pull up to Walgreen's drive thru window and hand them a prescription made out to "Isabella Fleming The Dog".


Now that Isabella has her meds, I'm ready for the storms to return. We're back into a no rain and too dry mode, plus it's been ungodly hot lately, record breaking heat in fact. It's been over 90 for days now, and with high humidity the heat index has been between 100 to 105. This is very unusual for here because we normally have afternoon storms that cool things off, and a strong sea breeze that keeps us from getting too hot. Due to the heat we've been spending alot of time inside with the TV on. For the past several years I've been obsessed with political news and watched all the cable news shows. After the election I realized I was just burned out on politics and swore off all the cable news shows and political pundits. To fill my TV time I began watching the cable reality shows-omg- that's a whole 'nother blog entry for another time.


Anyway, I got sucked back into watching cable news this weekend to follow the news coverage of the protests in Iran. MSNBC didn't cover any of the Iran news, but showed old reruns of Lock-Up and Dateline instead. Unbelievable! Thankfully, CNN provided great coverage, plus Twitter was jumping with news and links. I have just been amazed at the courage of the Iranian young people. I've participated in many protests over the years, but if there had been a gang of secret police attacking and beating protesters, I would have ran for home. I am not brave when faced with physical violence or even the threat of it. In fact, I'm a wimp. I was shocked at the videos coming out of Iran, young people being beaten and viciously attacked. And to think I was outraged when it was reported that the U.S. government was sneaking around and taking down our license plate numbers when attending peace rallies and marches prior to the Iraqi war.

Then the news of the death of a young woman hit Twitter, soon followed by a video of her as she died. I usually avoid watching anything involving physical violence and blood, even fictional, and often have to leave the room during violent parts of movies. But I felt compelled to watch this video, that to not watch it would be a dishonor to Neda. I don't think I will ever forget her eyes, her beautiful, sad eyes. As Iranian women fight for equality, what a tragedy that young, beautiful Neda Agha-Soltan was murdered for merely attending a protest. The L.A. Times has posted a great article about Neda that you can read here.

Why has it been so hard for women through out the world to be granted equal rights? If you haven't watched HBO's Iron Jawed Angels about U.S. women's struggle for equal rights, you must! My god, what those women went through to obtain the right to vote.


I haven't been in the studio since last Friday, but plan on spending the day in there tomorrow. Still working on the naked old lady (actually overworking the naked old lady- need to finish her and move on) and have plans for a new canvas. Mike loves blues music so I'm wanting to do a mixed medium canvas using some old photos of his favorite blues artists. I want to try some of the techniques from the new book I recently bought- Creative Paint Workshop for Mixed Media Artists by Ann Baldwin.


Okay, I'll take pity on you and quit rambling. I'll save the rest of my ADD fueled thoughts for another time.

Peace-

Linda Fleming