...there is a WAR here in Texas!

...MAN o' WAR that is.

Some would see these and consider that they are jellyfish, which in fact, they're not. They are actually several sea animals in one. And after walking through this 'invasion' on our beaches the other day about two weeks ago, I had to see what is causing this heavy influx of them washing ashore. They have absolutely no self-propulsion using the 'bladder' like pouch as a 'sail' to drift on the oceans' currents. Their sting is very painful, and beware, even after their death their tendrils still hold and can release its venom. Don't step on them, don't touch them. But, to much chagrin, I found nothing about the Coastal areas of Texas and the huge amount of these Man o' War coming inland. But I did find a news clip of some Floridian telecast that their shores are being invaded [or were invaded] by the same creatures and no one knew the reason for such a huge amount showing up on the beaches. Its long tentacles can extend to about 30 feet beneath the surface of the water and are armed with stinger cells called nematocysts, which are filled with venom, even if the tentacles are broken off, the venom still exists and you still can be painfully 'bitten'.










Read more

Linking to Camera Critters and Shadow Shot Sunday2 [linked buttons found above]


Our home is back to the norm once again. Today, we woke up to a heavy dense fog and the temps are reflecting a bit of a warming spell. It was near mid 50s at 6 a.m.....love it. But, another cold front is moving in for the New Year's weekend. Perhaps a sprinkle here and there. Hopefully I can get out of the house and do some walking on the beach later.

...from my house to yours ---MAY THE YEAR 2012 bring you happiness, good health and peace of mind!! CHEERS!!

A holiday greeting to your house...from ours---

I'll be on a blogging hiatus. Will return in about a week's time. There will be all the dismantling of the holiday decorations and cleaning the house [we'll be getting our carpeting shampooed also while this is going on and moving furniture, etc.], then putting everything back to normal again for another year until next Thanksgiving rolls around. Hope your holiday season is filled with joy and happiness, love and laughter!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS !!

AFTER tomorrow, I will begin my 6th year of blogging in this venue. Hootin' Anni came into existence on Dec. 25, 2006.

Sweet Mutti ---

This past week, I received a package from Denmark! Dear, sweet, Mutti had shipped a gift to me for Christmas. In a card she wrote: "Please accept this gift as a token of our long lasting friendship. Wishing you and Bud and your entire family a very, very happy Christmas and a blessed New Year." Mutti? The snowglobes light up my night and your friendship fills my heart!! Thank you [TAK!]. "du er den bedste!! Jeg elsker dig min ven!!"

I've received some beautiful Christmas cards from online friends...this means the whole world to me. Literally...from around the world. I have them all sitting near me, on my desk!! Thank you all.

I had mentioned I found a couple of new seashells that I don't have in my collection of 'finds'. And yes, they're still not cleaned up enough to bring indoors...



"French Fighting Conch"


Auger



Below, I have several of these kinds...


Angel Wings and Sundials


Sand Dollars

In the USA, on TV, while watching commercials [seems that's all that's on worth watching sometimes]...anyway, I am still trying to figure this one out. It involves Jessica deClerque and the insurance company. On the phone --a guy has called Jessica. Well, wait, that's not my point. Let me get straight to the point. At the end of the commercial, it flashes on the screen the text - 1-800-STATE FARM. Okay. Got it? Ya, baby!!! The thing is, everyone living in America knows that phone numbers consist of seven digits...Right? Right!! Well STATE FARM is NINE...the area code being the 800 number...the prefix having three numbers, and the last being the four numbers that is unique to YOUR phone. If I dial 1-800-STA TEFA, that's as far as I can should go....what gives? If I dial in 1-800-STA-TEFARM does it take me to someone residing in INDIA that doesn't talk English clear enough to understand? [insert sarcasm tones]

Speaking of commercials, I still can't figure out what the Geico Gecko says at the end of his 'newest' commercial in a TEXAS BAR [about having big hats, big steaks and BIG HAIR - here is the link I just found on YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QTTDCe5_FA]!! But, while searching to no avail, I did find something I've always wanted to know --who is really 'behind' the Geico Gecko. Well, now...a British actor named Jake Wood...

And to end my fragments, the annoying and sometimes tolerably cute Progressive Insurance lady...Flo [aka Stephanie Courtney]...

I do go on wikipedia and google search tangents often and for no apparent reason.

RON PAUL is looking better and better as the days count down to 2012. But, will he even make it in the Texas' Primaries?

commercial/photo images courtesy of Google Search

Just....BELIEVE!!!

I'm going to have only the video I composed and published at youtube today along with the lyrics posted here...BELIEVE by J0SH GR0BAN, and photos from my past Christmas posts over the years....

Children, sleeping.
Snow is softly falling.
Dreams are calling,
Like bells in the distance.
We were dreamers,
Not so long ago.
But one by one, we
All had to grow up.
When it seems the magic slipped away...
We find it all again on Christmas Day.
Believe in what your heart is saying,
Hear the melody that's playing.
There's no time to waste,
There so much to celebrate.
Believe in what you feel inside,
And give your dreams the wings to fly.
You have everything you need, if you just believe.
Trains move quickly
To their journey's end.
Destinations...
Are where we begin again.
Ships go sailing,
Far across the sea.
Trusting starlight,
To get where they need to be.
When it seems that we have lost our way...
We find ourselves again on Christmas Day.
Believe in what your heart is saying,
Hear the melody that's playing
There's no time to waste,
There so much to celebrate.
Believe in what you feel inside,
And give your dreams the wings to fly.
You have everything you need, if you just Believe.
If you just believe.
If you just believe.
If you just believe...just believe...just believe.

- - -

Once again, it's time for the 'talk of the town'. This time "town" litter ummmm, literally!!

More than 100 apples mysteriously rained down upon a small British town on Monday night. The still-unexplained apple shower left 20 yards of city streets and car windshields covered in the cascading fruit just after the daily rush hour.

The news immediately brought up comparisons to biblical tales of raining frogs and whether such reported freaks of nature actually occurred. In this instance, no one has officially confirmed when, how or if the apple storm truly took place as described.

However, Jim Dale, senior meteorologist from the British Weather Services, told the London Telegraph: "The weather we have at the moment is very volatile and we probably have more to come. Essentially these events are caused when a vortex of air, kind of like a mini tornado, lifts things off the ground rising up into the atmosphere until the air around it causes them to fall to earth again."


And, as always, the comments found under the online news article are the "best". For instance:

hnieves posted: 2012 the sky is falling

benjamin a posted: I have a theory! It's apple corps' ploy to advertise the coming of the iphone 5.

chieftain posted: Crop circles, Stonehenge, UFO abductions, and now apple showers: How come all this weird stuff always happens in "small British towns"?

Janice posted: 100 apples is a shower .. well see i learned something new today.... Next time I am on Jeopardy it will come in handy I am sure.

leBoots posted: ...or a bunch of kids were throwing apples. I'll go with the space vortex from another dimension though.

O'Rourke posted: God has got to keep in practice even though no one's asking for anything sensible -- this one reminds of Eden: He was just reminiscing, "Hey, Satan, how's them apples?"

and last, but not least --

AUDREYH posted: If God gives you apples; make a pie!


Read the article HERE

a death mask, Hard Rock & architecture---

The past Sunday I posted the shadows on the exterior wall of the Cathedral. Louisiana (French: La Louisiane; by 1879, La Louisiane française) or French Louisiana was an administrative district of New France. Under French control from 1682–1763 and 1800–03, the area was named in honor of Louis XIV- - -



Jackson Square, Cathedral, Museums...oh my. Again, this is one of my favorite areas in and around old town, French Quarter, New Orleans. There is so much history in this section of the city. Most all dating back to the 1700s. The history of the river, the piracy, I think of the term "mark twain" [which makes me think of Samuel Clemens, tho "his" area is way up farther north in Hannibal, Missouri - still I associate the river with him], riverboats, Cajuns, Creoles, French, Spanish...all so rich in heritage. Of course, the French influence is very strong. And, I love the architecture. For instance the cathedral. The two identical buildings to the right and left of the church are now Louisiana State Museums - one on the left is history from the era of King Louis XIV and Napoleon...the right is dedicated to governmental work I believe. But, more specifically, the St. Louis Cathedral ---






















Few cities in the world are so identified by a building as is New Orleans. The city is instantly recognized by the cathedral and its position overlooking Jackson Square. The Cathedral-Basilica of St. Louis King of France is the oldest Catholic cathedral in continual use in the United States. Since 1727 New Orleanians have worshiped in churches on this site. Half a dozen years earlier, the French engineer, Adrien De Pauger, who arrived in the newly founded city on March 29, 1721, designated this site for a church in conformity with the plan of the Engineer-in-Chief of Louisiana, LeBlond de la Tour, who was at the capital, Biloxi. The new parish church, dedicated to Louis IX, sainted King of France, was thus perhaps the first building in New Orleans of "brick between posts" (briquete entre poteaux) construction, an effective method of building that continued to be used in Louisiana until at least the middle of the nineteenth century. It's located in what was once called Place d'Armas [French origin]...now called Jackson Square.






















In 1844, the Baroness Pontalba [remember the book I purchased ---Intimate Enemies; about said Pontalba], with New Orleans agents presented to the Council for the First Municipality a project to construct a two-story structure and facade in front of the old buildings bordering both sides of the Place d'Armas, buildings she had inherited from her father, Don Andres Almonester. Two years later, this remarkable woman again submitted and had approved by the Council elaborate plans, prepared under her personal supervision, which called for remodeling her buildings with arcades similar to those of the Cabildo and Presbytere, and also for extensive improvements to the square itself, to create a bit of Paris for her native city. The photo below is one --the other identical building structure is on the other side of the square!! The buildings [Pontalba Buildings]....they are an entire block long and four stories high. Today, the ground floor is all shops while the top three floors are apartments and offices. They are the oldest continuously rented such apartments in the United States.






















The most recognizable statue in the square is that of President Andrew Jackson. A formative event in the early history of New Orleans was the Battle of New Orleans. This battle, though fought after the end of the War of 1812, would enhance the political career of Andrew Jackson.




























By the time in our history of the early 1800s, with Thomas Jefferson as president, buying the land from Napoleon Bonaparte - "The Louisiana Purchase" (French: Vente de la Louisiane "Sale of Louisiana") was the acquisition by the United States of America of 828,000 square miles (2,140,000 km) of France's claim to the territory of Louisiana in 1803...New Orleans then, also has a bit of connection with the Emperor of France...The two museums shown in the first photo, we toured the Louisiana State Historical side ---on the left of the cathedral. Of course, photos were not allowed, but you know me and my not obeying the law sometimes...hehehehehe, I found this and read about the exhibit and no matter --security cameras and all, I had to photograph it [blurred, I know, but I was trying to get it photographed before the cameras were pointing to me; and I moved my cell phone too quickly]. It is supposedly one of the original death mask copies of Napoleon!! Now, reading the inscription plaque on the wall, there were five made and four others where-abouts are 'unknown'. Why oh why, I ask myself, does Louisiana have it then, and not France? That still is something that I am skeptical about its truths; but yet, an amazing 'find'....to actually see his features was quite unexpected. Okay, you know why I took this photo, don't you? Ya, you're right if you answered " 'Cause Bud is a Napoleon fanatic' "...





























"She’s the ninth steamer to bear the name NATCHEZ. It was her predecessor, NATCHEZ VI, that raced the ROBERT E. LEE in the most famous steamboat race of all time. Even today, the NATCHEZ is proudly the undisputed champion of the Mississippi, never having been beaten in a race." The steamboat company has dinner and jazz cruises along the Mighty Mississip!! [no, not a typo...I want to "say" mississip like the song ---Johnny Horton's Battle of New Orleans]








- - -

More photos near Jackson Square
TOP LEFT to right: Inside part of the Riverwalk Shopping Center - to the left of this complex, just yards away is the Mississippi River. And, The French Market [historically it was an open market in the mid 1700s.]
BOTTOM LEFT to right: A line forming about two hours before it opened....NEW ORLEANS HARD ROCK CAFE. And, a saxophonist in Jackson Square.





Finally, this will conclude the postings on our Thanksgiving of 2011. I know I spent way too much of your time, but the city has such an appeal to me, I couldn't resist sharing its ambiance with you.

If you'd care to read my Wednesday Hodgepodge, I have kept it as a separate post this week since there is so much to read and view in this single post...CLICK HERE to Wednesday's Hodgepodge.







Read more on the history of Jackson Square/St. Louis Cathedral HERE
New Orleans and Andrew Jackson history can be found HERE
Louisiana READ MORE
Emperor Napoleon and the Louisiana Purchase HERE
READ MORE on the Pontalba Buildings
Baroness Pontalba SHORT BIO

- HODGEPODGE -

1. Are you cooking Christmas dinner? How many will be 'round your table this year? What are we having? Well, ya....I'm cooking...but only for two this year. And who knows what I'll cook. Maybe our belated Thanksgiving dinner...tho much less...and really nothing a 'big deal'. While typing this response, I'm thinking maybe a hot turkey, open-faced, sandwich with gravy, mashed potatoes, cranberries and cole slaw. What I'd really like to do this year is see the opening movie on Christmas Day..."War Horse". Only time will tell.

2. What is one must-have Christmas cookie in your house? Not really much on Christmas Cookies as a necessity for the season, tho I've baked 'em a lot over the years when the kids were home....my favorite would be gingerbread cookies...as in gingerbread boys [with raisins for buttons, eyes and nose].

3. Santa likes a glass of milk with his cookies. Do you? What kind of milk is on tap at your house-skim? almond? soy? full fat (Gasp!) I am one that LOVES and drinks a LOT of milk. Icy cold...in fact I've been known to pour me a glass and put it in the freezer so it's slushy; I like it that cold. And it's FAT FREE milk. And, COW's milk...none of that 'fakey' stuff that some consider milk.

4. Time magazine recently named their 'Person of the Year' for 2011. This is the person the editors believe had the greatest impact, for better or worse, in the past year. This year they chose 'The Protester'. Your thoughts? Who would you name Person of the Year for 2011? I like the concept of protesting something you strongly believe in changing because of your dissatisfaction...but, my thoughts are plain and simple, if you so strongly believe in protesting then you MUST stand your ground and go all the way if necessary. Do not become violent and deadly...just stand your ground and go to jail if arrested...Do not pass GO and do not collect your $200 [oops...monopoly got here somehow]. I lived in the 1960s during a high level of protests and they seemed to have made their statement in history and the protesters DID make a difference. As for whom I would choose as person of the year...it'd be someone that made a high impact for humanity. Probably someone from the future if I'd have to choose...one that hasn't come around yet --someone who would come up with a cure for a deadly disease ---someone like that. I have no name tho.

5. December 21st is National Flashlight Day... when was the last time you needed a flashlight and did you know right where to find one? First, where in the world do you get your info? National Flashlight Day? Oh my goodness. Okay...the last time I needed a flashlight was just recently...I dropped a Chocolate Covered Raisin on the carpet....dark candy, dark corner of the room, dark carpeting....couldn't find it. Had to get the flashlight...found it...[the flashlight] and found the candy. The flashlight is always in the same hidey-hole...HALL CLOSET.

6. candy canes...yum or yuck? They're okay, but nothing I crave.

7. What Christmas carol lyric means the most to you? "I'll be home for Christmas...if only in my dreams"

8. Insert your own random thought here...A double take usually refers to a second (delayed) reaction to something, or repeating an action for a 2nd time. When you do a double take, usually you have already reacted to (seen, heard, done) something without fully noticing or comprehending all the details. Often it's in connection with something normal but with some sort of unexpected aspect. Then there is a second reaction or action (the double take) when the detail of what you've just seen or heard or done, finally becomes clear in your mind and you may find yourself having to look again just to make sure that what you think you saw is what is really there......





above 'photo' is courtesy of FUNNY DB dot Net
open face hot turkey sandwich image courtesy of Recipes dot Com



If y'all would like to read a 2nd post I published for today [JACKSON SQUARE in New Orleans], you can by clicking HERE

Ruby Reds & Contrasts

Ruby Tuesday this week is something I've been wanting to 'show off' for some time. I've mentioned before in a previous post several days ago that I found the most adorable soft sculpture snowlady and couldn't resist bringing her home with me. I believe it was either Marshall's or T J Max where I found her. She stands about 10 inches and is free standing. The body is white of course, and she's draped in a woolen red 'floor length' coat. Black mittens. Black pom pom buttons, a tie down hat of the same red wool and a black, rhinestone adorned, velvet, bow, and red/black feather boa scarf. Along with all this, her matching purse is of a snowman face - all identical to her outfit only with a man's top hat on its head....





...then, for Tina's Picstory, her challenge this week is 'contrasts'. For me, contrasts can be a whole slew of things of oppositional values such as smooth/rough - dark/light -the color wheel contrasting colors such as red/green - black and white etc. etc. etc. And it being the holiday season, here are some little whimsical items sittin' 'round our home this time of year [with mouseover captions].

next week´s topic is *relaxation*!