Dog Day Afternoon

I took Velvet for a walk today and by chance, we crossed paths with a dalmation, who from the accoutrements in its yard, i.e. dalmation dog statues, jumping track, rings—looked to be a show dog. I cheerfully greeted his owner with a friendly...."does your dog compete?" to which she replied "yes" without a touch of pride or joy in her voice. At this point, since we were stopped, Velvet started to pull on the leash and I had to say "settle" to regain control of her. Big deal! I went on to say..."oh, I've been told that my dog has the temperment for competing," and the lady looked at Velvet (with unveiled disdain), and snarled at me (with uncompromising annoyance)—"I don't know if they have competitive venues for uh, mixed—um, non breed specific animals. I looked up at her, smiled, then looked down at Velvet and said, "don't take it personally Vel."

I quickly realized that the conversation was derailing and said, well thank you for your insight. Goodbye. As we walked away from them toward the opposite end of the street, she called out..."You'll have to get better control over that animal if you plan to do any kind of show work."

Men from Mars and Women of Venus Revisited

Tonight I had the rare opportunity to revel in the spontaneity of a date that derailed through no fault of the dating couple. My bf and I went to a movie, an exorbitant $28. for admission, a shared popcorn and diet Coke. Not surprising for a Monday evening, the theater was empty except for three other couples. After the previews rolled, the feature began with an odd presentation of HUGE YELLOW subtitles complete with music and sound effects. A few people jumped up to alert the management that there was a problem. After all, the film was in English.  Here's what happened: the subtitles were requested by a hearing impaired movie goer. The other couple and we complained and received refunds. End of story although I may comment on another day on the issue of PC ness and pleasing all patrons in the theatre.

Anyway, BF and I end up back at his place where we have the most relaxed, insightful and satisfying evening doing nothing more than talking about Men Are From Mars, Women Are from Venus. 

More Portfolio Work-- LensCrafters.com

Here's an article on the dangers of blue light...it's the newest and truest threat to overusage of digital screens. Pay attention and follow the tips to save your eyes. I learned a lot as Digital Content Creator at Luxottica.

Digital devices fit so naturally into our daily lives that it's easy to forget how "unnatural" it is for our eyes to work, read and play from a digital display for hours. Back lit displays expose us to higher than normal amounts of blue light which can cause digital eye strain, fatigue and sometimes permanent damage to your eyesight.

WHAT IS BLUE LIGHT?**

Natural blue light is all around us. It's what makes the sky look blue. Natural blue light regulates your sleep and wake cycles. It also boosts alertness, elevates your mood, and increases feelings of well-being. Artificial blue light, found in things like computers and flat screen televisions, LED lights and energy-efficient light bulbs, can be harmful to your eyes. The backlit displays on cell phones, e-readers, and laptop computers emit high amounts of very strong blue light waves. Too much blue light can take a toll on your health.

Within the visible light spectrum, blue light has a shorter wavelength and higher energy, which is harder for our eyes. Because these waves are shorter, they appear to flicker more than longer, weaker wavelengths. Flickering is the flashing effect that happens when the LED backlight controller of a monitor adjusts the brightness levels during display refreshing. This causes eye fatigue without you even noticing. Take a look at the light spectrum to see how blue light works.

A Harvard medical study states that "High Energy Visible (HEV) blue light has been identified for years as the most dangerous light for the retina. After chronic exposure, one can expect to see long range growth in the number of eye diseases including macular degenerations, glaucomas, and retinal degenerative diseases."

Our eyes have natural filters but they're not enough to protect against the over-exposure of blue light. Our skin, nails, hair and eyes all contain melanin, the body's natural "sunscreen" which absorbs harmful UV and blue light rays. But as we age, we lose melanin; by around age 65, half of our natural protection is gone. That makes our eyes more susceptible to damage from both UV rays and blue light which can more deeply penetrate the retina leading to macular degeneration.

WHAT CAN YOU DO TO AVOID THE EFFECTS OF BLUE LIGHT

More than half of U.S. adults – 60 percent – spend a minimum of six hours a day, every day on phones, tablets and computers, so it's important to practice good habits to keep your eyes safe from blue light. Because we use our electronic devices so regularly, we are gradually being exposed to more sources of this light for longer periods of time.

1. Use the 20/ 20/ 20 RuleFollow the 20-20-20 principle. This means, look away from your computer or digital device every 20 minutes for 20 seconds about 20 feet away. This helps your eyes refocus and avoid computer eye strain.2. Invest in Blue Light Filtering LensesGet fitted for blue light filtering lenses to block the penetration of blue light from computers and digital devices. They're available for prescription and non-prescription glasses.3. Use Good Ambient LightingKeep balanced lighting around your computer work area to avoid high contrast and reduce glare to avoid computer eye strain. Avoid using a device in complete darkness.4. Avoid using digital devices an hour before trying to sleepDon't take phones and tablets to bed. The blue light from your phone's display is more likely to keep you awake than the incandescent lamp on your bedside table.

Nearly 70% of adults who use devices regularly and who experienced symptoms of digital eye strain didn't do anything to ease their symptoms. Why? Because they didn't know they had it. Computer eye strain symptoms are very common, and also very treatable. Schedule an eye exam* to make sure you're doing everything you can to protect your eyes from blue light computer eye strain.

My Work Portfolio: Digital Content Creator

I'm a Digital Content Creator at Luxottica. Been there since October, 2014. I research and build original content for the LensCrafters website.
Here's a page on Eyewear Trends

GEEK CHIC

QUIRKY COOL

Adding a geeky vibe has never been more in. We love the hip nonchalance of this bold, bookish glasses trend. Check out our plastic and oversized frames, perfectly suited to keeping your inner geek, chic.

BROW BAR

TOP LINE

With a strong profile, the brow bar trend is the latest look in eyewear cool. We love it in metals and acetates. Raise the (brow) bar on your personal style with shapes and colors designed to get you noticed.

GRADIENT FADES

SHADES OF YOU

From translucent to pearls and solids, the gradient trend will flatter your look. We love how it gives you an eye-catching color change-up top-to-bottom, or side to side for a fashion forward kick, that's guaranteed to push your style to the next level.

METAL WORKS

MIXED MATERIALS.

Style up with an edgy mash-up of tone and texture. Metal and acetate collide in this mixed materials trend. We love how it amps your swagger and personal eyewear statement.

https://www.lenscrafters.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/lc-us/fashion-in-focus?storeId=10851&langId=-1&catalogId=11651&krypto=hkOrdPc%2FiXISi28c6DYT7EAM9EzxYPBeoR3DyScuEP26o4BNbW9WcaaE%2Bcd92iRLO%2Bp%2FW%2BivfKn30NbEQuBbBdaQwxLoTxJcUosTEsB7%2F53uNdFEusuO%2BIrSXiM5aW4YHa4EJv%2BFjfmeIc8WQYRe8F93XZYIvBwFW2%2Bdi%2F%2FiX7zyFiHJklGXZeXPL7lopxmI&ddkey=https%3AClickInfo

Garden path

This pathway with its large fond du lac stones paves the way to my secret garden. Spring! It's just beginning to bloom.

Spring Beckons

Diary of a Hopelessly Romantic Pragmatist

To say I was missing something wouldn’t be true.  Life has a way of filling its empty spaces with purpose and familiar passions.

The goodness I have in my life feels like an heirloom tapestry...it is worn and wonderful.  I feel its frayed patches and its velvety folds.  I wrap my family in its warmth.  It is a colorful life handmade from loose ends and silken strands.  A beautifully imperfect life with the threads of good moves and missed opportunities woven together.

And yet, there’s something unsaid, unknown.  I think I found it crumpled and forgotten in the pocket of a too-small pair of jeans.  Faded, yet beautifully detailed, it was the softly colored romantic dream I’d carried in my heart. And now, I keep it safe in that pocket, afraid that if I open it up in the bright light of day, it will disappear. 

The Death of Spontaneity

Does the blistering accuracy of technology have a hand in killing the joyful surprise of an unannounced phone call? Do we so easily and painlessly ignore that which we either do not know (an unidentified caller), or even worse, the caller we know and wish to avoid?

Is it true that we are all at one time or another both pursuer and pursued? Do we block access to others because we're just not in the mood? I seem to be constantly on both sides of this conundrum. You'd think that because I know how painful it is to be avoided...to have my calls and texts ignored, that I would never take part in such a passive aggressive folly.

I am regularly on the receiving end of having calls/texts checked out and dissed. But it does make me think twice about doing it to someone else. We all deserve the chance to be heard.

On Kindred Spirits

After 12 months of dating, I am happy to announce the advent of something new...the late-in-life relationship with a kindred spirit. After having a regular gig date night for 12 months, my friend introduced me to his mother, a gentle, smiling lady with the softest hands I'd ever felt. She lives out-of-town which made a casual introduction precious and awkward. The arranged lunch meeting was wonderful. Since I don't think anybody reads this blog of mine, I'll post a recent low-quality pic we snapped at a late-night SBux rendez-vous.

The relentless spirit of HOPE

The world cheered as the carefully choreographed rescue of the Chilean miners ended happily and heroically. Experts in the psychology of survival cited HOPE as the single most influential and sustaining energy driving this successful effort.

HOPE, like faith is a remarkable force. It rallies the human spirit like nothing else. I witnessed its pervasive and positive power two years ago this month when my dad was very sick in the hospital. I recall how tenaciously he hung onto mere fragments of HOPE as he slowly drew himself out of depression and despair to a miraculous full recovery. I remember thinking to myself that his HOPE was unreasonable. Ridiculous even. But I never doubted its strength as I saw it motivate him to reach for a better outcome, a happier life.

HOPE is universal. It is the religion of all. And we were reminded tonight, watching the last of the miners emerge from the rescue capsule that what the world needs now is HOPE.

Keeping the Faith, Feeling the Love

Looking for a job is a surefire way to stressfully ponder the TRUE meaning of life. In the beginning, the prospect of carefully seeking out the perfect position was invigorating. It began for me beneath a gentle halo that I might now callously refer to as blissful disenchantment. By that I mean that I was oblivious to my restless malaise, but too stymied to push out of my comfort zone in pursuit of a passionate purpose. It called up all the fears that we all face down...the scary unknown and its boundless opportunity.

My hope is that along the way I will learn to trust the universe and to look to the stars to guide me. And when I find it, that perfect position, I will start feeling the love.

Social Media and the Pressure to Live an Interesting Life

With everyone tweeting the details of their lives into a carefully crafted 42 word entry, what does that mean for those of us who continue quietly along keeping our details hidden and our exploits under the radar? Social media has created a dichotomous world of exhibitionists and voyeurs. Facebook is a defining model that simultaneously tempts and repels me...how does that person have the nerve to post such blatant nuggets of narcissistic nonsense? And yet , there are those individuals who know exactly how to post... with the eloquent drama of a deftly choreographed soap opera. People whose antics and storytelling prowess somehow keeps us fully engaged and enthralled.

Facebook for one, has created a hierarchy of social media characters. There are the Queen Bee Evangelists whose every word triggers a frenzy of no less than 18 posts no doubt from the disciples who aspire to be so I N T E R E S T I N G. Then there are the post-challenged who try to be clever and cool, but whose posts fall like lukewarm dribble between drama and dirge. Last, there are the Facebook "Air Eaters" who just eat up the air without leaving behind anything much to remember.

Falling into Functional Fashion

Such a glorious indian summer has left me with a sense of extended carefreeness...a kind of reprieve from the serious structure of fall then winter's shortened days. Each beautiful blue-sky day belies the impending doom of daylight savings time. Every still-warm cloudless day, I walk about in the comfort and informality of flip-flops only casting my feet into real shoes that beckon from the sale racks at Macy's. Too high. Too narrow. How can I ever squeeze back into the unyielding pressure of business shoes and coordinated outfits.

This time of year has always evoked a sense of trepidation...the back-to-school blues or the back-to-work woes. No longer is it enough to dress for success.

I mean to like to put myself together and go to work, but if the shoe really fits, will I wear it?

Summer of Love

Why is it so hard to find a person to like and to have fun with. This spring began with a voluptuous bloom of romance & opportunity...where did the love go? ARGH!!! I have begun to feel a renewed sense of being fatally flawed. Ouch!

Love is really just an illusion

Sadly, love is just an illusion. It's as elusive as a rainbow. My how we fool ourselves in the name of love, romance and sentiment. How could I be so taken in? Again and again and again.

Blogged Down

I'm just terrified of change. And a new job might mean just that.

Power Bloom

The cherry blossoms are fluttering all over Washington DC. Julia and I are compatible travelers. She is off to the White House with her Uncle, Aunt and cousins. Me, I am enjoying the luxuries of a gloriously appointed hotel.

Spring Break Fatigue

Spring Break with Julia began with a jumpstart! Got going 4 hours too early so have spent an unremarkable morning downing Starbucks and watching CNN as President Obama signed the Healthcare Bill.

Dream Job Paralysis

I have an acute case of dream job paralysis. This means that when presented with an option or opportunity that perfectly fits my life vision, I stop dead in my tracks, paralyzed with fear of EVERYTHING UNKNOWN. Afraid to go for it and get rejected. Afraid to ignore it and get hit a backlash of regret.

But let it be known that today, I will break out of my pattern, shatter my own paradigm and GO FOR IT with reckless resolve. Onward and forward into the fertile frontier of the unknown. Godspeed.

mothers & daughters

Today Lexi let me photograph her.

Spending time with my lovely daughter Lexi, is something I've not done for 20 years. Being with her every day is a joyful surprise and delight. We shop.