Topsy Turvy

Today we have another installment in the Cam-Adventures of Green Floppy! These images were taken by the security cams at the local Wal*Bart, as I attempted to wheel a cart full of top soil to the checkout. Unbeknownst to me, there was a depression in the road where the water drain was, and I was steering right for it! Oh, nooooooos!

I was able to obtain a copy of the security cam video, and so I post it here for all to see. The quality isn't the best, of course -- a little choppy, and grainy, and perhaps a bit distorted -- but that is to be expected from a cam of this type. I mean, you've seen them on tee vee, when somebody robs a place, and they expect people to identify the person, right? Well, this one is kind of like that. But slightly better quality, as it is in color. Anyway, here it is!


So just remember: Tis better to pull than to push. Because at least that way, you can see where you're going!

Guest Article: Update!

This just in from the author of the previous post's Guest Article: The Day They Tried To Kill Me:

Hey, GF -- I was looking through an old diary I found, and I now know exactly when it was when they tried to kill me! I was guessing a bit early on the months, but I had the year right. The actual date was June 15, 1975. It was a Sunday and, according to this diary I found, it had been raining for the past couple of days. So that's why the water was so high -- not because of snow melt, but because of lots of rain. Wow!

Also, this diary says that the bike was purchased on May 31, 1975, for a price of $53. Holy carp! That's a lot of money for a bike! And then it gets dumped into the river only two weeks later. Crazy! LOL!

-- B

PS: Thanks for posting my story! You're swell!

Well, B, thanks for letting me post it! I think you're swell, too.

And there you have it, Dear Readers. I think we can safely say that the moral of this story is: Don't ever buy your kid a bike.

Guest Article: The Day They Tried To Kill Me

Hey, everybody -- in the comments of my previous post, the subject of falling into the river came up, and I said I knew someone who did that, and Stamppy asked if I could post the story. So I checked with the river-falling person, and she has sent me The Story. And I thought I'd post it here in its entirety. So here it is!

Green Floppy asked if I would write up the story of when I fell into the river -- what I like to call "The Day They Tried To Kill Me" -- and so here it is, in all its glory. I hope you all like it!

So, this one time, back around 1975 or so, some of my older cousins and siblings (some, but not all, of the arrowed people in this group, only everyone was a couple years older than in this picture)...


...decided that we would all go for a bike ride around town. I don't remember exactly when it was, but it was probably one of those warm days of early spring, where it's warm enough to be outside doing stuff, but not warm enough to be without a jacket or hat. Anyway, I know I was riding a small yellow bike with a yellow and white "banana seat" on it -- those were the style at the time -- and I was wearing The Most Fabulous Hat Ever, as seen here:


As I said, it was probably early Spring, which means that the snow had been melting for a while, and all the melt in town was making it's way to the Mighty Maunehsa River, as water is wont to do. Which means that the water was higher than normal, and running faster than normal.

Anyways, when you ride your bike around town, the most fun way to get back home is to go through Firemen's Park. And the quickest way to go through the park is to cut through on the cement bridge down by the mill and just below the dam. (Otherwise, you have to ride all the way downtown and up the steep hill to get to the main park entrance, and who wants to do that?) Here's a picture of the cement bridge, taken on a normal-water day.



So anyway, we're riding around town, and we get to the cement bridge below the dam, and lo and behold, it has water rushing over the top of it! Well, the older -- and, presumably, wiser -- in the group (as seen in this picture)...

...determined that it was okay to cross, in spite of the RUSHING water going over the top, and they forged ahead on their thin-wheeled bikes with their strong teen-aged legs, making it safely across with no problems. I, however, with my wimpy single-digit legs, and small thick-wheeled banana-seat bike, did not. One moment I was pedaling away, and the next -- WHOOSH!!! -- and I was floating away. The water started to carry me down the river, along with my bike and The Most Fabulous Hat Ever.

(Here's a picture of the water rushing away from the cement bridge -- and this is on a normal day! Just imagine the rushing from water going OVER the bridge, too!)


So there I am, being swept down the river, and the next thing I know, The Brother had jumped into the river and rescued me -- Yay, Brother!! And then somebody fished out the yellow banana-seat bike -- Yay, Someone!! Unfortunately, however, The Most Fabulous Hat Ever had been carried away downstream somewhere, and was never to be seen again.

And that is the story of The Day They Tried To Kill Me.

I wandered lonely as a cloud...

Hey, Stamppy! How you like THESE daffys?

Whew!

Ahhhhhhhhhh....

This is muuuuuch better.

Error! Error!!

OMG, STRAWBERRY?!

OMG!!!!!!


What have I doooonnnnnnnneeeee?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

GF's Visual World

Pussy Willow Linkage!

Regular readers of The Penguin Ate Her will recall my earlier post about palm weaving, where I mentioned that some parts of the world use pussy willows instead, on account of them not having access to palms. Well, Stamppy lives in one of those parts of the world (Ha ha!), and has posted some great Pussy Willow pictures! Be sure to check it out!

Palm Weaving, part the second!

Earlier I posted a picture of the weavings I made from Palm Sunday palms whilst they were in their drying stage, and here they are again, almost all dried.


A couple of the spirals didn't quite turn out right, and the fish seem to be loosening up as they dry, but everything else is drying as expected. I'll be sure to keep you all updated with any further exciting developments!

Palm Weaving!

By popular demand, below is a picture of the palm weavings for this year. I like to try a different style every year, and this year I learned how to make fish. So that's why there are so many fish!

I also made some in the "leaf" pattern (or "push-pull"), several in the "spiral" pattern, one square cone (or "grape"), a couple of "folded aura" (which is the easiest kind to make -- even easier than the spiral!), and then I had some leftover "wire" pieces (the stiff and uncoperative ribs/spines and such, that you can see at the bottom of the picture) and could have made a "wire cross" out of them, but I didn't. But I could have!

Sidebar Update

I've done some minor cosmetic adjustments to my sidebar, including adding a link to this great blog that sometimes posts old-timey Earth pictures and is called Bloggity Blog Blog Blog.

Pixie!

If you want to get serious about finding the *perfect* color for your webpage coding, I've found something that's even better than Hex Hub. (Though Hex Hub does have a page with the "Triple Hex" numbers, which seems to be what Blogger uses in their template things, and I don't see that in this new thing I've just found.) Anyway, it's this great little freeware program from Nattyware that goes by the name of Pixie. You start it up, and then as you move your mouse pointer about the screen, it'll tell you the color value for that particular pixel.

Awesome!

Palm Weaver-ing and Bunny Basketer-ing!

According to my calendar, tomorrow is Palm Sunday, which commemorates the day that Jebus rode into a town on an ass that his buddies stole from outside the gates, and then everybody who didn't have a coat to lay down, put palm fronds (a symbol for triumph and victory) down on the ground instead, so that the ass could walk around without having to soil its hooves on the sandy ground (because that was the style at the time -- to pretty up the path of someone thought worthy of the highest honour) , and then the extra fronds that they didn't need for a carpet, were waved around while people sang "Hosanna!" (which is also the name of one of the songs in the great rock opera, "Jebus Cripes Superstar" by that one Weber guy and that other Rice guy).

For Palm Sunday in modern times, people get palm fronds when they go to church. (It's a reward, like when you get a tootsie-roll at the bank, or a cow eraser at the dentist!) (Unless you live someplace that's else, where they get pussy willows instead. *snerk*) But then what do you do with them once you get them home? You can't eat them. They don't make good clothes. You can't fuel your car with them. So what then? Well, some people -- but only people who are very boring -- will just take that palm as is, all flat-like and straight, and stick it on their wall as decoration. Maybe tucked behind the corner of a picture frame, or a crucifix.

But other people -- far more interesting and creative people -- will take the palm and make something else out of it by weaving or braiding it. If you'd like to be one of the creative people:

• Here's a place that has some great online tutorials on palm weaving!
  


• Sister Cecilia Schmitt, of the Franciscan Sisters of Little Falls in Minnesota wrote a fabulous book called "Palm Weaving: The Story... and The Art" (which has a companion video and guide-sheets), and an excerpt from that book can be found here. I don't know where one can purchase this anymore. Her website seems to have vanished. Boo! Perhaps one could contact the Franciscan Sisters.
  


• And here's a place that has a list of other books to buy on palm weaving!

Isn't that frabulous?!

But wait! That's not all!

Palm Sunday is the beginning of Holy Week, and at the end of Holy Week is Easter. Easter is, of course, the day that Jebus un-died and started popping in on people and making them stick fingers in his sword holes and stuff. Well, in modern times, nobody really wants to have a party where people stick fingers in sword holes because: Ewww. So instead people hide colored eggs and wait for something called "The Easter Bunny" to bring them chocolate. But in order for EB to leave you some chocolate, you must have a place for it to go! Say, for example, an Easter Basket. And if you want to know how to make an Easter Basket that looks like a bunny and is made from a bleach bottle (or vinegar bottle, or any other similarly shaped bottle), here are directions on how to do it! And here is a sample photo!

Wow!

April 11, 2006 - ETA: Here's a link to some great Pussy Willow photos from Stamppy!

Hexadecimal codes, yay!

Ever want to try and change the color of something on your website, and just couldn't find the exact right color? Well, no more! Just scurry on over to the Hex Hub, where you'll find just about any color you could possibly want, with its corresponding hexidecimal code.

Awesome!

Blogger for Dummies

Better than blogger's "help" files!
Blogger for Dummies

Still right!

Even when I'm wrong, I'm right! And the comments here are proof of it!

Ode to a Daffodil: Have you had your Roots today?

Knife! Knife!

I hear that this "Rock and Roll Pizza Cutter" is the best thing sinced sliced bread slicers!

And apparently, you can use it to slice bread! (In swammich form, anyway.) Look at how simple it is to use -- just "rock and roll" to slice!

Here's a picture out of the package. Woah!

And here it is in action! Look at the fine cutting lines it made. And the trail mix bar things didn't stick to the cutter at all. WOW!

This device really is a cut above the rest! (Get it? A "cut" above? See, 'cause it's a cutting device, so I used a common phrase that includes the word "cut" in it. Do you get it??)

Logo of Green Floppy

I've decided that this blog needs a logo, like all the big fancy blogs have, so that readers can see right away that this is the blog of Green Floppy. I thought and thought about what kind of logo I should have: Should it be something that is distinctly Green Floppy? Should it be something that gives an idea of just what, exactly, this here blog is all about? Or should it be something more unifying, to let the reader know that he or she or it is welcome to read here, and will find something of interest here, no matter who they are or where they're from? And I've decided on the last option -- because I'm all about unification!

But then the next question is, what could I possibly find that could unify all of my diverse reading public? What is The Thing that we'd all have in common? Not such an easy question to answer, let me tell you! Well, as I was pondering, I happened to be looking at a map, and I thought: "Ah HA! Here is something we all have in common!"

And what is that thing, you ask? Why, it's roads! Roads and rivers. Roads and rivers and trees. And hills. And maybe some squared out plots of land. But that's it! Roads, rivers, trees, hills, and squared out plots of land. Because we all need roads to get from place to place (unless you have an air/space vehicle, as I do, but even then, you still have "roads" -- they just don't have dotted lines on them), and we all have rivers and trees and hills and squared out plots of land around us (unless you live in a desert, in which case your trees and rivers are more sparse and the hills are made of sand, and the squared out plots of land shift with the winds). And so, here is my new logo, a smaller form of which will appear at the top of Green Floppy's blog:


Isn't it frabulous?