My Photos | Ain't Complicated

Yoder, Oregon: UFO Convention

Strange lights in the sky.

Strange sights on the ground.

And that in our little community of Yoder, Oregon.

No, I didn’t see them.

In fact, I don’t know that any were around to be seen.

But as I was driving through “town” on my way to the Molalla Post Office with a batch of business packages to mail, I saw some pretty balloons out of the corner of my eye. (The right one, that is.)

I looked over quickly…and did the proverbial double-take.

So on the way back home, I stopped to take some pictures with my cell phone.

UFO sightings? -- Yoder, Oregon

I actually worked up the courage to get out of my car to take a closer-up shot:

So there you are — a UFO fly-in about a mile up Kropf Road from us. So if we see strange sights and sounds to the north of us….

Maybe I should go down there tonight and scope out the visitors.

And find out what it takes to join the local U.F.O. Club.

Mexico: Check Out This View!

Or at least check out these view “establishers.”

My wife Ruby and I were in Guaymas Valley (Mexico) again; this time, the last part of June. And we stayed with Margaret Miller again. (Did I already tell you that in an earlier post?)

For breaks and entertainment, I experimented with various “frames” for some pictures.

southern view out the outhouse

looking east now, the length of the back porch

vertical view out of a jug
(me looking into a homemade clothespin holder/hanger)

Read it all

It Was Hot That Day!

Update way down below

This was at Margaret Miller’s place (a mission “compound” of Hope Mennonite Missions) in Guaymas Valley, Mexico:

It was hot that day! (And it got at least two-tenths of a degree hotter than what it shows above.)

Thankfully, it was also very dry.

The wind that blew most of the day, as I recall, was also hot and dry.

On days like that, to stay healthy stay in the shade and drink liquids.

Do lots of both, in fact.

Anyway, I’m left wondering what the thermometer would have recorded if we’d had it out in the sun.

Yesterday, I did an experiment here at home (near Yoder, Oregon). Here are the results:

Thermometer in the sun

That must be why temperatures are measured “in the shade” rather than “in the sun.”

😉

Originally posted: July 10, 2008 at 1:54 pm

Updated: July 12, 2008 at 2:03 pm

At 10:20 this morning, the temperature in the sun was 107, but in the shade it was merely 76.

Collecting Carbon Credits

Necessity is the mother of virtue. I don’t know that such a statement falls into either the Good Ole category or the True category.

But if reducing our carbon footprint is virtuous, well then, here we are in Mexico, being virtuous. Out of necessity.

automatic washer no work-ee

[Mark the printer]
computer printer no be-ee

So there you are: we didn’t run a washing machine nor a printing machine. We saved electricity. We reduced our carbon footprint. We collected carbon credits.

I don’t know how many.

But, yes, they’re for sale.

Cheap.

Expensive.

Exhorbitant.

RealConscienceSoother.

Buy those and I’ll throw in the credits I collected this morning when I (1) used the above lavadero to scrub out my handkerchief and (2) dried said handkerchief on the clothesline.

🙄

Happy Pappy!

I posted that from my cellphone at 2:08 pm.

Now I’ll add more via the Web.

Among the cards I received for Father’s Day are four from my wife, my seven children, and my three grandchildren.

Thank you!

And thanks to the rest of you as well!!

Memorial Day, Part 1

I drive by two roadside memorials quite often. (Well, more than two, but I’m thinking of two in particular.)

The first one is about two miles from our place — where Hwy 211 and Canby-Marquam Hwy cross. Over the years it’s been a bad, bad intersection — many wrecks, many injuries; many lives changed, many lives ended here on planet Earth. Interestingly, though, only one memorial remains:

Mercedes F. Ramirez-Flores

Cut off at age 15. Eleven years ago. People still remember Mercedes. I know, because I’ve seen some of them there. In their hearts, there’s more left of Mercedes than this roadside memorial.

But there’s another memorial that has often produced fleeting melancholy in me.

It’s also by Hwy 211, about 5.8 miles east of Hwy 99E in Woodburn.

It just sits there year after year. Untended. Perpetually almost to fall over. Forgotten?

Not by me!

And to my knowledge, I don’t even know this Peter: