How to fill time in retirement

A while back I did a short post about connections. There I talked about memories triggered by aromas, or the connections of actors in different movies. Recently, I saw that the actor Ian Holm had died. He was famous for the original Alien movie, as well as playing a Hobbit in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Last night I saw that the movie Time Bandits was on and being a favorite from the early 80s, I started to watch it. I forgot that it was Ian Holm who played Napoleon in this movie. Laughing at the little puppets, and making the time bandits his generals...What a connection... I have also shared my love for collecting obscure photographs off the internet. I now realize that each picture I collect and save has a connection for me. Here are some of my latest saves... Having a degree in Mathematics, I have always loved optical illusions. Most often, it is the brain filling in wrong information to get a mistaken image. Like this image... First, I thought he was wearing a mask and I did no...

I want to continue discussing my visit to Shelburne Museum last fall in Vermont. The blue path is what I have already discussed in past posts, and the red line is what I will talk about today. My first stop was the Horseshoe Barn and the Annex to that barn. Like the Round barn, it is full of sleds and wagons. They also have some of the equipment used in wintertime sledding. This includes furs to keep you warm... Here comes the bridles... The Horseshoe Barn has two floors and each are covered with old style sleds and wagons... My next stop was at the Print Shop. There were many presses and some of them are in working order. There was a printer (man) in the building that you could watch and ask him questions about the devices. This is a photo of one of the bigger machines they had... Next to the Print Shop was the Weaving Shop. Again, a weaver was present and she would also answer your questions. I have always found these machines interesting because of the patterns, very mathematical......

My cat Pumpkin had been having problems the past year, nothing too serious but enough that I was concerned. After 13 years of never getting in a vehicle or visiting a Vet, I finally had to take her in. It was a terrible day. We arrived at 2pm, sat in the car for 20 minutes because they were doing curbside pickup due to the pandemic. At 4:15pm, she was put to sleep. I acquired her back in 2007, an adopted stray who had been dropped off in the wild, pregnant and not even a year old. They fixed her and put her up for adoption. My friend Debi brought her over at the end of March and this was the first picture I took of her... She was not feral, but had come from a home who apparently did not want to have kittens. She was a mix with lots of Maine Coon. I did not like that she had long hair but her colors were beautiful. I gave her the name Pumpkin because of her orange belly. It did not take long for her to get comfortable in my home. She was my only cat after a three year hiatus with no pe...