Wait! What? Is…. Is that…. Is that the finish line?

Okay, so I’m still trying to burn through 2012’s Project 365 picture updates so that the dang thing will finally be out of my hair.  I think there will just be one post to go after this one.  Ready?  Me too.  Let’s do it….


Day 336 (2012-12-01) ~  Scope’s mom had a Florida-themed tree set up for Christmas.  This is a shot of one of the sand dollars she has hanging on it.  I love, love, LOVE how to looks in black and white.





Day 337 (2012-12-02) ~  Just a partial shot of a beautiful light-up house Scope’s mom had set up in the guest room we stayed in when we visited for the weekend.   (Sorry, this pic was really taken on the 1st, not the 2nd.)





Day 338 (2012-12-03) ~  A shot of Christmas lights on a fence that I snapped while running to the train station in the dark.  (Eh.  I know, I really felt like I started to lose my motivation on the whole project right about here.)  I wasn't happy with the quality of light in the shot, so I tinted the whole shot green, which I definitely prefer.





Day 339 (2012-12-04) ~  This is a similar shot to the one the night before—lights on a fence, which I dyed green.  However, I was playing around with effects on Picmonkey and kind of liked how this one came out with the red bow immune to the green tint.  It's kind of striking in a way, I think.  (Pic really taken on the 3rd, not the 4th.  Another boo-boo, I know.)





Day 340 (2012-12-05) ~  So, the neighbors started decorating for the holidays and this was the first guy to go all out.  *snicker*





Day 341 (2012-12-06) ~  Oops.  A ball buster.  While decorating my tree, I accidentally dropped a ball which smashed into a million tiny red splinters of glass all over the hardwood floor.  *sigh*  What a pain!  But at least it made good picture-of-the-day material.





Day 342 (2012-12-07) ~  Ummm….  yeah. So, it was, clearly, a very, VERY hot day at one of the local high schools!  *snicker*





Day 343 (2012-12-08) ~  Wednesday had a weekend school assignment which took us to the Art Institute of Chicago.  This was the first wall of paintings she studied.





Day 344 (2012-12-09) ~  Another shot from inside the Art Institute of Chicago.  (Actually taken on the 8th, not the 9th).  I liked the lines and festivity of the staircases there.





Day 345 (2012-12-10) ~  Okay, so this was a shot Wednesday needed for a computer class she’s taking at school.  She needed me to take her picture, then she would use Photoshop in class to transform herself into a superhero.  I haven't seen her Photoshop transformation yet, but I really, REALLY love this photo of her.  My goodness!  When did she grow up????





Day 346 (2012-12-11) ~  Another one of my 80's Strawberry Shortcake dolls.  This is Lime Chiffon. 





Day 347 (2012-12-12) ~  When I went for my morning walk around the park on 12/12/12, there were police cars everywhere and the buses were being re-routed off their usual street.  Very strange.  As I rounded the corner, I found out why.... a motorcyclist had crashed into the back of a parked car so hard that he caved the back of the car in, shattered the car's back window, and actually moved the car off to the side!  It was an unbelievable sight.  No, the motorcyclist did not survive.  And, no, I didn't see the body; I arrived on the scene after he had been taken away.  What I saw though was a demolished car, a fallen bike, a broken helmet and gloves on the ground in all different directions near the front of the car (as if the motorcyclist's helmet and clothes had come flying off at impact and kept moving forward without the body), and a street that sparkled with tiny vehicle fragments as if it were covered in glitter.  I can't fathom how fast the motorcyclist was travelling to make an impact as catastrophic as that, but it must have been an astonishing speed.  Ugh.  Slow down out there, people.  The hurry just isn’t worth it.





Day 348 (2012-12-13) ~  Another 80's Strawberry Shortcake doll that sits in the glass cabinet in our den.  Crepe Suzette.





Day 349 (2012-12-14) ~  Cute, isn't he?  This is one of this year's new ornaments on my Christmas tree.  It's Mickey Mouse dressed up like the cast members in the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland!  I love him!!!!  (Oh, if only they made a Tower of Terror one like this.... Maybe next year.)  (My days were still off a bit, so this pic was actually taken on the 17th, not the 14th.)





Day 350 (2012-12-15) ~  My kiddo told me (for the millionth time) how much she hates mushrooms and will never, never, NEVER eat one.  Then she opened her advent calendar.... and it was a chocolate mushroom.  (Ha ha!)  And, yes, she ate it.  Never say never.





Day 351 (2012-12-16) ~  Another filler picture of an ornament on my tree.  It's a limited edition Harry Potter Golden Snitch from Hallmark.  When they came out, Chicago sold out of them instantly and I couldn't find one anywhere. Scope and I went from store to store, but they were all gone.  *sniffle*  Luckily, I whined about it enough to my mom that she found one back in Seattle and gave it to me for my birthday that year.  Yay! : -)  My favorite part of it is on the front where it says "I open at the close" just like in Deathly Hallows.





Day 352 (2012-12-17) ~  The flag at the local high school was at half staff due to the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School.  At first I was standing there wishing the wind would whip up into a frenzy so I could get a picture of the flag billowing, but then I realized I actually like it better this way some how.  The air was still in the Windy City.  Completely still.  Somehow that just seemed fitting in a way.





Day 353 (2012-12-18) ~  Sometimes Christmas feels JUST.  LIKE.  THIS.





Okidoki, just one more Project 365 post to go and then we’ll be done with them. 






© Coracabana

Yeah, it’s January and I’m still posting pictures from Halloween. Your point is….?

And now for another update on 2012’s Project 365….


Day 305 (2012-10-31) ~  Halloween night, Wednesday dressed up as Sally from The Nightmare Before Christmas, Scope was Jack Skellington, and I was Oogie Boogie.  Here's Sally and Jack heading out to go trick-or-treating.





Day 306 (2012-11-01) ~  Our pumpkins, all baked by tea-light candles, the day after Halloween.





Day 307 (2012-11-02) ~  *sigh*  I got an emergency call from Wednesday at school.  She had broken her glasses in PE class.  Somehow I hadn't expected it to be quite THIS bad!  (Oops.  This was taken on the 1st, not the 2nd.  My bad.)





Day 308 (2012-11-03) ~  Wednesday and her friends in a limousine on her 16th birthday party.





Day 309 (2012-11-04) ~  This was Wednesday’s family party for her Sweet 16.  I can't believe I'm the mom of a 16 YEAR OLD.  Seriously, where does the time go?!





Day 310 (2012-11-05) ~  When all else fails, draw a picture of your thick-skulled, non-listening, jackass-y nemesis on a left over birthday balloon…. and then beat the shit out of it!!!!  That’s a valuable coping tool Wednesday picked up this particular week in November, which she found to be extremely satisfying!  :-)





Day 311 (2012-11-06) ~  And the winner is….





Day 312 (2012-11-07) ~  We picked up two new Halloween decorations this year.  I figured they deserved to star as picture of the day once before being shoved away in storage!





Day 313 (2012-11-08) ~  Since changing the clocks, my walk to meet Scope after work is A LOT DIFFERENT.  Soooooooo dark and kind of creepy.





Day 314 (2012-11-09) ~  This is a partial shot of a Harry Potter display item I bought on eBay.  I owned one when I lived in Seattle, but I got rid of it (along with a TON of other stuff) when I moved to Chicago, and I always regretted not keeping it.  *sniffle*  I wanted to replace my long-gone one, but I couldn't find one for sale online anywhere, then suddenly there one was on eBay for MUCH cheaper than my original one!  I bought it and when it arrived I was thrilled—it was in even better condition than the one I originally owned.  Sweet!





Day 315 (2012-11-10) ~  My old skool 1970's Mickey Mouse doll.





Day 316 (2012-11-11) ~  This was the night that Wednesday discovered the joy of Jiffy Pop!





Day 317 (2012-11-12) ~  So, you leave Wednesday alone for a couple of hours in the house with a camera, paint, and some clay, and look what you'll come home to:  A stop-motion/claymation movie in progress!  WOW!





Day 318 (2012-11-13) ~  There was one spot of light snow on the ground at the park this morning.  ONE spot.  There was no snow to be found anywhere else.  Weird.





Day 319 (2012-11-14) ~  Out of time and out of ideas.  This was just a super-quick shot of some red leaves and a street light in the dark as I was running to the train station.





Day 320 (2012-11-15) ~  Blue light special?….  Anyone?…. Anyone?….





Day 321 (2012-11-16) ~  Yep.  We ran to several stores to stock up on Hostess cakes the day we heard they went out of business.  This was what we managed to hoard.  Mmmmmm.





Day 322 (2012-11-17) ~  Just a shot of some flags I saw while taking a walk through the local community garden.  (Taken on the 18th, not 17th.  My mistake.)






That’s it for today, but the rest of the project is on the way soon….






© Coracabana

I’m going to be just like Elaine with the sponges, I just know it! (Are you Twinkie-worthy?!)

I hit four stores to stock up on all things Hostess-y (and mourn my childhood) since I heard they went out of business this morning.  Did you?!


*sniffle*






© Coracabana

Why Windex smells like VICTORY.

In loving memory of my favorite photo editing playground, Picnik, where I draw all my cartoons, I’m serving up one last Picnik-ified story here, just for YOU. You see, Picnik was hijacked by Google awhile ago and, most sadly and inexplicably, the Google overlords decided to pull the plug on Picnik yesterday. *sniff* So, while I figure out where oh where I will do my cartoons from now on, please enjoy the following tale of Windex, a drunk, and one satanic zebra.



Back in the early 1990’s I worked one summer in a snack hut with several other girls, selling hot dogs, chili, and Slushies to camera-toting, clad-in-plaid tourists.


Oh! And we made ice cream cones……





….for bears.





(Yes, bears.)


(Really.)


(I swear.)


This snack hut sat amid the rock-strewn parking lot of a famous sort of drive-through zoo in Washington State. Since I don’t want to get sued right now (one legal rodeo is more than enough, thankyouverymuch!) let’s not mention the real name of the place and, instead, just call it The Drive Thru Zoo, ‘kay?


People could drive their cars through The Drive Thru Zoo and get all up close with bison, llamas, deer, rabbits, peacocks, and one perpetually pissed off zebra.





(Watch out! He bites!)





There were also bears who lived in pens in The Drive Thru Zoo. These bears would do tricks for their trainers during show times in return for ice cream cones.


(Bears prefer Sherbet.)


(Just saying.)


Anyway, I would show up to The Drive Thru Zoo’s snack hut five days a week in my Depeche Mode t-shirts and Doc Marten boots, munching on Mentos, quoting Seinfeld, and singing Nirvana songs.





(It was the 1990’s. Shut up.)


The job didn’t pay very well ($6.00 an hour, I think it was), but I got all the free food I wanted during my shift which kind of made up for it.


(And which also meant I made sure I ate three meals a day there.)





(Ahem).


Besides the lack of money, I really liked my job. My co-workers were hilarious. The food was delicious. The hours were great. And the animals were fluffy and sooooooooooo cute!





(Well, maybe not the zebra.)





In fact, there was really only one thing I hated there: My manager. Let’s call her, ohhhhh, I dunno…. how ‘bout…. Ann. Ann Ebriated.





Ann’s in-law’s owned The Drive Thru Zoo and she actually lived on the zoo’s property in a house which was sitting smack dab in the middle of the parking lot, right within view of the snack hut. Ann was loud, picky, irritable, and had nothing to do all day but stare out her living room window at us slaving away in the snack hut, just waiting and waiting for someone to do something she didn’t like so she could march on over and yell at us.


Yelling at people was her second favorite thing in the whole wide world. Her first favorite thing? Getting drunk. And if she could find a way to combine the two—well, hello!—then her whole week was flipping made!


It became a regular sight to see Ann stumbling in a drunken rage across the parking lot towards us, shouting to herself about idiotic things. Then she’d burst through the door, yelling and throwing things at us in front of all the customers.





When Ann was drinking, no-one could do ANYTHING right. It was so humiliating. One of the girls once got yelled at for writing a smiley face on the dry erase board with all of the day’s Specials.





I once got yelled at for putting lids on the relish and onion jars on the condiment stand to try to keep the wasps from crawling around inside them.





What truly evil, inept employees we were.


One day, there were three of us working in the snack hut when we saw Ann staggering her way over to us, flailing her arms angrily and hollering to herself. Again. We didn’t know what she was mad about this time, but I noticed that the glass counter top had some coffee drips on it and, not wanting to get screamed at over it, I quickly grabbed the Windex and started frantically cleaning the counter as she bumbled her angry drunk self our way.


I was still scrubbing the counter with the Windex bottle in my hand when Ann came tripping furiously through the door in mid-tantrum.


“You little b*tches!“, she drunkenly boomed and started slurring off today’s list of irrational grievances. But she only got about three complaints into it when suddenly she gasped and stared at me in horror as if I had just sprouted a unicorn horn….





….and then farted a rainbow.





”Is that W-w-windex?”, she said in a raspy voice, pointing at the bottle in my hand. Thinking I was about to get a Mounds bar chucked at me, I nervously nodded. Ann’s bleary eyes flew wide open and then she immediately scampered back out the door and stumbled her way back home across the rocky parking lot without even finishing her tirade.





Bizarre.


The next morning, Ann was there and surprisingly sober this time. She sat us all down to have a serious discussion during which she told us she was “very allergic” to Windex and that we should never, never, ever spray the foul stuff if she was in the room.


Interesting.


Now, Ann mysteriously failed to mention what form her awful Windex allergy took. Perhaps she broke out in hives. Or had trouble breathing. Or maybe her boobs would shrivel like raisins as she involuntarily moonwalked through the bison poo piles and then she’d spontaneously combust while screaming “ayiyiyiyiyiyi” like Xena. (One can hope!) But it didn’t matter, because at that moment we were armed with almighty knowledge, and Windex became our valiant savior.





Whenever Ann came charging towards us like a drunken bull, we knew exactly what to do: hose the place down STAT! We would spray Windex all over the counter top, the door, the fridge, the sink, and even out dang the window while giggling to ourselves maniacally.





It worked like magic every time. Ann would thunder in through the door, take one whiff and then leave again without being able to properly degrade us.





And the beauty of it was that we could always claim innocence later on and say we were just keeping the snack hut sparkling clean, and—please—even someone like Ann didn’t have the gall to berate us for that. Windex was the perfect sauced a**hole repellant!


It’s been nearly 20 years since then, and I still LOVE the scent of Windex. Windex smells like power, victory, and craftiness frosted with a heaping helping of utter jubilation!





*le sigh*


I would totally wear it as a perfume. I’m not kidding…. Y’know, if I didn’t think I would end up in a padded room, listening to Zamfir, and braiding yarn baskets for doing so. Just sayin’.


Anyway….


What became of Ann, you might be wondering? Well, last I saw of her, she was on the local news. Some patrons of The Drive Thru Zoo had their skivvies in a bunch because the evil zebra was biting people, and they had the videos—and scars!—to prove it. Despite the fact that one of the first things Ann ever said to me when I was hired was, “don’t go anywhere near that damn zebra; he’ll bite your arm off,” she was rolling her eyes on my TV and telling the reporters that the satanic zebra was safe and tame and that the zebra's victims were making a big deal out of nothing.





Unbelievable. Did I mention that one of the zebra's victims was a three year old who was yanked right out of a car window and dragged along the ground and had to get stitches? Yep!





I wonder if Windex repels demonic zebras too?....






© Coracabana