Interlude with (another) Sunset

My sister's 15-year-old dog, Trapper, headed to Rainbow Bridge this morning. This is the first time in my entire life that I've been in a house without a dog.

2013's running out of pets to kill, and it still has two and a half months to go...

Bright and Shiny Objects

Fall continues to trudge its muddy boots on the waning pages of the calendar, bringing with it some wild weather (including a recent tornado), morning fog, evening chills, and all the rest.

It also brings autumn leaves, fairs, festivals, and other shinies.

 This year, a large local fair featured an exhibit entitled Luminasia, a "modern take on Chinese lanterns." I wasn't interested in the fair, but I was intrigued by the exhibit... though not enough to pay what they were asking to enter, on top of the fair admission. It proved so popular that they extended the run past the fair, and offered a two-for-one ticket deal on Amazon Local. That got our cheapskate tails out of the house and down to the fairgrounds.

There were two sections: a traveling Asian-themed display, on a local retention pond, and one custom-built for the area, with local sights rendered in 3D silk-and-light displays. They ranged from the 60-foot Space Needle replica to smaller butterflies perched on tulips, from totem poles to an apple orchard and a fanciful rendition of the underwater remains of "Galloping Gertie," the doomed Tacoma Narrows bridge.

I took three cameras, on my usual photographic theory of throwing enough crud at the proverbial wall that something had to stick. Surprisingly, even without a tripod, most of the pictures came out okay. Of course, the 70-foot dragon boat got a fair bit of my attention... I even got several close-ups of his head. The whole family enjoyed the outing, so it was well worth the price.

Luminasia isn't the only shiny new thing in my life this fall. It was on this trip that my old clamshell cell phone went AWOL, due to a cruddy holder I've been meaning to replace. I searched all over, two or three times, everywhere I'd been before finally giving up and calling the company to report it missing. Being a cheapie prepaid plan, I lost my minutes and my phone number, but there was nothing to be done about that. Besides, I'd been meaning to order myself a better cell phone for my birthday - I figured this was the Universe tweaking me in the tail to do it.

Guess what turned up, impossibly, after I'd placed my order.

Oh, well... I just got my new phone set up, and I think I'm going to be happier with it in the long run. It's not new, and it's not top of the line, but it looks like it'll do about everything I wanted. It even has an MP3 function, though I'm happy enough with my GoGear I don't expect I'll use it. (But never say never, I suppose... I never thought I'd want to upgrade my cell phone.)

If nothing else, the new phone is much shinier than the old phone. And I've always been a sucker for bright and shiny objects.

Interlude with Sunflowers

My sister went in for another scan and test today. She's still in pain, she's still far too tired, and they still don't have any real answers for her. So, while I'm waiting to hear what's going on with that, here are some sunflowers, from a recent trip.

UPDATE: Well, they ruled out some stuff she was afraid she had, and have a few more answers. So that's good. Now, to see what can be done about it...