Blue Sponge Newsroom Update

Twenty Democratic lawmakers are raising a fuss about supporting any health care bill that would pay for abortions. Democrats? The one thing you can say about Republicans is that they know how to fall into line. Dems cannot do this. HBO’s Bill Maher mentioned recently how we need a liberal party in the U.S. I agree. The Dems are now mostly what moderate Republicans used to be. We really do need a party that is for liberal ideals – a party for marriage equality, abortion rights, higher taxes on the wealthy, helping the poor, gun control, real health care reform, and anti-war.

The Senate voted to not fund the F-22 Fighter Jet, which the Pentagon doesn’t even want funded. The main argument for the jets was to prevent a loss of jobs. These are the same people complaining about people on welfare and they want to spend Government money on a program just to keep people employed? I’m guessing that most of the employees working on the F-22 would not lose their jobs, but would be incorporated into other projects. However, the cut would save taxpayers $1.75 billion, but it still has to be finalized with the House of Representatives.

In an interview with NBC, President Obama has finally admitted to looking “a little frumpy” in his baggy jeans at the all-star game last week. Really? They are talking to the President of the United States and this is what they choose to discuss? Do I smell a Pulitzer Prize?

I was surprised by a poll result in the Express newspaper. It asked, “Does Michael Vick deserve a second chance to play in the NFL?” Vick is a football player convicted and recently released from prison after serving nearly 2 years for his role in dog fighting. He is still suspended from playing. The poll results showed 58 percent voted no and 42 percent voted yes. I was surprised that nearly half the people voted yes, he should be able to continue to play. Though I agree, he served his time and should be allowed to play, I can’t imagine any team would be foolish enough to hire him.

DVR Alert: TLC is premiering season 2 of Toddlers & Tiaras tonight. How did I miss season 1 of this show? There is nothing sadder or more bizarre than child beauty pageants. I never get tired of watching this stuff and remembering that gay people are not allowed to adopt children in some states, yet these parents are lawfully permitted to do this to their kids.

Hump Day Art -- Richard Roflow Watercolor

Here is yet another painting from the Blue Hill Bay Gallery, in Blue Hill, Maine. It is a watercolor by Richard Roflow called South Deer Isle Bridge. It measures 16 by 16 inches.

I thought it was an amazing watercolor. I realize this photo taken with my iPhone is horrible. I had to take the picture at an angle because of the reflective glass over the painting. Even with the horrible photography though, you can see it is an exceptional work. The water alone is quite an effect. I'm not art expert, but I thought this painting was very good.

The following is from an article in the Mainely Art section of the Just Art web site: Deer Isle [Maine) painter Richard Roflow was one of the winners in the 1995 National Park Academy of the Arts competition, Arts for the Parks. Most of the artist's paintings are inspired by the drama of the Maine coast and coastal weather.

"He rarely paints on a sunny day. It's always misty, foggy, and dramatic. He paints those days that Mainers know as being a Maine day," said Barbara Entzminger, whose Bar Harbor [Maine] Birdnest Gallery exhibits many of Roflow's paintings.

"I fell in love with Maine by reading the Kenneth Roberts novels when I was in high school," said Roflow. But it was more than 20 years later when he and his wife, Jerry, first traveled to Maine where they bought a wharf-side house on Deer Isle.

"I consider myself a light painter. I try to paint the light I see and how it creates distances," Roflow said, explaining the prominence given to plays of light in his compositions.

"Roflow captures the qualities of atmosphere and its light-color shows which most of us hardly notice," writes Fran Watson. "Tiny droplets of moisture in the air act as color magnifiers, bathing landscape in eerie glows of uncommon intensity for brief moments, transforming the ordinary into the exotic. The most familiar objects attain an importance through his eyes as he renders them with a combination of softness and accuracy. His depictions are tinted fragments of hushed time, caught in the manner of masters like Corot and Daubigny whose visions changed rural simplicity into mythological magic."

New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest #201

Al Fresco, Private Eye. How may I help you?

The above is the cartoon for New Yorker Cartoon Caption Contest for week #201. Let me know if you come up with a caption. Click on the link above to enter. Stupidly, when I actually entered this captioned, I didn't proof it and forgot the "r" in Fresco. Al Fesco, Private Eye, doesn't make as much sense, huh?

One of the finalists for Contest #199, which showed a defendent in the courtroom in swimming trunks and snorkle, is almost identical to one that Walt at WCS submitted. You were robbed Walt! Walt came up with the picking the lobster concept.

Pie or Cake?

We're back home from NYC, and getting ready for the work week. This photo is of a couple of the desserts from the Brooklyn Diner, which is, in fact, in Manhattan. We didn't have any dessert when we were
there, because we went there for breakfast. But, they looked amazing. I am a cake person, but I love cream pies, especially banana cream pie.

A Divine Day in New York City

This is a window display on 5th Avenue of Baltimore's own Divine. We had an amazing day in NYC. We saw two great shows, had a great dinner at an Italian restaurant, went to the top of Rockefeller Center, had a run in the park and a wonderful breakfast at the Brooklyn Diner. We want to move here. We love New York!

Seeing Next to Normal

This was an awesome show! I highly recommend it. Alice Ripley was amazing. We'll be back I'm sure.

Shane and Alice Chit Chat

Next to Normal star Alice Ripley chit chats with Shane about the show.

Tony Winner Alice Ripley, Star of Next to Normal

Alice signs my playbill after the show. She and other members of the cast spent a lot of time mixing with the crowd outside the theater.

Ben Stiller and Sexy Gal Pal in NYC

Ben sat right in front of us at Next to Normal. Luckily, he's not very tall.

Top of 30 Rock

Generic Time Square Picture

Shane waits impatiently as I take a picture of Time Square.

Dr. Phil On Broadway

Dr. Phil created quite a stir in Time Square and I helped. Dr. Phil? Oh yeah. He knows Oprah.

Watching Wicked on Broadway

It's intermission and the show is great. The photo is the dragon over
the stage and the curtain.

Breakfast at the Brooklyn Diner

I had a frittata and polenta.

Running in Central Park with a Few of My Friends

I ran the Park Loop Road around Central Park this morning. I had invited some of my blog readers to come along and was very pleased with the turnout. The park is very hilly, and the weather was warm, but it was an awesome run!

Swinging Over to New York City

Shane and I are on MegaBus to NYC. Roundtrip was $23.50 all together for the both of us. Since it's Friday night, we're stuck in MegaTraffic.

The photo is of the trapeze school that was near the bus stop downtown. How cool would that be to do?

Capitol Sunset

Looking down Pennsylvania Avenue near our house on my way home from the drug store. The iPhone camera makes the Capitol Building look further away than it is (10 blocks).

Work Happy Hour Surprises

Notice the blue string near my collar.

We had a work happy hour last night and we surprised my boss, who had recently turned 50. This is her and I as she is performing my mid-year review.

For the Happy Hour, we had to come up with a "fun fact" about ourselves, which people at the Happy Hour had to then guess who's fact was who's. Mine was that I once buried a man as his young son watched. Nobody guessed it was mine. There were some very interesting facts revealed. Someone in my office had been in a Lil Kim video, and someone had dinner with Michelle Pfeiffer. They both sound a lot more fun than burying a man.

As I arrived at Eastern Market subway station on my way home, I looked down and noticed my work badge was not on my person. I wear it on a blue string around my neck. I don't remember taking it off, but I remember seeing it in my pocket at the Happy Hour and it is clearly around my neck in the photo above. I got off the train and got on another going in the opposite direction. I went back to the restaurant and checked at the Metro station from where I left, but nobody had seen it. I went over to my office and reported the badge was missing to the guards, so it couldn't be used to access the building. By the time I got home, I was in a very bad mood, hot and sweaty, had a splitting headache, and was very unhappy. Happy Hour Fail.

Today, somebody named Andy called me on my cell phone and told me he found my badge on the Metro train. I must have accidentally taken it off when I removed my backpack from over my head when I sat down on the train. Andy sounded very nice and offered to mail it back to me. I thanked him and accepted the offer, but I'll still have to get a new badge because that one will have been deactivated. I'm off work today, because I have to go to a meeting tomorrow, which is my regular day off. Now I have to go in early enough to have a new badge made. I have no idea how long that will take.

Hump Day Art -- Don Bishop Paintings

This is the painting we purchased last year at the Blue Hill Bay Gallery in Blue Hill, Maine. It is called Afternoon Glow and is an oil on canvas, mearsuring 12 by 16 inches, by Don Bishop.

This painting, also by Bishop and available at the Blue Hill Bay Gallery, is called Purple Iris. It is also an oil of canvas and measures 16 by 20 inches.

Don Bishop is rapidly emerging as one of the accomplished tonalist painters in the Pacific Northwest where he divides his time between plein air and studio work. Most of his pieces are painted alla prima using different color combinations according to the season and light. His roots are firmly planted in the early Californian impressionism because of the outstanding patterns of color and atmosphere associated with this school. Don has patrons throughout the US, which include Senator John Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth, of North Carolina, and the more happily partnered Mark and Shane.

The Ross Sisters Sing "Solid Potato Salad"

I found this video on the blog, Tales of a Tenor, as I was exploring the interwebs. How can you not want some Solid Potato Salad?

Be sure to watch the dance after the singing. They are quite bendy.