Standing Into Danger: October 2022

Friday, October 21, 2022

The Scariest House I've Ever Seen!

I've seen lots of scary houses and buildings in my lifetime,

but the scariest I ever saw was in Waikiki.

Terry and I were walking around and exploring the area near our hotel,

when a spooky house brought me to a full stop.

Straight Out of "The Birds"

Waikiki Area of Honolulu

Hawaii, USA

March 30, 2014

A house and yard were covered with hundreds of whispering, cooing pigeons.

The sight and sounds thrust me immediately

into Alfred Hitchcock's natural horror-thriller movie "The Birds."

Wikimedia

My brother Roy and I saw this movie when it first came out in 1963.

We thought it was hilarious and laughed all the way through it,

much to the consternation of people sitting around us in the movie theatre.

It was inconceivable to think of seagulls behaving so badly.

MUBI

But when I saw this house on Waikiki, I was hit with a surge of terror:

all those birds eerily perched on almost every horizontal surface

muttering, peering at me, ready to move at the slightest provocation.

I wasn't laughing now! I was rooted to the sidewalk.

Was Terry bothered?

Nope! He just sauntered on by.

The only thing that worried him was the possibility of disease.

Google

Finally my urge to take photos overcame my urge to remain frozen on the sidewalk.

I eased out my camera and carefully began shooting.

The shutter sounded thunderous, but not one pigeon attacked.

A few fluttered, but I'm still here!

I think someone who lived in the house had a sense of humor.

Really?

It's not nearly as exciting to walk past this house nowadays.

The city made the owners stop feeding the birds,

and they've all moved on: Health hazard.

I can't resist a few memes:

Google

The Scariest House photos are for Rain's Thursday Art Date theme Haunted House;

and for Nicole's Friday Face Off this week, I have some faces below.

It's no secret. I've been dealing with brain fog about a year.

I've been worried about developing Alzheimer's, but it's more likely been due

to thyroid disease, multiple medications, Covid, prednisone, stress, or all of them together.

But my brain fog is dissipating, 🤞, and I can finally laugh about it:

Google

And some real faces in an old family portrait:

Top Row: Mary Lou Raymond (cousin), Ella MacDonald (maternal grandmother), not sure (right)

Bottom Row (left to right): my brother Roy, my sister Barb, Sara Cossaboom (maternal great grandmother)

Me (Louise), My mother Sara MacBeath, and my sister Donnie

I will be without my computer from October 23 through November 2 and unable to post.

I'll try my best to visit around before then.

Have a great weekend!

Till next time ~
Fundy Blue

My next post will be on

Friday, November 4, 2022. 🤞

On the Bay of Fundy
© M. Louise (MacBeath) Barbour/Fundy Blue
All Rights Reserved

Friday, October 14, 2022

Cloud Land

Do you like to fly?

I love to fly!

I love Cloud Land, and I break through the cloud deck

with soaring anticipation on every flight I take.

Cloud Deck

Over Lake George, Eastern Rockies Corridor

Colorado, USA

October 5, 2022

Some flights may begin with clear skies or fly through clear skies,

as our flight home from Las Vegas did on October 5, 2022,

but chances are you will fly in Cloud Land at some point.

Heading Home on Southwest

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, USA

October 5, 2022

I didn't always love to fly.

I used to get sick and throw up a lot.

Then I became increasingly afraid as I experienced multiple episodes of violent turbulence.

My fears began to dissipate after a chance encounter with a U.S. Navy structural engineer

whose specialty was the structural design of navy planes.

I was flying alone to Calgary, and our plane was jitterbugging

up and down and sideways all over the sky.

Everyone, including the crew, was strapped in tightly,

and I was gripping my armrests for dear life.

"Are you scared?" the man sitting next to me asked.

"This is nothing! It would take a lot more than this to knock us out of the sky."

What are the chances I would be sitting next to a U.S. Navy structural engineer?

He calmed me down with lots of information about planes and the physics of flight,

and he showed me a channel from the channel selections available

where I could listen to our pilots talking in the cockpit.

I listened to that channel on every flight for years until the airlines eliminated it.

A U.S. Navy Plane Landing on an Aircraft Carrier

The U.S. Navy is the second largest Air Force in the world,

second only to the U.S. Air Force.

Wikimedia

Now I'm fearless whenever I enter Cloud Land.

I have my eyes glued to the window throughout any flight

not wanting to miss the ephemeral show.

Each cloudscape is unique.

It never existed before, and it will never exist again.

Once gone, it is lost forever.

Terry knows that my shooting photographs out the window

keeps me happily occupied throughout a flight

instead of staring anxiously at the wing and willing the air to flow faster over its top

than underneath it so the plane will stay in the sky.

No Longer Willing the Physics of Flight to Work

Over the Moab Area

Utah, USA

October 5, 2022

Terry does everything he can to secure a window seat for me,

and generously takes the middle seat every time.

He entertains himself playing Spades on his phone.

Terry Playing Spades as We Fly Home

Over Jumbo Springs Wilderness

(which connects to both the southern and eastern sides of Lake Mead)

October 5, 2022

I can't remember a flight in at least 15 years

when I haven't taken a photograph connected with a flight.

I have hundreds and hundreds of photos of airports, planes, employees, and passengers.

Waiting to Board Our Plane (on the right)

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

October 5, 2022

The pilot does his walkabout to check our plane before it flies.

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

October 5, 2022

Backing Away from the Gate

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

October 5, 2022

Up, Up, and Away!

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

October 5, 2022

I love the cloudscapes, but I also love the landscapes

on flights between Vegas and Denver.

Because so much of the area is desert or glacier-shaped mountains,

airplanes fly over a geological wonderland.

I watch for all my favorite geological features and snap away.

This time I was rewarded with the sight of Monument Valley.

I have tramped and climbed all over this incredible place.

Iconic Monument Valley

(center of the photograph)

Navajo Tribal Park, Arizona and Utah, USA

October 5, 2022

Here are a few more shots of Cloud Land on our flight:

Below is a cloudscape with towering cumulonimbus clouds,

and a landscape dominated by Navajo Mountain.

Navajo Mountain or Naatsis’áán, Head of the Earth,

straddles the Arizona-Utah border and reaches a height of 10,348 feet/3154 meters.

Navajo Mountain (bottom center of the photograph)

Navajo Tribal Park, Arizona and Utah, USA

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land

Over ‎⁨Kaibab National Forest⁩, ⁨Marble Canyon⁩

Arizona, USA

October 5, 2022

Many of the clouds we encountered on our flight were over Colorado.

Coming over the Colorado mountains and landing on the high plains

is always a bumpity-bumpity ride.

"Time to rock and roll!" I often say to Terry.

Cloud Land and Aspen Gold

‎⁨Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre, and Gunnison National Forests⁩

⁨Montrose⁩, ⁨Colorado⁩, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land and Aspen Gold

‎⁨Crawford⁩, ⁨Eastern Rockies Corridor⁩, Colorado, ⁨United States⁩

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land and Aspen Gold

Crested Butte, Colorado, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land and Glacier-Shaped Mountains

Buena Vista, Colorado, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land

Lake George, Colorado, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Cloud Land

Lake George, Colorado, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Dropping Out of Cloud Land

Denver International Airport

Denver Colorado, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

My Cloud Land photos are for Rain's Thursday Art Date theme Lost

and for Nicole's Friday Face Off this week, I have some faces below.

A Vendor's Wares

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Vibrant Faces

Fremont Street Canopy, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 5, 2022

Lead Vocalist Rich Embry and Drummer Daniel Conway of Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Lead Vocalist Rich Embry, Drummer Daniel Conway,

and Guitarist Johnny Douglas of Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Lead Vocalist Rich Embry of Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Bass Guitarist Kevin Vecchione of Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Guitarist Johnny Douglas of Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Watching Alter Ego

Fremont Street, Downtown LasVegas

Nevada, ⁨USA

October 4, 2022

Terry and Others Waiting for Our Flight Home

Harry Reid International Airport (formerly McCarran)

Las Vegas, Nevada, USA

October 5, 2022

I'm looking forward to visiting around!

Have a great weekend!

Till next time ~
Fundy Blue

My next post will be on

Fridayday, October 21, 2022. 🤞

Books Read in 2024

"5 Languages of Love: The Secret to Love That Lasts" by Gary Chapman
"At Home in the World" by Joyce Maynard
"Cockroaches" by Jo Nesbo
"Death's End" by Cixin Liu
"Eruption" by Michael Crichton and James Patterson
"In Darkness" by L. Diane Wolfe
"In My Time of Dying" by Sebastian Junger
"Nothing to Fear" by Julie McFadden, RN
"The Bat" by Jo Nesbo
"The Dark Forest" by Cixin Liu
"The Frozen River" by Ariel Lawhon
"The Last to Vanish" by Megan Miranda
"The Montauk Monster" by Hunter Shea
"The Road to Character" by David Brooks
"The Song of Achilles" by Madeline Miller
"The Twist of a Knife" by Anthony Horowitz
"The Uninhabital Earth: Life After Warming" by David Wallace-Wells
"The Women" by Kristin Hannah
"Where the Crawdads Sing" by Delia Owens
"Writing the Shadow" by Joanna Penn

Pages

Friday, October 21, 2022

The Scariest House I've Ever Seen!

Friday, October 14, 2022

Cloud Land