The Avant Garden

"You would have to have your &%##!! gall bladder surgery when it's time to take down the Christmas tree!" while visiting Anne at the hospital are totally unfounded. But the Christmas tree isn't down yet. Anne is still fine. Tired, but moving.

She called and asked me to come home from work today and immediately sent me and the dog outside with all the kids I could coerce away from their various digital entertainments. Josh complained, but he had more fun than I did, I think.  He's into his "art" once you get him started.
I helped with rocks, he directed artAnd after complaining about having to come, he is often the one who then doesn't want to leave.

This stone and straw thing was his creation.

He wanted some of my rocks, though he found them first. We actually got into a little resource tussle, a precursor for the proverbial "Dad, can I borrow the keys?" I suppose. 

I'm not sure where this is going, but this was a gift of the hurricane. I like the shape. I have this bigger project in mind and this may be the start of it, but it depends on how long it takes to get the Christmas tree down over the next few days.
Burned wooden thing

I did this guy right before we left; dubbed him, "He went thattaway."

... tired, of course. Poor thing. Thanks to everyone for your offers of help. It's nice to know that when circumstances take us out of our routine, we have folks willing to help and make it easier on us. 

Anne is eating and drinking now; puttering about the house like a grandma. It hurts her to laugh, so I won't tell that joke about "Jesus, Moses and Dale Earnhardt go into a bar..." for a while.

Don't tell my boss, but I did manage to sneak out to the rockpile today while Anne was watching "Harry Potter" and her mom and sister were visiting.
Hurricane Frances brought me that splinterI fixed the little stacks that make up the "Teardrop that finally got the Splinter out," as the wind had knocked many of them over.

Anne insisted that I take Josh and Katie (K-T) and the dog out for a while and I was happy to oblige. T'was (as Josh says)  a glorious day, and K-T got the idea of stacking some ice from a nearby mud puddle and then we decided to combine ice and stone and sunshine (the leaf was an added bonus) and make a multimedia stack that would be with us very briefly. 
Ephemeral art for  ADD sufferers

I took this photo just seconds before it fell, and just minutes after my friend Rob had admonished me for not even knowing how to use the "movie" function of my camera.     

It stayed up long enough for me to get down and take a
Built to last, built to fallphoto through SecondArch, which has been erect since Nov. 6.  Not that I'm counting or anything.

As Anne's gall bladder was causing her grief Tuesday morning, the first arch in the stone serpent fell.

Click the arch to see the Serpent:

I think it was sympathy pain.

The story goes that beneath the surface of the Earth, when just the right combination of stones band together in just the right way, they form stone serpents and go up to the surface for a blast of fresh air and sunshine (it's good for combatting the winter blues). Though they move very slowly, most folks have never seen them. I was able to catch this one in my back yard and snap a quick photo before she went back down. Anyway, Rob Quayle came over and we fixed the first arch back and put the spikes on her.

...Anne wasn't feeling that well last night and got worse today and went to the doctor and they sent her over immediately to have her gall bladder removed. She will spend the night in the hospital and be home tomorrow. Poor kid is in a lot of pain. Look at this Dec. 26 photo of her:
Treble clef and Cornpone

and try to imagine her without a gall bladder. Pretty easy, isn't it? Here's another Dec. 26 photo, both of these taken by Ray Peery (http://crash.smugmug.com/), the IT Director of WorldNetDaily.com. This one is another photo of my friend Joe's pond artwork, and you can see Joe and Anne reflected in it.
Portrait of the art, the artist and my wife

Anne should be all done with the surgery by around 17:30 (that's 5:30 p.m. for the non-doofuses) or so, and after taking Joshua to Tae Kwon Doh! I am going back to the hospital to see her sleep.

This is why you never take your eyes off a stack when you are within striking distance:
Me and Joe's rockstack, version 12 

Ray also took these two photos.

Gravity wins again, dammit

...it was a good time all way round. We drove to my parents' house Saturday afternoon -- 206 miles in 205 minutes. It was the first time we've ever averaged over 60 mph. Traffic was minimal. We ate way too much and opened gifts.  I got a hammerdrill for drilling holes in stone. We had a nice evening. In the morning, I woke up and got a cuppa and did this guy:
Boxing Day rock stacking

He's got two dependent balances and a flyer on top, so I was pretty pleased.

Then we went to my friend Joe's house in Atlanta. When we were there last month for Thanksgiving's Boxing Day, I made this hollow cone on a pedestal into which we put a lit candle, and one month later, on Christmas Boxing Day, it looked like this: 
Cone top crumbled; Joe blames birds

I also stacked this guy:

Joe's stack, version 13

And then Joe stole the show with this bit in the pond he built in his back yard:
It makes me say "levels"

We drove home in time to have a few hours of daylight, so of course I trundled off to the rockpile. I repaired the Marching Arches who'd fallen and couldn't get up. All 35 are standing now. K-T came with me and did this one:
The rockstacker's daughter stacks rocks

I was quite impressed that she was attempting it and was shouting out advice, which turned out to be the wrong advice and she nailed it:
Katie celebrates a win over gravity

Back to work work tomorrow.

...were a Christmas gift from my wife to me, and of course I had to go try them out. They're great, but you have to remember that they aren't waders.  I waded out in the River
Worth cold toes? I think so.and took some photos. We had 1.06 inches of rain Wednesday/Thursday and the River has been slowly retreating since, leaving ice sculptures on things.

St. Anthony, as he has become known, was fortunate enough to have a stick settle near him and create some ice weirdness.
St. Anthony the StillSeveral people have commented that he looks like a monk or a friar, and as he hasn't budged in a while, he has become known around the rockpile as "St. Anthony the Still." He's on a rock behind Quayle Manor.

Now we're off to Atlanta to see the folks and have Christmas with the Russell clan. Back late Monday afternoon, I reckon.