Our Days In Sheffield, England

Many thanks to Arthur Button, Anna's Grandpa from England, for the tour of his "proper English garden"!!

5 Minute Sketches (From June)

Doing some "catch up" work, here:

Several weeks back (yes it's been a busy summer...some ups, some downs) Anna and I took a trip one rainy morning to the Wagner Free Institute of Science in North Philly and did what any self-respected 21st Century naturalist would do in a 19th century museum: we whipped out the drawing pads (no iPads, thank you very much!!) and spent our time sketching the stuffed birds and the old bones on display! Here are a few of our favorites:

Eat your heart out Charles Darwin! I've seen your sketches of those finches from the Galapagos! Speaking of Captain Evolutionary Theory, we three Hobans are hopping across the pond starting tomorrow (and going for a fortnight) to jolly ole you-know-where. Spending time with family in Sheffield and TOTALLY avoiding the "2012 Mayhem" in London. We are planning an overnight, however, in Cambridge where I'll track down all things related to Mr. Darwin. Can't wait!

Until next time...Cheers!!

You've Heard Of Victory Gardens...

...here's Anna's "Victorious" Garden!

Fourth of July Celebrations! A Hot One!!!!

Good Neighbor Day in Downingtown, PA. Late morning arrivals to the fun: Big wheel races, rides, carnies, the works!! Happy Birthday, America! Enjoy scenes from the morning:

The Longest Day of the Year...

...deserves the first post of the season!

As of last Friday, school is officially over and summer has begun!

Much [back logged] work in the garden has taken up most of my time these past few days. A vegetable garden in a raised bed, some pruning and replanting here and there and a refilled [not so] new feeder that attracts more than the birds of the air. Next project: squirrel proof that shaz!!!

Little Lost Pillow Pet: An Epic Poem (Part II)

Little lost pillow pet
I see you there.
"That's right, it's me
Up here in the air."

Little lost pillow pet
Playing around
"Someday real soon
I'm sure I'll be found."

Little Lost Pillow Pet: An Epic Poem

Little lost pillow pet
Where, oh where are you?

I am far from my owner
At a place called PU.

Little lost pillow pet
Where will you go?

My course is now set
Tomorrow you will know.



Dear Reader: Can you name the building behind Little Lost Pillow Pet?

Day 2: Such Summer School Stuff...

Morning:
Trip to "Everything Plastic"
A visit to Please Touch Museum.

Afternoon:
Tumbling class at the Y

Day 1: Such Summer School Stuff (w/ Anna)

Morning:
Number recognition,
Number words.
Pattern recognition w/ coins.
And how to make a paper boat.

Afternoon:
Tumbling class at the Y

Happy Father's Day! or Hints From Hoban

Say you're about to head out to a Father's Day brunch and your only clean dress shirt is the one with the collar whose tips always veer upwards because it's been through the wash one too many times and you never remembered to buy collar stays to tame it back into place and now you wish you had because if you go out to brunch in this rag you'll look like a doofus!! What could be worse (well, besides opening run on sentences?) Not much. But here's a quick fix and a fast way to get to those eggs benedicts:

1. Find a used up gift card. I chose a recently depleted Regal Cinema card. (Saw X-Men: First Class with the fam, and Super 8 on my own with it.)

2, Next, cut a strip of the card slightly narrower than the stitched "pocket" in your shirt collar. (Dimensions vary)

3. Cut a nice pointy end on one side of the new gift card stay:

4. Finally, jab that thing into the stitched "sleeve", trim the length to the desired dimension and round off the sharp corners. Repeat steps 1 through 4 for the other collar tip.

5. Done and done. Now, if I only had the good fashion sense to buy quality shirts that come with collar stays! (Oh well.)

Happy Father's Day!!

Recyle/Trash Picking Day: Out With The Old...In With The New Junk

Our township/municipality, Willistown, holds an annual "Drop-Off Recycling Event" for locals to unload their large junk at the township building. We've never participated in the offer...until now! Angela decided it was time to get rid of all her old computers dating back to the mid-90s. So, being the dutiful husband (and one with some new found time on my hand, yeah!) I packed up the techno-junk and hauled it up the road a click or three to the drop off event.

If you know anything about me, you understand (or at least accept, or even just look the other way) that I am a pack rat of sorts. I wouldn't go as far as to say that I am the next subject in A&E's Hoarders show, however I will continue with this cable television programming idea and suggest that I am more in tune with the guys on American Pickers (a great show!). I love thrift stores and flea markets. Garage sales are my sanctuary. And I'll whip over to the side of the road in an instant if I see some curbside crud worthy of a little investigation. What can I say. It's just one of my things.

So I pulled up to the township building, got in line behind a few other Saturday afternoon haulers and was directed around the back to...

...HEAVEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Look at that amazing junk! Now, I must come clean: these pictures were taken on the day after the drop off event, so they don't do the event justice at all! I didn't have my camera on the actual day, and I had high hopes that most of the large piles of computers, stereos, televisions and all other forms of electronica garbage remained, but alas, most of it was carted away.

Finding myself in this Mecca of Messiness, I was as giddy as Templeton the rat from "Charlotte's Web", hauling away his trophy rotten egg from one of the geese on Zuckerman's farm. The volunteers at the drop off event didn't take too kindly to us "poachers" sniffing around while they separated the worthless from the even less than worthless, but being that I brought by several old monitors and pc towers they looked the other way when I went a pokin'!

In the end, there wasn't much of anything to take home (Angela breathes a sigh of relief). However, the point of this sort of activity is not so much the thrill of the chase, but the fun of the rootin' around. Don't get me wrong, finding something so totally clutch is a nice end to the game and, in fact, I did find something amazing...at least to me: an old Realistic boombox, circa 1983 and weighing in at (probably) 20 lbs. It's really cool and it works! I like the old stuff, or at least the forgotten forms of media of yester-decade. Plus, it was totally FREE! and worth between $50.00 - $100.00 at auction on Ebay. Now how's that for some good old fashioned American pickin'!!!

Here's a video of my "diamond in the dumpster rough":





-Marty

Another Year Done, Another Notch

Phew! Made it.

School's officially over. Time to organize such summer stuff, indeed. Yesterday took the looooong way home and captured one frame of video for every second of travel. It's a fun view on its own [silent]:




...but more interesting with music pumping. I choose Cream's "Crossroads" for your listening pleasure:



To experience the full interactive extravaganza, click on both videos, pause the "Cream - Crossroads (Live)" video until you queue the "Last Day Drive Home" video to approximately 1:23. Hit play on both videos, expand the "Last Day Drive Home" video to full screen and enjoy the online mixed media moments!! (Mind you, it ain't no "Dark Side of the Rainbow", but there are some moments of speedy serendipity. And, the music ends at or near where I get off the Blue Route and trudge through neighborhood roads. This is when I normally turn off all music and meditate the rest of the way!! ;))

Another Pre-Summer Post: A Visit To Something Called "The Paradiso of Doctor Bogarian"

The purpose of this post is to merely link you to a video of my midday experience while walking across campus this fine, pre-summer day. Also, I feel I should point you to the best explanation for why such a spectacle is indeed occurring. Needless to say, there is no rational explanation for any of this!!



Visit: Occupation Anything for the concept behind such shenanigans.

The Return

Dear Readers:

As the school year finds its end, my summer blog site is primed for entries from the up and coming Summer 2011. Check back this season as I recover from a grueling school year and wander through the hazy crazy days ahead. For now though, I provide a video of nature at its best, a hopeful sign of a new start: a nest of baby robins outside our house in West Chester, PA. (Anna has yet to name them!) The stop motion vidage was shot on the last day of May from 4:30 - 8:30 pm. Cute.

Winter is gone, spring is nearly over and such summer stuff is just around the corner.

See you later, online!

-Marty

Marty is:

a) driving to work
b) listening to Howard Stern
c) stuck in the mud somewhere in the swamps of Jersey
d) all of the above



A new day is dawning on a new school year! (Feel free to play your favorite driving music as you enjoy my ride to work.)


-Marty

Summer Project Clearance!! Post #1

As the summer continues to wind down, way beyond last weekend's Labor Day celebrations, I have much to finish in the way of "project-based" work. Of course, all hopes were to get a lot more of this work done than I actually did. Oh well, there's always next summer! But for now, here's Summer Project Clearance Post #1:

The collage of crumpled Rolling Stone covers (above) is inspired by the work my Media Arts students did last year while investigating the artistry of Stephen J. Shanabrook's series entitled Paper Surgery. Wild stuff, sure, but really, really great examples of mixing up the message in today's media saturated world. Or maybe it's just a lot of fun to wrinkle up Keith Richard's face more than it already is! And for that matter DiCaprio...and Perry, and Gaga, and Jay-Z and more to come! You can check out the untouched versions of the covers here.

-Marty

104 Days of Summer Vacation...

I am not quite sure how Phineas & Ferb tally up their days off during summer break, needless to say whatever the final count...all good things must come to an end! Boo hoo, the summer's over and the school year's just begun. Anna has her first day of Kindergarten today and I, along with other Hun School teachers, will continue to participate in the "soft opening" to the school year, which really-o and truly-o begins next week. So, in honor of a great summer...here's the "title sequence" to Anna's favorite Disney Channel cartoon (and, I might add, one of the BEST written shows on TV (and that includes Mad Men!!)), "Phineas & Ferb":



p.s. I will still add an entry or two on the blog since the official end of summer doesn't come till September 21st!

-Marty


Video Addendum:

Since the following event, covered in this latest video post, happened during Labor Day Weekend I must upload it on this page! So sue me!! I'm only three days behind in my video uploads! Enjoy the car ride vidage:

Check That One Off...

...the summer to-do list [mine] AND the bucket list [my dad's]!!



A month ago my father, age 83 and a Philadelphian all his life, told me when we made plans to see the newly restored "The Gross Clinic" by Thomas Eakins that he has never been to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. INCREDIBLE, I thought. So, not only would we take in the highly revered work of Philadelphia's famous 19th century artist, but we would also make an attempt to knock out a few exhibitions in the venerable old building up the steps that Rocky made so famous.

The following video excerpts were shot [mostly] with the permission of the museum staff. Thank you to anyone who had to put up with my dad for any exchange that took longer than him saying, "You know this is my first visit to the museum and I've lived here all my life!"

A New School Year, A New Hope

After a full afternoon of back-to-school meetings this past Thursday, the School held it's annual "kick off" picnic for staff and family...always a wonderful social event. Afterwards Ang, Anna and I stayed overnight in New Hope at Porches Bed & Breakfast. One more visit (in four years maybe) will make it a tradition!!

Before heading home, we headed down the Delaware River to visit the Yardley Zoo (aka Jim & Kay's home) complete with old friend, Lizardo...




...and new friend Willie (pictured below with Jim & Anna). The pup is appropriately named after one of Mr. Willie Nelson's songs.

WELCOME BACK, HUN SCHOOL TEACHERS!!

All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy. All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy.

-Marty