Tuesday, July 29, 2008

White Trash Green

On Line We Have Knot Studied
Four screws from home, cotton rope and wooden clothes pins from Family Dollar. For about $3.50 we have a clothes line on the back porch.

Every little bit helps not to heat up the house. And save the earth. Oh. Yeah. That. Too.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

Double Decker Bike


I might need one of these. Found it on Sherri Talley's blog. (Kathryn)

Monday, July 14, 2008

Movies

70th Street Babe
I finally erased these from the dvr:
Tiernery Gearon: The Mother Project Sundance
Tina Barney: Social Studies Sundance
I Always Do My Collars First KLTS
Peter Beard Sundance
Helmut Newton Sundance
Height of Sky Sundance
Iconoclast Eddy Vedder & Laird Hamilton
Making Waves: Louisiana's Radio Story KLTS
Summer Camp Sundance
Blue Vinyl Sundance
Yves Saint Sundance
Tom & Viv
The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros

The above pic, 70th Street Babe, has nothing to do with those movies. However she would fit in nicely with some scenes in The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

I Need to Live in this World


There was an event today I wanted to go to but it was at a loud noisy place like my place of work. I just couldn't bring myself to go there. I feel all cracky. (Kathryn)

Thursday, June 19, 2008

I haz the blahz

Sunset Smile
Feeling disconnected to everything. What is life? What is the purpose of being here. I seemed to remember knowing purpose when I was four. Somewhere along the way I've misplaced it. Could it be in my white Easter purse from 1967? (Kathryn)

Thursday, May 29, 2008

so it's not just louisiana, then.

Hey guys, it's Katee, writing my once a year post apparently. I felt the need to share this little nugget of information with as many people as possible, and I figured this would be the place to do it.

Before I write anything, read this article:

Kindergarten teacher makes class vote special needs child out of classroom

Holy shit. Really?

You know, I thought I had it bad in school. I always had these bitchy, angry, menopausal teachers who hated me and made sure my life was a living hell, but at least none of them ever had my peers tell me exactly why they hated me and oh, hey, you should leave the classroom now because you're annoying. I don't know when kindergarten classes became a democracy, either. Call me old fashioned, but I was under the assumption that the responsible adult was the one in charge of what happens in the classroom, but I suppose you have to get all Lord of the Flies on us when a classroom lacks a responsible adult.

In my opinion, the proper punishment would be for the teacher to be placed in front of a crowd and have all the people who don't like her tell exactly what's wrong with her and why they hate her and see how this bitch feels. What kind of god-awful human being subjects a five-year-old kid to something like that? Kudos to the mom for keeping her cool, man. Had that woman admitted to me -- completely unashamed, mind you -- that she put my baby through something that awful, I'm pretty sure I would have punched her in the face.

And as for all the people arguing that one kid with special needs shouldn't disrupt learning for all the "normal" students: fuck you, dude. I'm willing to bet 99% of the people with this opinion are upper middle class douche bags who don't want their kids exposed to anything out of the ordinary. Let me let you in on a little secret, though. If your kid grew up being around a more diverse peer group the world would probably be a better place because they would be familiar with people who are, you know, different. Ignorance creates fear and fear creates prejudice, so the next time Johnny says, "This kid Bobby in my class in being loud and annoying and I think he's retarded," maybe it would be a better idea to sit him down and explain that "retarded" is not the proper term and that Bobby has feelings, too, rather than calling and complaining about your little boy being exposed to somebody who is different.

I don't know why the teacher thought this was appropriate, but I really and truly hope she is banned from working with kids ever again, and God forbid she ever have a child with any type of special needs. I shudder to think what she would do if her kid had autism or anything of the sort because I wouldn't be surprised if she tied it up in the back yard or something.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Foam Head

Styrofoam Head
We've been working on sealing up air leaks in our almost hundred year old home. Bought a piece of styrofoam insuluation at Lowe's yesterday. Had to wedge it in on top of my head in the van to get it home. It made me miss the truck.

We're gonna create a box that goes in the attic and covers the opening of the attic pull-down stairs. Bought insulated curtains for Katee's room last week.

Monday, May 26, 2008

All a Twitter

The good news is Katee has finished another semester of college. She made the Dean's list and I finally paid the last payment of the semester to the school.

Charlie took Seroquel this week. It made his body go all wonky. Captured it on video. Will post it later. He's not taking that anymore.

Discovered Twitter. Made a video on it and started a twitter.com account.

Monday, May 12, 2008

Cherub and Angel

Cherub and Angel
What lovely young people Katee and Auguste are. They spent Saturday and Sunday with their mommas and other family members.

Katee bought me a radio alarm clock. It's a much needed Mother's Day present since I broke mine a couple of months ago.

The other part of my present included the two of them taking me to church. They went to church with Auguste's momma Saturday night. (Kathryn)

Monday, May 05, 2008

My Brains Hurts

Salvation Army Sign
I has hurted my brains by trying to learn to put together TV stories.

Think lighting, think good framing of shot, think of the story, think WWWWWH, think don't get shaky video, think, think, think think... (Kathryn)

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

My Spacing it Up

Katee Took This Picture
I won a video camera from KTBS. It was in the house less than 10 minutes and Katee had to start taking pictures with it.

I could complain but since I bought her a camera a couple of years ago and have completely stolen it from her, I will not utter a word. Just blog a post on it... (Kathryn)

Sunday, April 27, 2008

Eggs

Free Range Eggs
These egg cartons go back to my mother in Haughton. She's found a farm couple who sells eggs with the richest colored egg yolks you've ever seen.

We're living on hard boiled eggs around here. Now if I could perfect my egg poaching skills.

To learn more about Kitti and recycling click here. (Kathryn)

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Wristcutters and Dirtfoot

Kathryn and Katee Before Trekking to Columbia Park
Katee's semester will be over in a couple of weeks. She was an English major but I think she's switching to history.

We had a good weekend. Watched Juno and Wristcutters. Is it just me or does the music from Wristcutters sound like the kinda of music the Shreveport band Dirtfoot plays? (Kathryn)

Monday, April 21, 2008

How I Entertain Myself at Work

Walking Stick - by Kathryn Usher
I pulled this out of my lunch box. That's why it's got a little folds in the paper. (Kathryn)

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Threads

Coins
Vacation ended Tuesday night at 8 PM. That's when my work week started. I'm reading Jill Fredston's Rowing to Latitude:Journeys Along the Arctic's Edge and I think I'm finding some new ideas on dealing with a draining job even though the book really has nothing to do with that.

I'm intrigued by the trailers for the new Jackie Chan and Jet Li movie The Forbidden Kingdom. There's a lot of swirling fabric in it. I might not wait for DVD on this one. The last movie I saw, Fido, came courtesy Katee and Netflix. (Kathryn)

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Silent Film of Our Bottle Garden


Experimenting with the camera on movie mode. The bottle garden grows in the front yard of our house on Dalzell Street.(Kathryn)

Saturday, April 12, 2008

Recycling?


Ms Peachez has found a better use for one of those red Family Dollar carts. I discovered this fun Shreveport character about a year ago.

Vacation time means playing around with You Tube and contemplating making my own movies.(Kathryn)

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Vacation Middle

SRAC Outhouse
Day five of a nine day vacation. I've cleaned a little. Haven't taken many pictures. Went to the doctor with Katee today. Now I'm washing dog beds and contemplating washing dogs. Did wash Bebe the Maltese a couple of days ago. (Kathryn)

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

Dog Fat

Slentrol
The best way to pass the time while waiting in line to pay for groceries is to read magazines. It's amazing the things you can learn such as: if your dog is obese, help has arrived.

By the way, I've always noticed fat people have skinny dogs and skinny people have fat dogs. (Kathryn)

Monday, April 07, 2008

Monday: Waiting for the Trash Man

Waiting for the Trash Man Rescuing Items Bound for the Shreveport Landfill
Bird watching from the front porch, contemplating cleaning out the litter box, pounding thighs for Chicken Parmesan... it's been an exciting start to my 9 day vacation. (Kathryn)