Flickr Down, Blogs Up, Good News
I’ve been diddling around on the computer all day while I could have been out marching for immigration in the streets of Portland. I feel vaguely guilty for sitting on my butt, but here I am anyway, and here’s what I’ve discovered. Flickr has changed the rules. Now if you want to store more than 200 pictures, you have to pay. If you want more than three “sets,” you have to pay. I was afraid that would happen. Until now I’ve been using the blog for words, with a link to Flickr for pictures. No more free ride there. Anybody know any reliable free sites for storing photographs? On the other hand, there’s Youtube, which I sometimes forget. But what a resource! Moonbeam McQueen’s blog for today is so hilarious I had to read it three times to take it all in–especially Dennis and Vageena. And check out the birdhouse. Genius on wheels. I want her to move to Portland. And I’ve just found two really delightful new blogs. One is by Jamie, who I met in Houston just before she moved to New York state to go “homesteading” (and if you are like me and you don’t know what that means, I’ll come back to it in a minute). The other is a delightful blog by a woman the age of my firstborn son who calls herself “Old Crone” (if she’s an old crone, what does that make me? a withered hag?). OC writes with energy and infectious delight. She posted the following ode to Aretha:
Picture me, a little blond haired, blue eyed girl growing up in the desert of Southern California in the 70’s and 80’s. I was so out of place really. I loved the blues, even back then. My mom thought my sixteen year old self was nuts because I had collections containing names such as Bessie Smith, Billy Holiday, Nina Simone etc..but the one Lady (yes I did use that capitol “L” on purpose) that I spent the most time listening to was Aretha. I still melt when I hear her. Her version of Bridge Over Troubled Waters is the only one I really like, and I love Simon and Garfunkle. My all time favorite song though is “Ain’t No Way”. How many hours of my life have I spent listening to this song, or to “Say a Little Prayer” or “Call Me”… but sometimes, a girl just needs to go home. People have asked me what I think God sounds like when he sings. Well, I don’t know what “he” sounds like, but I know, without a doubt in my soul that when God sings, this is her voice.
Oh my goodness, how wonderful. Sometimes a girl just needs to go home. Ain’t it the truth. I spent the morning looking at my favorite Aretha, Patti LaBelle (this link is to her performance of Lennon’s “Imagine” at LiveAid, but you have to be patient, put up with an idiotic British M.C. who calls her a great “Black lady singer” [ow!], and then wait for the song she’s singing at the beginning of the video to finish–but it’s worth the wait for this version of “Imagine”), Odetta, and Joan Armatrading performances on Youtube, thanks to OC. They’ve all aged wonderfully, and they are glorious models of how to be a FINE old woman. Joan Armatrading makes my knees weak.
And here’s what Jamie says about homesteading:
“I think in a nutshell at 8:19am on a Thursday morn to me it means living in harmony with the land, tending to it, taking care of it to meet its potential without taking away from the local wildlife and habitat so that it can provide for me and my family, cause no harm, building a small earth sheltered home with the smallest footprint possible from what is provided without a mortgage, being self sufficient, living off grid, becoming the least dependent as possible on this system for anything and no gas guzzling farm equipment and cars.”
Go, Jamie! Some days, listening to the voices of these young idealists, the future just looks so rosy, despite all the other things we know, I have to grin. And then there is more good news: my daughter Manko is no longer (her expression) a “broke heifer.” She has just landed a job at Kroger’s in Houston and is living happily with a wonderful family who’ve helped her make a major shift in energy. And my ex-daughter-in-law has found a spectacularly gorgeous very large studio apartment in Newark, with little nooks and crannies and built-in bookshelves and wainscotting (she sent me a whole stack of pictures) not twenty minutes from Manhattan. Now she can make her good, new life. I’m launching into a full-voice version of this song!
Tags: Blogs and Blogging
Kendall
Hi Kendall,
Thank you so much for stopping by my blog, and for all the nice things you have to say about my blog.
Peace,
OC
Delighted, Old Crone. Yours truly, Withered Hag.
hahah i loved moonbeams post too 😛
Thanks Kendal mostly for your blog, but also for the nod at mine. 🙂 It’s always a blessing to come back in contact with a congenial soul. Adds a spark to the day! I’m looking forward to reading the BearsMountain blog.