Paul Ryan recently gave his opinion that Progressive thought is to his mind arrogant and elitest and then provided his own definition for what Progressives think. This is of course a common tactic but particularly galling coming from this man who posted workout shots grinning in smug satisfaction wit… Read full post »

This is a post from my blog on Our Salon, I seem to have copied too much. I look forward to toasting this hero of three nations: Spain, Mexico, America this 23rd of July

Bernardo de Galvez y Madrid, Hero of the Revolution

His statue stands at the end… Read full post »

I wrote a small piece defending George W. Bush’s interest in art. I felt that it might in some small way encourage others to contemplate their lives in dimensions beyond the capitalist centering on money and power. Art has often profited from the attention of people whose life was devoted to… Read full post »

I think George W. Bush was a poor president but that does not obligate us to find fault with everything he has done or tried to do. My opinion is that he spent much of his life trying to please his father and grandfather by trying to be his image of… Read full post »

I actually have planned to go to OurSalon but it is blocked on my work computer and generally work on by site at home, not doing chores, painting. I cannot guarantee how often I'll get there but will make effort to join there.

  Read full post »

I was having a good morning, got up at 5:30, meditated, stretched (well 60 year old stretches), painted a bit and got to work early to read a few blogs and there was this picture of Paul Ryan in a clean apron washing a clean pot! Then I read he stopped… Read full post »

“And suddenly you know: it’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.” Meister Eckhart  

The prepared support for a painting is both beautiful and intimidating as you stand before it. The canvas stretched taut, white from layers of gesso, ready to bec… Read full post »

I was born into the America of White Male exceptionalism. I did not question that America was the greatest country on earth, that we won World War II and saved the world mostly on our own; that we were the greatest athletes, finest artists, best scientists, best parents, had never lost… Read full post »

I have assembled some of the great questions of American history, questions which we have pondered through the generations, and humbly submit them as potential questions in the upcoming debates. Extra points if you can match the questions to the great Americans who first posed them:

1. "What do you h… Read full post »

i got on this morning mostly by clicking and then going out to arrange a few rooms, and then i was able to read Toritto's blog by reviewing a few charts. my new system is that its a crap shoot and an error message of timed out means a new shooter.… Read full post »

Let us remember Open Salon in the bloom and promise of her youth: eyes wide open, calling on everyone to traipse with it through the gardens of youth; read some poetry, share a story, tell a joke, voice an opinion. and for a while, it was a chorus of songs, friendships… Read full post »

Theodore Roosevelt versus “Citizens United”

I have been reading Colonel Roosevelt the third in Edmond Morris’s series and was struck how 1910, on his return from African Safari and European tour Theodore was being drawn back into politics because it was his nature to res/… Read full post »

I want to recommend Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Black President in the September Atlantic,  www.theatlantic.com/magazine/.  well-written, his position presented and defended in a coherent style free of emotions despite Mr. Coates including enough of his own story to allow the reader to understand… Read full post »

I heard somewhere- most likely Alan King's old Comedy College that "all humor is based on sorrow". I can't remember if that was from Professor Newhart or Professor Cosby. I smiled but never gave it much thought until this morning thinking of the latest Convention. funny how your mind can laugh… Read full post »

we had a little dinner party Saturday, Lisa showed her great talent for cooking, socialization, hostessing and she only pointed out one person I may have offended accidentally- there is a reason a Woman should always host a salon.

Really enjoyable conversation- the Barnes a success inside and out, t… Read full post »

This is a quotation, i deserve no credit, in fact will likely mistype the best part, but then, I am an illusion and Thomas Merton is still real:

Those who love their own noise are impatient of everything else. They constantly defile the silence of the forests and the… Read full post »

Let me praise and remember a fine American, a man with frailities like all men but who stood tall through three great tests of our country, tall and brave even when oppossed by his own party, his religion, perhaps his family- let us remember George Romney and men like him, and… Read full post »

it is generally a good idea to listen and then to evaluate what it being said; it should be a basic life skill but one that needs practice- I certainly am aware that I regularly catch myself listening for what I want to hear. I could blame a lifetime of indoctrination… Read full post »

Just a hello to friends here and I do try and keep up with my reading of the articles here as I enjoy them- generally i get to work forty minutes early, an old habit from "accepting" floors but I like to organize, let the place grow quiet, make the transition… Read full post »

i was sitting outside last even playing the didgeridoo for the birds.  didgeridoo's have the benefit of making one look comical so no critics come by but for squirrels which disapprove but not so much as to stop stealing from the garden, and they are easy to make noise through, and… Read full post »

I generally do little  of the blog nature on weekends but happened tobe reading this in the "private reading room" of my vast (proportionally to an ant hill) estate and found it useful as playing the digereedo for hummingbirds.

           &n… Read full post »

It was a hummingbird and it wintered in a place called Meheeco which was beautiful in sun and flowers and the hummingbird kept busy from flower to flower often buzzing past people scratching earth as quickly as a hummingbird flies. It felt a certain connection with these people tied to sun… Read full post »

after I posted my hummingbird tale ( we do get breaks between sessions) the Clinical Manager came in asking me to keep an eye out for one of our out patients who was cut from medical assistance without notice in our Republican state Governments balancing of the budget on the backs… Read full post »

I am increasingly fearful that this is a movie and that I do not understand my part. I actually am not sure if its a drama or a comedy although I am sure its a bad movie with a drunk director and a producer with too much money. I wake up… Read full post »

I love the Fourth. I watch "1776" and remember Richard Nixon trying to take out the number "Always to the Right" pointing out that the conservatives in the Continental congress wanted, though more to the left than the Tories,  to be safe. I used to go to the awarding of the… Read full post »