Dogs and Other Distractions

I should have submitted this entry for Feline & Furball Friday, but I meant to do another one later in the week. Oh, well!

Pepper and Cayenne wait for the vet.

As millions of people over the past decade and a half have had occasion to remark, the Internet can easily suck up every minute of your spare time and more. That was true even in the old days of Usenet, Prodigy, CompuServe and then-nascent AOL, when the offerings consisted almost entirely of message boards and the beginnings of email. Since then, it's gotten much worse. One may eventually tire of writing three paragraphs a night about some tv show, to be read by the same people as last night's three paragraphs. But these days, there are many flavors of potentially addictive online activities. I personally can happily ignore most of them: gaming and cybersex, chat rooms and most kinds of downloads hold little attraction for me. But that still leaves blogging and photo sharing, Wikipedia and the toe-dipping edges of social networking and online political activism. Like everyone else, I can ignore the vast majority of the Internet because not all of it suits my particular interests, and because the firehose is simply too big for any single person to chug what it sprays. But that still leaves the trickle of stuff that is interesting enough to eat up an entire holiday weekend if I let it.

After my all-nighter with Picasa last night, I got two hours of sleep and then took the dogs to the vet, about which more below. Then I fussed with Picasa some more, went to bed for five hours, got dinner and went back online. Aside from the usual, I've written a blog post on the Obama website linking back here, made two of my Picasa collections of Outpost photos public as Picasa albums, and made a start on tagging hundreds (eventually thousands) of photos. Yeah, this is going to take a while. Even since starting this entry, I've been distracted for a couple hours, doing more tagging and deleting another 3 GB or more of dupe photos from the backup hard drive.

Restless dogs in motion

Can we leave now?

The veterinarian's appointment was just for Cayenne, so she could get the last of her booster shots. But Pepper was so excited when I put the leash on Cayenne, and so determined to get out the door, that it was easier to bring her along than to make her stay home.

This outing seemed much more fun back at the house.

In a way, though, it was just as well, because Pepper got more out of the trip than any of us bargained for. The vet wanted to put both dogs on heartworm prevention and pre-prevention testing, plus a flea and tick prevention formula. With the exam and the booster shot, this would all have come to over $200 for Cayenne alone. But by saying no to the flea and tick stuff ($96 per dog), I was able to get the heartworm thing done for both dogs. They didn't really examine Pepper, but they did measure her weight: 44 pounds, I think it was, something like ten pounds heavier than Cayenne.

Cayenne did not enjoy waiting around.

There was a lot of sitting around waiting at the vet's office, mostly in the exam room, resulting in a lot of doggie stress and fidgeting. But the vet was pleased with Cayenne's improved weight and skin, which had been flaky before. Pepper's was worse, and is also much better now.

And then tonight, Pepper made another contribution to the Monday Photo Shoot meme of destruction. But that's a photo for tomorrow night.

Karen

First Night With Picasa

I've been up all night playing with Picasa, Google's photo sharing and organizing program and online service. So far I've basically managed to dump thousands of dupe files from my backup hard drive, and build the following album and slide show:

http://picasaweb.google.com/Mavarin2/TroubleDogs



First impressions:

• It's hard to figure out how to get started with this thing. I went around and around, trying to use my existing screen name, but couldn't. In the end I went with Mavarin2. There is little or no useful help info, most of the time.
• Picasa is extremely useful in figuring out what you've got, where it is, and whether you have multiple copies.
• On the other hand, deleting folders of dupe photos is made difficult by a quirk of programming. Picasa throws a config file into the folder, so it's not empty, so Picasa won't delete the folder. If it's inside another folder, it actually stops Windows from letting you delete the whole thing.
• Some things are clunky. For example, I didn't find a way to do mass tagging. When you have over 1500 folders containing photos, tagging one photo at a time is going to take a while.

Enough. Cayenne has a vet's appointment in less than three hours for her booster shots. Good night/good morning!

Karen

Weekend Assignment #231: Candidates With a Difference

After a primary season that seemed to go on forever, we're in the thick of the political conventions in this country. The Democrats just finished, and the Republicans start up shortly. All this hoo-hah is a reminder of past political campaigns, and of how much things have changed over the years. One of the biggest changes seems to be that candidates no longer have to be middle-aged white men to be taken seriously. Then again, not all candidates are meant to be taken seriously. Hence this week's Weekend Assignment:

Weekend Assignment #231: Over the years we've had a number of oddball candidates for public office, from cartoon characters to a live pig, from comedians to tv stars to an ex-wrestler. But it's only in recent years that a candidate who doesn't fit the usual profile can run for office and actually expect to win. Who is the most unusual political candidate you have ever supported, either seriously or in jest?

Extra Credit: Present politicians excepted. have you ever regretted voting for a candidate, in light of later events?

Me first! My first Presidential election as a voter was in 1976, when peanut farmer Jimmy Carter faced accidental incumbent Gerald Ford. Both of the headliners were unusual, but at least one also-ran that year was far stranger.

I'm speaking, of course, of Howard the Duck.

I've written before about my enjoyment of the late Steve Gerber's writing, especially when I was in college and he was writing Howard the Duck. The character was ascerbic and down to earth (literally), a wry commenter on human society and an unwilling participant in a series of altercations with such satire-based foes as Bessie the Hellcow, Sudd, the Scrubbing Bubble That Walks Like a Man, and Rev. Joon Moon Yuc.

In Howard the Duck #7, Howard is drafted by the All-Night Party as their Presidential nominee. Issue #8 (see the Gene Colan cover art here) is the story of his campaign, which consists largely of ducking assassination attempts by "Canada's only super-patriot" and his associate, a duck-hating bellboy. The issue ends with a scandalous (and doctored) photo published on Election Day, which ensures that Howard can't win the election. In issue #9, written before the actual election but published immediately after it, the loathsome bellboy says, "I told you--Howard didn't win. Even back home, nobody cares who did."

I'm thinking that compared to Howard, Obama has it relatively easy. He is, after all, human, doesn't have a homicidal bellboy after him, and he's not going to be thrown out of his hotel because his political party can't pay its bills!

So anyway, the thing is, there were real Howard the Duck campaign buttons. I have one. I wore it all through college. I think my dad was a little worried that I would write-in Howard's name on the two-inch strip of paper meant for write-in votes on the old New York State voting machines. Under the law in those days, a write-in vote for president didn't count unless you could legibly write the names of all of the appropriate members of the Electoral College supporting that candidate, and be done voting in no more than three minutes. But what the heck - a protest vote is a protest vote, even if there are no electors for Howard the Duck, even is it's completely impossible to enter a vote for him and have it be counted, even if there's no such...uh, duck. So I think my dad got a little nervous when he saw me wearing my HTD button on Election Day. He made it clear to me that the 1976 election was too close and too important to mess around voting for spurious candidates. But hey, no problem. I was always going to vote for Jimmy Carter in real life.

I'll come back for the extra credit later today.

Your turn! Tell us about the quirky candidate back home, the comedian whose satirical platform actually made sense, the candidate who wasn't even human, or the very real candidate who was unusual as the first X to do Y. Don't forget to link back here in the entry, and to leave a link to the entry in the comments below. I'll be back late Thursday night with a gallery of unusual politicians. Have a great week!

Karen

Weekend Assignment Results: The World Was Watching

I'm a little surprised - pleased by surprised - at the excellent response to last week's Weekend Assignment #230: The World Is Watching, in which I asked whether you watched the Olympics this year. The responses covered different levels of interest, different sports, and even different Olympics, which is fine by me!

Becky said in comments...

While I have a small interest in some summer olympic sports, I haven't seen even a MOMENT of this years events. Not even recaps on the news (which I also haven't watched lately). I have seen a couple names mentioned online and a photo here and there. That's about it.

Barbara said in comments...

I don't watch the olympics religiously but I do enjoy the gymnastics, in the winter I like the ice skating.
Barbara

Laura said...

I caught a couple of races with Michael Phelps. I usually watch more than I have, but I was traveling around the country and had not set TiVo to tape them before I left. I like watching swimming, volleyball, and track on TiVo, since you can fast forward and find out who wins without sitting through the whole thing. The swim team guys were really buff this year.

Sarah said...

Um, the Olympics have been happening? OK, actually it isn't quite that bad. I know the Olympics began on 8/8/08 and ended today. Having been in Beijing myself two years ago, I even made a few first-hand observations of the city's gargantuan efforts to prepare itself for them.

Florinda said...

Even if the sports had more appeal to me, I feel that the way the TV coverage is done detracts from the games themselves. I don't really enjoy the "USA vs. the world" angle; isn't it "every country in the world vs. each other," really? The soft-focus human-interest stories about the favored athletes have become joke fodder rather than interesting background.

Mike said...

I'll admit, I got sucked in to the Michael Phelps hype. I wanted to see if he'd break Mark Spitz record. I remember pretending to be him with my brother and step-brother when we would go to the pool. I was only three when he won the medals, but he was still popular. Didn't he do aftershave ads? That's where I probably saw him first.

Kiva said...

This year we were staying with friends in Gardnerville and they had the Olympics on from morning to night. I was blown away by the Opening Ceremonies. That huge LCD screen was amazing, but I was rather frightened by the precision of the dancers and the drummers. Very scary -- it was like seeing the Borg come to life.

Bea said in comments...

Sorry for my absence....these past few weeks have been focused on school. I did watch the Olympics, as much as I could. The opening was spectacular. I'm going to order the DVD of that event. I caught glimpses of the gymnastics, swimming, men's volleyball, beach volleyball, the relay races, pole vault, fencing, and diving competitions. When I wasn't sleeping or in school!

Thanks, folks! The new topic will be posted shortly.

Karen

No One Quite Gets It Right

Gack! It's 1 AM already! I've been fussing with photos, Twitter and a couple of campaign sites, and editing the last chapter of Heirs of Mâvarin (yay!), and suddenly it's late again. I'll just throw a few images and a few comments on here and call it a night, okay? (As if you have a choice!)

He's just a mouse, but he could be a metaphor,

John spotted this mouse outside his office this morning. He's climbed onto a ledge about ten feet off the ground, and seems to have no way to get down again. If he's still there in the morning, I've asked John to find a way to rescue him. I know, I know: mice can bite, and carry diseases. But I hope John will find a way to do it safely, assuming the mouse doesn't manage on his own. He's two or three times the size of a basic house mouse, and yet clearly not a rat. I even wondered whether he might be a house pet. Gerbil, perhaps? I could make the mouse (or gerbil) a metaphor for someone or something, but let's not.

I love the monsoon!

The weather here has been wonderful for the past few days, overcast with beautiful clouds that keep the temperatures low and disgorge intermittent rain. We've actually been driving two and from work with the a/c off and the windows open. Tucson in the 70s? In August? Amazing! Okay, so officially it did get up to 92 in Tucson at one point, but it was mostly in the 70s.

Another lost opportunity for metaphor.

Sort of like a pink and blue mushroom cloud.

I have a few days' backlog of sunsets and clouds and stuff. This one was Saturday, I think. Maybe Friday - yes, that's it. I liked that this vaguely mushroomish cloud built up right where the sunset was. I was going to use it as an excuse to call my blog entry "Boom!" But I hadn't quite worked out a concept to go with the title. Ah, well. Sometimes...most of the time...maybe all of the time, I don't quite manage to pull off the effect I'm trying for in these entries. There are typos and compromises as I get tired, realize I lack the resources or inspiration or expertise, or just run out of time. I don't quite get it right.

But that's okay. Nobody else does either.

As I mentioned at the top of this entry, I visited two campaign sites tonight - well, three, if you count the one with the live convention feed. If you've glanced at my sidebar, you know which sites the other two are.

I have to say, though, I was slightly disappointed with the sites for both Obama and my congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords. Obama's web-savvy online presence has been heavily praised, and rightly so, especially in comparison to John McCain's technological illiteracy. Heck, I'm following Obama's campaign on Twitter, and they're theoretically following me. He's on all the social networking sites, has videos and web graphics and even news and video feed widgets. So how come I can't find a single downloadable Obama-Biden logo? I got one, but I had to "view source" to get to it, and it's not especially sidebar-friendly.

And then there's the Fight the Smears page, which debunks the anti-Obama email that my former co-worker and John's current boss both like to forward everywhere. (It's almost a game between John and his boss; John seems to research something and show C. that it's not true nearly every day.) I'm all in favor of Obama using the web to fight web-based lies and distortions, although Snopes pretty much has it covered, with more claims debunked than Obama's site. But why isn't there even one simple link from Fight the Smears back to the main Obama site?

As for Gabrielle Giffords, I kind of expected her site to be on a par with Obama's, since she's fairly young and definitely smart, and seems to have a clue about such things. After all, she's married to an astronaut, and is a bit of an expert on alternative energy sources. And her site is pretty good; like Obama she's got videos and online donations, organizing opportunities and email listserves. But she doesn't even have a page of logos for your blog or web site. The one of my sidebar is the one at the top of the page on her blog. In context, you know who Giffords is and what she's running for and when, but away from her own web site that logo, such as it is, is dull and uncommunicative. I added her first name to my sidebar logo, but the result is grammatically iffy.

Ah, well. I'm not going to solve the candidates' minor deficiencies tonight on this blog! It's late, and one of the things I'm not getting right is the whole adequate sleep thing. Good night!

Karen

And the Destruction Derby Continues!

Getting my entry in early for Feline & Furball Friday:

How long before Cayenne chews my shoes?

Did I mention that they're Trouble Dogs? Why, yes, I did. And since then, both dogs have seemingly set out to prove it!

Goodbye to my favorite vintage lamp.

Not content to let Pepper hold the title of Destructo-Queen after the damage she did on Sunday, Cayenne got her leg caught tonight in the cord leading to our irreplaceable 1950s overhead lamp. She panicked, and brought the whole thing crashing to the kitchen floor!

Shortly after that, she was leaping on and off the bed, barking, in an attempt to engage Pepper and establish her dominance. At one point she grabbed a hunk of blanket in her mouth, but we quickly put a stop to that.

In the den, she climbed on the couch - but not just onto the part where you lie down. She was going for the top of the back of the couch. I quickly removed the empty dishes from the pass-through to the kitchen, which is accessible from there.

And then...and then! She dashed to the bookcase of Doctor Who DVDs and leaped up against it (or possibly the wall next to it), grabbing for a fly!

I called her off, but the fly continued to hold her attention. She completely ignored Hillary Clinton's convention speech. Well, I don't really expect a dog to understand politics.

Today I made a Saturday appointment for her booster shot. The receptionist remembered her from three weeks ago, just before we dumped her old name, Ireland. She volunteered that Cayenne is a great name for her, and looks forward to seeing her again. Well, sure! She didn't just destroy the receptionist's lamp!

Then again, Pepper lies down a lot anyway.

But hey, their training continues. Pepper now knows how to Lie Down on command (if a treat is involved), and Cayenne, whom we're trying to teach not to paw at us, knows how to Shake.

Somehow I think the training is going a bit wrong....

Karen

The Monsoon Returns (Cough-Cough)

The subdivided sky: Saturday 8/23/08, approx. 4 PM

The time has come to admit that I'm a little concerned about this cough.

Back in late June, I had a cold. As usually happens with me, especially in recent years, the cough has hung on long after the cold itself was gone - not constantly and horribly, but a nagging cough set off by little things like lying down, or trying to take a deep breath. As I say, this has happened before, a number of times. I've even been to my doctor on past occasions of it. As I recall, she listened to my chest, heard very little, wrote down the word "bronchitis" and gave me a prescription for an albuterol inhaler. Which didn't help.

Two things are different this time:

1. The cough is getting worse. I drive John crazy, coughing in the car, coughing into my pillow, coughing pretty much anywhere. I'm not going to try your patience with gross details, but I feel an asthmatic tightness in my chest pretty much all the time now. A good cough helps a little, briefly, but it's clearly not going away on its own. I'm coughing more and more, not less and less.

2. I have no health insurance. I'm a temp. If I temp for long enough on a continual basis, I'll have health insurance through the temp agency. I should check the envelopes they keep sending me, to see whether I've reached that point - but I doubt it.

I have a history of asthma, going all the way back to infancy; but normally as an adult it's only hit me when I was around certain allergens (e.g. cats), attempting aerobic exercise, or exerting myself in the summer heat (100+ degrees). But now I'm having problems just sitting in an air conditioned room, typing. I've been taking the common expectorant Guaifenesin, which is found in basically all cough medicine. So far it doesn't seem to help me clear things out much. John thinks I should be taking fish oil capsules at mealtimes, and maybe he's right.

Our old friend, the ribbon of clouds on the Catalinas

I think the return of the monsoon, much as I love it, is exacerbating things slightly. Even John can smell the mold as we approach the river on the way to work. But I do love this time of year. That photo at the top of this entry comes from late Saturday afternoon, as I drove back from photographing Glenn Stone and the wine bottle. The sky was dark with rain or impending rain to the northeast and southeast. But dead east, there was a patch of brightness and fluffy white clouds. As I arrived at El Taco Tote on Wilmot, it started to rain.

Odd thing about El Taco Tote, a regional chain of Mexican restaurants: that location closed months ago. It was replaced by a restaurant with a rather strange menu, Hawaiian plate meals I think they were called. This was basically Polynesian barbecue plus macaroni salad. Apparently this polyglot cuisine is common in Hawaii, but I'd never heard of it. It was okay, but I could have told them it wouldn't go over well in Tucson. And now El Taco Tote is back, in the same location they left early this year. So why did they shut down, and what brought them back? Not that I'm complaining! They're rather good.


One last shot before I go back to bed. John spotted this on Speedway Blvd tonight, and turned around so I could take a picture to go with the ones from the weekend. What can I say? The man loves me.

Karen

Monday Photo Shoot #35: Two D Words and an Announcement

Okay, first off: last week's Monday Photo Shoot #34, in which I asked you to show us just any old junk, was responded to only by our faithful friend Jama in Singapore, who managed to make even her junk pretty!

Second: I have an announcement! Starting next week, September 1st, the Monday Photo Shoot will be taken over by our good friend Carly, over at Ellipsis. This meme, started by John Scalzi on By The Way on March 7, 2005, remains close to my heart; but I've been getting a little burned out in it recently. Carly will bring fresh ideas and a new and better attitude to the Monday Photo Shoot, and I hope that many of you will support her efforts by participating, even if you haven't done so in a while.

So, since this is the last time I'll be assigning the topic, I really should make it a good one. Trouble is, I've had two competing ideas in my head all day. They both start with a D, so let's use that as an excuse to combine the topics in one MPS:

New Monday Photo Shoot #35: Departure, or Destruction! Photograph either a departure of some sort - people walking away, a train pulling out of the station, a graduation, whatever - or evidence of destruction. If your photos combine the two somehow, that's even better!

Goodbye, Tuffy

Dogs have their priorities.

The source of the departure concept is obvious, even though I'm not going anywhere. I'll still be playing along, just not organizing.

As for the destruction, here's my inspiration:

Pepper checks her work.

Pretty impressive damage to that door!

Pepper declined to leave the air conditioned bedroom when I set off for church. When John checked on her, she had tried to claw her way through the door in her attempt to depart from the room!

Your turn! Here's your last chance to play along with a Monday Photo Shoot topic that comes from me personally. Please don't be a no-show! Put the photo or photos in your blog or journal with a link back here, and don't forget to leave a link to your entry in the comments below. I'll be back in a week to highlight your entries - and Carly will start off a new era with her New New Monday Photo Shoot the same evening! Have fun!

Karen

RRPC: Public Art, Privately Provided, Part Two

As I was compiling my Round Robin entry last night, I found myself getting bogged down with what one might call the kitschy, Roadside America end of the public art spectrum. I spent at least an hour searching for my photos of dinosaurs and giant lumberjacks, and although I didn't find everything I wanted, I still ended up with far too much material for a single entry. So here we go: Public Art, Part Two: Prehistoric Pitchmen and Other Outdated Artifacts of Advertising Art Americana. Or something like that!

First stop on our tour of Tucson's roadside art: the Dinosaur McDonald's at Grant and Tanque Verde:

There he is! the T. Rex McSaurus!

(Thanks for Sara for the nickname suggestion.)

The world's friendliest T. Rex? Maybe.

Look at the evidence. He waves an American flag on the Fourth of July, and at Christmas he wears antlers and pulls a sleigh. Nice lizard! On the other hand...

Red means stop! Violators will be eaten!

Not content with the cameras that record red light runners at key intersections, the city has hired our friend to take more drastic measures as needed.

The other dinosaur checks her reflection.

Around back is another dinosaur with her babies. She's a Maiasaura (meaning "good mother lizard").

Don't cry, baby dinosaur!

And here are her babies. I don't why the mother and baby both get the eye discharge. Maybe it's genetic. Or maybe they're both just upset about something.

What? No Shamrock Shakes? But...but...!

Next stop: El Toro, the Brave Black Bull. He and his matador have been hanging out in the Casa Molina Restaurant parking lot (on Speedway near Wilmot) since the late 1940s.

"We've both seen better days, old friend."

He currently needs a new coat of paint, and I wish people would stop giving him star spangled...um...well, see for yourself.

Does this mean I'm marching in a parade?

Nearby is another large herbivore, the Winged Bison of Copper Country.

Not many winged bisons like to ride in boats.

I previously showed you the bizarre bison when he was in a silver space suit, standing next to a flying saucer, in honor of the UA Lunar and Planetary Laboratory's Mars Lander. This week he's thanking our nation's military by standing on a red, white and blue boat.

Does this color look good on me?

He's not one to pick a look and go with it, our winged bison friend. The first time I saw him, he was hot pink!

I made a number of other stops today, including Fort Lowell to see a somewhat more traditional statue, and OK Feed and Grain, where a painted pony stands on the roof. They don't quite fit my criteria for this entry, so those shots will have to wait for another time. And the full complement of critters and mythological figures is still at Magic Carpet Golf, months and months after the place closed. You can see a bunch of shots, some of them from past RRPCs, by following my Magic Carpet Golf tag. And of course there's also the Kon Tiki, the classic tiki lounge that I've photographed at least twice before, including an outdoor tiki head. But no tour of Tucson's roadside Americana-style public art would be complete without a pilgrimage to two more local landmarks:

No, he's not Paul Bunyan, or a Muffler Man.*

He's Glenn Stone, the axe murderer!

*See Roadside America for the story of the muffler men.

Okay, I take it back. He is both a Paul Bunyan and a muffler man, and he's never hurt anyone as far as I know. I've told his story before. His name, Glenn Stone, comes from the fact that he stands at the corner of Glenn and Stone. At the moment, his shirt needs cleaning (birds, you know), and his face needs a touch up. Also, his right arm looks as though he's undergone Tommy John surgery. Or something.

The last one I had trouble finding. I couldn't remember which street it was on, anywhere from Oracle to Campbell, from Grant to Roger. It eventually turned up on First near Grant. Behold: the giant concrete wine bottle!


I could swear it used to look much more interesting.

Karen


Linking List:

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Momma - Posted!
Sandcastle Momma
http://sandcastlemomma.blogspot.com

TJ - Posted! 8/23
TJ's Photo Blog
http://tjphotoexpressions.blogspot.com/

Annie - Posted!
Pictures of Craziness
http://krspkrmmom.blogspot.com

AND...

Me and My Phone - Posted!
http://neemom.blogspot.com

Wammy - Posted!
The Ellis Family Cincinnati
http://www.theellisfamilycincinnati.blogspot.com

Vicki - Posted!
Maraca
http://mymaracas.blogspot.com/

Molly - Posted!
Return of the White Robin
http://returnofthewhiterobin.blogspot.com

Riccardo
Photo Blog (Private blog)
http://riccardophotoblog.blogspot.com/

Pamela - Posted!
The Dust Will Wait
http://thedustwillwait.blogspot.com/

Swampy - Posted!
Anecdotes, Antidotes, & Anodes
http://anecdotes.typepad.com

Sahvvy
Instantaneous Exsistence
http://instantaneousexsistence.blogspot.com/

Em Dy - Posted!
Captured Beat
http://capturedbeat.blogspot.com

Jama Hameed - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Jennifer Robin - Posted!
Robin's Woods
http://robinswoods.blogspot.com/

Teena - Posted!
It's all about me!
http://purple4mee.blogspot.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com/

Charish -Posted!
Charish-Me
http://www.charish-me.blogspot.com

Maryt - Posted!
Work of the Poet
http://workofthepoet.blogspot.com

RRPC: Public Art, Privately Provided, Part One

I commute past these statues daily.

Our friend Carly has been showing us an amazing variety of outdoor art on her blog for years. Ever since she suggested Public Art as a Round Robin Photo Challenge, I've been looking forward to seeing what art can be found in public spaces outside the Bay Area, and on the lookout for examples here in Tucson. Now that the time has come to show them off, I'm going to limit myself to examples with rather specific criteria.

Most places have government-sponsored public art - a statue of a general on a horse, a mural of some historic moment, a sculpture outside a library or courthouse, that sort of thing. But what about when the public art is on private land, displayed by a business for commercial purposes? That's what I'm interested in showing off - specifically, statues one can see from the street. Tonight I'll be focusing on the commercially available pieces seen at two particular locations I pass every day on the way to work, both of which have art galleries. Tomorrow I'll take you for a swing around Tucson for some kitschy roadside Americana.

One end of the Plaza Colonial, near the bronze monuments

The current bust in the housing market has hit Tucson hard (you may recall that the mortgage company I worked for suddenly went belly-up a year ago this month), but new buildings continue to go up in the Catalina Foothills. There are several recently-built shopping centers along the Sunrise/Skyline corridor, with ornate domes and high-end businesses inside. The corner of Campbell and Skyline is home to Plaza Colonial, site of at least two art galleries, with more across the street.

Cowboy and Indian, coexisting as High Art

I've been intrigued all summer by the upscale shopping centers, especially the one with the three statues at street level. Riding past them with John driving, I couldn't really tell what they were meant to be, and my initial researches online were fruitless. So on Thursday we stopped to inspect them up close and take pictures. (Actually, John waited in the car while I climbed up to the little plaza with my camera.) Today I did more online research and even made a phone call - and finally got some info for you. Let's meet these three figures of upscale Western art!

Addih-Hiddisch, Hidatsa Chief -
looking out over the Santa Catalinas

Addih-Hiddisch, Hidatsa Chief - front view

This first one is by John Coleman, depicting a chief that historian-painters Karl Bodmer and George Catlin met a quarter century after Lewis and Clark. Nine of them were cast in this size (it's 7'3" tall), and it won the 2004 Cowboy Artists of America Gold Medal, Artist Choice, and Kieckhefer awards. There's something about it that doesn't quite work for me, but it's an excellent piece of art. It's very detailed, a careful and respectful rendering of an historical person. It has dignity and gravitas and beauty. I think my problem with it is that it's not as accessible at the other pieces here, and Addih-Hiddisch probably never visited the Santa Catalina Mountains in real life. That's a very silly reason not to appreciate the piece as much as I undoubtedly should.

Jack Knife Moumental Bronze
by Ed Mell

This is the modern entry among the pieces here. I like modern art, but the setting at Campbell and Skyline doesn't quite set this piece off to its best advantage. It looks very much the odd-figure out among the two realistic statues on the plaza, and from the street you can't really tell what it is because of the distance and angle. The gallery website shows two of its brothers against different backdrops, and it really helps.

Fabric of Life "Ganado Red"
by Star Liana York

Rear view, looking north toward Navajo country

Another angle, showing the intersection

This one is my favorite by far, and it took a bit more digging to identify it. It's part of a series called Fabric of Life, depicting native people (mostly this specific character, it looks like) doing something textile-related. This Navajo woman seems very strong and matter-of-fact to me as she shakes out her Ganado Red-style rug, the sort that used to be sold at the legendary Hubbell Trading Post. The Navajo are from northern Arizona and neighboring states, so it's less of a stretch to see her here in Tucson. I also like the way the artist has used the medium of bronze to give the woman and her clothing fairly lifelike colors.

How many restaurants have something like this out front?

Now we leave the Mark Sublette gallery artists behind and head downhill, south and east to Plaza Palomino on Swan Road at Ft. Lowell. There was a restaurant at the corner there called Firecracker, with spicy Chinese food. That was replaced a while ago by something else, and that's gone now, too. This fall it's scheduled to reopen at Luna Bella, but that's not important right now. The point is that it's another place I go past every day that has statues on display, a few steps from the street. Some of them are fountains, some not. All are female figures, from a variety of cultures, with urns or baskets on their heads. I have no idea why they all have this particular detail.

It turns out they are from a gallery at Plaza Palomino called Enchanted Earthworks. They sell a wide variety of arts and crafts, from western jewelry to feminine fountains. Unfortunately, their website did not identify the artist or artists who made these figures. Tonight I walked around and photographed a number of them for you:

one of the fountains (detail)

The Japanese woman ignores the commerce
behind her, and enjoys the greenery instead.

The yellow woman is a fountain...

...but her friend with the purse is not.

A couple of the figures are encrusted with
stones. I think these are lapis lazuli.

There's no denying that the figures wandering outside Plaza Palomino are not in the same class as the three bronzes at Campbell and Skyline. But I bet they don't cost $75,000 each, either!

Now let's go see what public art everyone else found:

Linking List:

Carly - Posted!
Ellipsis
http://ellipsissuddenlycarly.blogspot.com

Karen - Posted!
Outpost Mâvarin
http://outmavarin.blogspot.com

Momma - Posted!
Sandcastle Momma
http://sandcastlemomma.blogspot.com

TJ - Posted!
TJ's Photo Blog
http://tjphotoexpressions.blogspot.com/

Annie
Pictures of Craziness
http://krspkrmmom.blogspot.com

AND...

Me and My Phone
http://neemom.blogspot.com

Wammy - Posted!
The Ellis Family Cincinnati
http://www.theellisfamilycincinnati.blogspot.com

Vicki - Posted!
Maraca
http://mymaracas.blogspot.com/

Molly - Posted!
Return of the White Robin
http://returnofthewhiterobin.blogspot.com

Riccardo
Photo Blog (Private blog)
http://riccardophotoblog.blogspot.com/

Pamela - Posted!
The Dust Will Wait
http://thedustwillwait.blogspot.com/

Swampy - Posted!
Anecdotes, Antidotes, & Anodes
http://anecdotes.typepad.com

Sahvvy
Instantaneous Exsistence
http://instantaneousexsistence.blogspot.com/

Em Dy - Posted!
Captured Beat
http://capturedbeat.blogspot.com

Jama Hameed - Posted!
Sweet Memories
http://mummyjam.blogspot.com

Jennifer Robin - Posted!
Robin's Woods
http://robinswoods.blogspot.com/

Teena - Posted!
It's all about me!
http://purple4mee.blogspot.com

Gattina - Posted!
Keyhole Pictures
http://gattina-keyholepictures.blogspot.com/

Charish -Posted!
Charish-Me
http://www.charish-me.blogspot.com

Maryt - Posted!
Work of the Poet
http://workofthepoet.blogspot.com

And don't forget to stop back here later this weekend for the matador, the dinosaur McDonald's and other delights!

Karen