Computer graphics

Weekly Photo Challenge: Vibrant Optimism

twobirds

Two birds!

Hoping to keep blogging in 2016.  I have to renew next month and I’m not sure I am up to this anymore.  I have really lost the enthusiasm I once had to do a good job.  I have not been happy with the quality or consistency of my posts since I started.  I don’t know if others have this problem.  I have always  struggled with many issues in my life and you would think by now I would be used to that and just make myself do it for the sake of others enjoyment.

I don’t have the same drive I did when I was younger.  I had such high hopes for my life about ten years back but when life keeps punching you in the gut without much of a chance to breathe in between, sooner or later you’re going down whether you like it or not.

That being said.  I am planning on stopping my other blog, musingsofamenopausalmaven.com.  Maybe if I concentrate on just pogirlshines.me, I’ll do a better job.  The other blog was meant to be a place that I was going to bitch about life and the state of our country and the world in general and the ideas I have to do something about it, of which I have many.  They are doable, but since fixing things would mean our wealthy and the large corporations would have to start playing fair, probably not going to happen in my lifetime.  Besides we all need to say something or do something.  They tend not to take a handful of people’s opinion very seriously.

I’ll still get in a number of posts before I quit it and I will have to get serious about this blog or stop it as well.  The fact that everyone and his brother and sister blog now, makes me very insignificant in the grand scheme of things, even though we’re all different and we all count.  I don’t have a thriving social life at this time since I’m older and I don’t drink or do drugs and I still haven’t found a church that excites me to show up to every week let alone become involved in.

Back to the Photo Challenge at hand.  Something vibrant and optimistic.  There is something very vibrant about optimism to begin with.  I guess it’s not super optimistic to be speaking about quitting something, but I think when you lose your passion for something or someone, it shows.

Spring is the perfect example of Vibrant optimism.

 

Psalms 9 1

 

Weekly Photo Challenge Daily Prompt: Circle at Midnight

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This post is two birds.

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I was home this New Years, in bed sleeping peacefully in the quiet country.  So unlike my New Years Eves in the city where everyone was setting off fireworks and shooting guns, hopefully into the sky.

God bless everyone and wishes for a safe and happy 2016.

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Daily Prompt: Forever Faithful and Grateful

Faithful2006Jesusfluffyclouds1enhancedwillofmyFather

You can’t be faithful to God and have an ungrateful heart.  Most that don’t believe in God or do believe but choose to hate Him and try to defile Him in all that they do seem to have a childish mindset that God is like a genie that grants wishes.  They don’t get what they want out of their life so blame God or think because they make bad choices and have poor impulse control that God does not exist.

The only people who can think this way are those that were not taught spiritual truth.  The term is “walking in the dark.”  They say ignorance is bliss but in the long run it really is death.  Man will be held accountable for deliberate ignorance.  God knows if you know something is wrong but choose to do it anyway or when you find something out that you know is true but try to pretend that it’s not and try to blame it on our current liberal propaganda that is obviously destroying His world.  I think we were all born with certain inner knowledge, as most creatures, of what to do and what not to do.  It is called instinct.  Since man is very selfish by nature because of that survival instinct, it is important to temper this selfishness with civility or spiritual training or any kind of civilization would be quite impossible.  Sometimes it truly looks like many are completely brainwashed by the low-grade movies churned out by the greedy and depraved.  Just cause you watch it on a screen, does not make it real life or anything worth imitating.  Man is very easily influenced by others, that’s how we learn.  It’s shameful that most of any entertainment that exists in America has so much gratuitous sex and violence instead of instilling values and reinforcing the positive qualities of mankind.

FaithfulAbstain

People seem to forget, that much like our earth is being mindlessly trashed, if we are not mindful of how we are raising human beings and treating one another, there could come a point of no return for everything.  We are not guaranteed tomorrow, we are not guaranteed the use of this earth, especially if we don’t take care of it.  The same goes for others in our lives that are not treated with the love and kindness that Jesus spoke of.  This is exactly why He is the truth, the life and the only way.

So yes, I consider myself faithful.  How could I not be faithful to someone who loved me enough to die for me?

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Why God, Why?

I always ask this when bad things happen to good or innocent people.  People minding their own business, doing the right thing.  All I ask is for you to question what is going on today in a real way.  Don’t just listen to what I or others have to say about it.  Get in a quiet place literally and within yourself and think about what the problem really seems to be and ask God what you can do to make a difference for the better.

blessings for ParisG

The world needs positive change.  Not just any change.

Dare to be someone’s hero.

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Another “New” Year

Instead of filing bankruptcy in the beginning of 2014 as I should have, after losing my part time job at the end of 2013, I tried to hang onto my house just so I did not have to go through all the stuff I am now having to go through which is bankruptcy and foreclosure, having to downsize and pack up what remains and start living a completely different way of life.  So that kind of explains why I chose to try to find another job that never materialized and drain what little savings I once had to almost nothing in the vain attempt to stave off the inevitable as long as I could.  I can’t see any reason to stay here any longer since my balloon payments are due to begin this year and I would be paying an additional $450 or more a month.  I will be able to just make most of my bills, since I stopped making my mortgage payments now, with the small social security income I had to start drawing on earlier than I planned to.

I didn’t bother to rent my home out due to the amount of rent I would have had to charge this year and I was advised against just signing the house over or wasting my time seeing if a short sale would fly considering that I have two mortgages.  I will have to see how my foreclosure plays out to see where I’m actually going to be living when I leave here.  I have managed to get some applications in cities where I wanted to live, so depending on how soon I have to leave, and who has an opening at that same time, determines where I actually move to.  There is a place a few blocks away from my house that has a month to month lease option that sounds promising, though eventually I want to get out of this dirty city and all the memories.  Some of my family is still trying to talk me into moving to the upper most part of the Upper Peninsula in Michigan where they are now currently 20 below in wind chill and have already had over 2 feet of snow.  Snowfalls are beautiful, within reason, but I am no fan of winter.

Still no lotto wins, but I never give up hope and keep buying one for each major drawing in my area.  The Lottery is the carrot that dangles before the working rich and poor alike and the fact that I once knew someone who shared in one of the bigger jackpots, keeps me playing cause I know people can actually win it.

I can choose to move into a cheap apartment for people over a certain age that are income based because they have them all over.  I could also take out the remaining pension I have and purchase some little fixer-upper like one of my brothers did many years ago.  He made some low offer in cash that was accepted and it was his.  He did have to put a lot of money into it once he moved it though.  Money that I don’t have.  One of my other brothers could have done the same thing when he moved up by him this year, but decided to just rent a cheap but nice apartment with all utilities included in these, his declining years.

Tough call for me.

I am very handy myself and would have help from the rest of my family to make most repairs.  By draining my small pension I will only be short $150. per month as a monthly annuity that I would be applying to apartment living should I rent.  The taxes in some areas of the Upper Peninsula are super cheap, like $300 to $600 a year.  So I figure my monthly payment for my tax, insurance and utilities would be approximately $300 per month, which is cheaper than any apartment.  If I happen to get a money pit, then it will cost me a lot more than that and after a bankruptcy, if I needed credit for any major repair, my interest would be through the roof.

Or I could move to an apartment, like my one brother, in an area that is very popular with tourists and it will feel like I’m on vacation all the time.  I could really be free to do any free or cheap thing I feel like with no maintenance or responsibility and absolutely no snow-blowing all winter long!  Sometimes that sounds great to me, but I am so independent and used to love living creatively.  I guess if I go apartment, I might actually think of stopping Po’ Girl Shines since I have not been using it to make the kinds of posts I planned on initially and it does not look like many people see my posts.  I guess I really do have to blog or get off the spot this year.

I don’t want to just post an occasional pretty picture or a recipe.  I really wanted to be providing information that people could use.

I will see what happens.

Few examples of various art projects from years ago to current.  I love experimenting with various computer software on my photographs.  A couple were just fooling around on blank part of 35mm negatives and then scanning/printing them to see what they look like.

Blue Angel created from a pin photograph.
Make four of same pictures in various hues, highlighted edges and placed together.
Drew tree with fine tip marker on exposed negative.
Drew face on negative with fine tip marker.
Nature sketch.