0 Breakfast, Power Outage Lessons, and a Couple Chicks

 (No, this isn't turning into a foodie blog.) 

Just an example of one of my favorite slow-morning breakfast garbage piles: 

shredded potatoes, leeks, chopped up mushrooms, egg whites, Wensleydale Creamery Oakey Smokey cheese, Wensleydale Creamery Coverdale cheese, rosemary, and garlic.  

Best part is- it's all organic, local, and the chickens and cows are happy- I've seen them myself!

 Our power was scheduled to go out today for routine maintenance.  No problem, right?  It didn't even go out until 2, so I was able to get some photo work done on my computer.  When it did go out, and our house alarm and fire alarms started beeping and freaking out Sloan (she hates those), I figured "no problem, we'll just go ahead on our walk." So I got the dogs together, got their bag together, got us all in the car, and punched my gate fob.  Three times.  Then I realized the gate's electric.  So we walked through our neighbor's courtyard and did a local walk.  Not a bad thing, except that both dogs have, for some reason, developed a firm aversion to walking in roadside grass, so when the sidewalk ends it becomes a physical struggle to keep all ten of our feet out of the 60mph roads.  One more reason why we normally drive them to places they can be off lead... grrrrr.

Oh- we also came home to the house alarm squealing.  Now, when I say Sloan hates beeping you should also know that she FREAKS OUT with the alarm going off.  She was yelping and trying to climb me as I punched every button possible- which only made the alarm louder and more obnoxious.  Finally I called Paul at work and had him look up our landlord's mom's phone number- she used to live in our house, and was able to give me the reset code.  

Lessons: open the electric gate before a known power outage so you don't get trapped

know the reset code before the phone becomes impossible to hear and the dog is freaking out

I also went through some old files and papers from college and found these little dudes (along with 15 or so of their assorted buddies).  As a photography major I was required to take one printmaking course.  I hated it every second, especially the second I stuck a sharp carving knife into my finger. 

However, now, 9 years later (ouch!), I kind of like these little guys.  I remember them; they're from after I gave up carving wood for reduction prints and just bought all the giant erasers I could find.

(Oh, yeah- if you want a cheater step in printmaking, buy giant white or grey erasers- the stiffer kind, used for charcoal drawings.  They carve easily and beautifully, and clean between inks easily, too.  Just don't use them in front of your professor- they tend to frown on shortcuts!)

I found some other prints, too, but I'm considering matting some of these little chicks in a grid and framing them.  Who'd have thought something from my most-hated art class would make me smile?!