Dinosaurs with Jobs

I got this colouring book last summer and the designs were basic enough that I was able to do up to four pages in a very short amount of time.  The colouring books are starting to pile up in the back room and I need to make a serious dent in them.  

It's a cute book.  Good for kids or adults.  The design is on one side with blank behind it so it was perfect for markers.  I always slip a piece of paper under the page to protect the next one just to be on the safe side.

My grey markers pretty much ran out after this book; I was using Crayola.  Good thing I got more!

Of course my choice of colours for each beast was purely conjecture on my part.

I would recommend this book for it's whimsy and ease of colouring.  While I do enjoy the very detailed books, every now and then it's nice to have large swaths in which to fill in.

Light Shows

Oh must show you this gorgeous sunrise from November 19.  It was beautiful.

I wanted to try this technique and was surprised that it actually worked really well.  That cable shutter release was a good investment.  

Got up at the crack of o'god thirty one morning and was delighted by this pretty scene, even though there were some high clouds making it a little fuzzy.

Then the sun came up.

My next door neighbour got one of those cool laser Christmas lights thing that shoots thousands of points of green light all over their lawn, house and even the trees.

Accidentally left the shutter open when I was moving things, but it came out cool.

Out of focus, but you can see the lights up in the trees.  I really want to get one of these, but in blue.

In the course of surfing around to find one of those laser lights, I stumbled on a projector with  prism that shoots moving lights onto your house.  I went down to Home Depot and picked one up...it was only $20.  The pics don't do it justice cause all the lights swirl around.  All I need is a disco ball and Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and I could have an awesome par-tay.

Best twenty bucks I've ever spent! 

Winter's Last Gasp......We Hope!

Last week we had two more snow events....actually three.  One was Sunday night (3/1) which melted pretty fast the following day.  Then it snowed Tuesday afternoon, and then another 'small' storm was predicted for Thursday.  Unfortunately they were WAY wrong about that one and the 3"-6" turned into a foot or more for Bourne & Sandwich.  It did not make for a pleasant time trying to get to a couple of appointments in Falmouth, but luckily we got home safely.  It finally stopped snowing around nightfall.

I wonder how long it'll take till my deck is snow-free.

We are all hopeful that was the last storm of the season.  At least with March snow, it does start to melt pretty quickly as we move towards spring.  The weekend was sunny and in the upper 30s and low 40s, so things are starting to finally thaw.  I really want that snow to come off the roof quickly. The south side is melting nicely but the north side is much slower.  I'm getting more icicles on that side now which look cool in the afternoon sun.  See the droplet falling?

The forecast calls for rain tonight and FIFTY ONE DEGREES on Wednesday!!!!!!!!!!  That's going to feel downright hot!  

Sandwich Gets a National Nod

Our humble hometown has been getting some national press over the past couple of months.  

First, Lays Chips shot a commercial for their potato chips in town, in early January.  As part of their 'Do Us a Flavour' campaign, they came to town to debut Lobster Roll flavoured chips and shot the commercial at Beth's Bakery and Cafe', on Jarves Street.  Unfortunately the chips shown in the commercial, which even has Boardwalk on the bag, were just prototypes for the ad.  This has not really been released.  Not that I would ever actually eat them because, well, gross.  But it would have been nice to have a bag for posterity, and to send to friends and family that have moved away.

It tickles me every time the commercial runs on TV. It's cool to see on You Tube and all but to hear your humble hometown's name and see images of it on TV are neat.  Here's the commercial.  The only person Russell recognized in it is the fireman, who went to high school with him.  I only remember what he looked like in the 70s....he doesn't look familiar to me at all now.  

Then we reached the pinnacle of 'on the map' when George Takei shared a Sandwich Police meme on his Facebook page.

In all the years I lived there I never once thought of 'Sandwich police' .  Of course over time whenever people would ask where I was from, I would also get the inevitable chuckle and bad joke, "You're from Sandwich?  You're full of baloney!"  Or, "East Sandwich?  Is that near the crust?"  But the obvious Sandwich Police joke was never made.  

A quick google image search of 'Sandwich Police Meme' yielded these results:

And my personal fave,

HERE is a link to the Cape Cod Times article about the Sandwich PD's 15 minutes of fame on George Takei's Facebook page.  I've copied and pasted the text of the article below because the Time is a bit nazi about how many times you can access their website before paying (3 times a month).

SANDWICH — They are the protectors of the peanut butter and jelly, the guardians of the grilled cheese and they take no baloney.

They are the Sandwich police — giving new meaning to a hero sandwich.

Fresh off its fame in a Lay's potato chip commercial, the town with the best name invented since sliced bread is hamming it up on Facebook.

George Takei, an actor known for his portrayal of Sulu on "Star Trek" and now a social media icon, shared a Sandwich police meme on Feb. 23 that, as of Friday had 174,000 likes, 5,179 comments and was shared a whopping 51,799 times.

Forget the viral photo that had people trying to decipher the color of a dress in a store — these people have been seeing the black and white of a Sandwich police cruiser with a caption that reads: "Sorry ma'am, you’re under arrest, too much mayo."

Takei’s one-liner: "Criminals are just toast."

Glen Watson of Forestdale is one of the people who shared the meme. "We have achieved George Takei fame," he wrote.

Watson said it's great exposure for the town.

"For such an icon in the social media industry and genre to give attention to the town of Sandwich is a pretty cool thing," Watson said.

The meme was shared on former Selectman Linell Grundman’s wall by one of her first bosses with the U.S. Department of Defense.

"I didn’t get it at first," Grundman said laughing. "It took me a while."

Sandwich Police Chief Peter Wack is relishing the buzz his department is creating.

"Sorry it took so long to get back to you, we are running an undercover operation in the condiment aisle of the local supermarket," Wack said when contacted by the Times.

It’s not the first time Wack and his officers have heard the joke. It won’t be the last.

"Typically, a tourist might say something or if I’m out of the area, travelling, and they ask me what I do, I get a chuckle when I say I’m the Sandwich police chief," Wack said.

There certainly won’t be any complaint from Jay Pateakos, executive director of the Sandwich Chamber of Commerce, who is already getting a lot of calls from places like Alabama and the West Coast after the Lay's commercial aired across the country.

"It’s free exposure. There are towns trying to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to attract people," Pateakos said. "People know Sandwich now and we didn’t have to spend a cent."

The attention from Takei certainly won’t hurt, but it does put the town in a bit of a pickle.

"Now we have to be prepared for the people it will bring," Pateakos said.

Animal Colouring Designs

A couple of years ago I found some really cool and free Animals of the World colouring designs online, from Louise Elliott Design's website, found HERE.  They look very 60's'ish to me so I've been trying to colour them that way. 

I have, or at least used to have, a small wooden horse from Sweden that was painted red.  That's why I did this horse red.

I coloured the llama dark blue before I realized that the Huichol colours I had chosen are Mexican and not Peruvian.  Oh well.

I tried to do the English cats in blue and red like Wedgwood, but I could not match the blue at all...that was the closest I could get with my markers.  I find the most challenging part of these designs are the birds and butterflies.  I'm so tired of looking up what birds look like so that I can at least try to get their colours right.

The Winter of Our Discontent

Woke up to more......you guessed it....snow, last Wednesday.  There was at least 5 more inches on top of the stuff that refuses to melt.  Here's a picture of the Cape & Islands and off Cape.  See all that ice in the seawater?  Crazy!

It was a very pretty morning though with bright blue skies and though it pains me to admit this, a fresh coating of snow does look very pretty.

The light breeze would shake loose the snow tufts.

This one shining flake looks so art deco!

More snow coming off the branches.

Then we got a very pretty late afternoon moon.

This crumpled snow pile on my bowl of stones and shells reminded me of the sorting hat except it's not pointed.  Then I cracked myself up when I heard Hagrid's voice in my head saying, 'Yer a blizzard, Harry.'   Yes....cabin fever has hit full force.