Ruby Tuesday – Wild Strawberries! November 23, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: frost, Ruby Tuesday!, wild strawberries
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…In November???
Well, actually, it’s wild strawberry leaves, turned autumn red ruby and here festooned with the remnants of the morning’s frost:
I liked the way each of the leave’s tiny, hair-like spines had captured its own accumulation of atmospheric rime.
This was taken at about ten AM in the deep shade of a stand of firs, and the crystal structures were becoming indistinct as the day warmed. I bet it was really good a couple of hours earlier!
Thanks to Mary over at Work of the Poet for hosting this rubilicious meme. Go visit her for more rubiliciousness!
Ruby Tuesday – Self-Portrait Edition. November 17, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Love and Death, Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: glasses, ruby, self portrait
9 comments
I’m generally loathe to do this, but somehow this self-inflicted wound is slightly less painful than most, so I thought, “What the hell, it’s Tuesday, and that retainer on your dollar store glasses does look kinda Ruby…”
With appologies to Mary over at Work of the Poet for so disabusing her otherwise comely meme.
Ruby Tuesday! November 9, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: dragon, Ruby Tuesday!, sea glass, Three Sisters Sanctuary
11 comments
This is an Accidental Ruby Tuesday, which came my way most unexpectedly this past weekend.
I’d overslept and missed the best part of sunrise, but I nonetheless left the house early enough to see some long shadows and a bit of color.
But the skies were boring compared to the sunrise I’d invisioned, and I drove without a destination, disconsolate yet propelled by my inate wanderlust.
Then, on the edges of Ashfield (it might have been Goshen by then) I passed a rustic building gleaming with chrome detritus of a most unanticipated sort – the Good Time Stove Company:
…yes, a real store, festooned with an interesting array of shiny stuff displayed to the delight of early morning travelers like me. I’d passed it hundreds of times without stopping, but on this particular morning the light was right, and I backed up to snap this shot.
There are several bits of Ruby scattered about this photograph, though I doubt you can see the most impressive one to me: the glowing red heart affixed to the chest of the twenty foot Tin Cowboy at the left of the photo.
Trust me, it’s a trip.
So at this resolution you might just be able to see the Glowing Red Whatever at the foot of the fifteen-foot Bicycle Wheel Arch which frames the entrance to the stove shop. I call Ruby-Dab!
…but then, off to the right, was a sign: “Three Sisters Sanctuary:”
Yeah, I know, “That’s pretty scant Ruby.” Let’s call it “sorta red.”
But I, being curious, wandered out back, the idea of “three sisters” appealing to me in some way or another.
And there I spied Ruby:
‘Twas a Morning Dragon, fifty feet at least, basking in the break of day, with two-foot chunks of sea glass guarding its sinuous spine, and a belly where fire lived, and a hideously beautiful mouth where the smoke came out, gnashing its earthbound fangs at the waning half-moon:
This was a truly cool find, and the low light of morning lit it to my liking.
I hope you like it too.
Thanks to Mary over at Work of the Poet for hosting this cool meme. Go there to see what else is rubilicious!
Ruby Tuesday: A Covered Bridge. November 2, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: Arthur A. Smith, Colrain, covered bridge
13 comments
Here’s the Arthur A. Smith bridge in Colrain, Massachusetts:
Spans the North River, it does. Recently “refurbished,” to the tune of a million and a half bucks.
There are times when I think that’s a bargain; tonight has been one of them.
See more Rubiliciousness over at Mary’s place, Work of the Poet.
Thanks, Mary. 
Ruby Tuesday – A Subdued Autumn. October 27, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: Autumn, Ruby Tuesday!
7 comments
This autumn has been uncharacteristically un-ruby. I mean, there are patches of reddishness around, but I’m not seeing as many sugar-maple-red landscapes, the ones which truly exemplify the potential Rubiliciousness of a Berkshires autumn day.
Nonetheless, it’s Tuesday, so here’s my best effort in this subdued season.
Powerlines in Shelburne, I think:
The town line’s a bit vague through there.
Yeah, the colors were a bit subdued, but the light was occasionally right enough to break out the box. Like at this old house by the dam at Puffer’s Pond, north of Amherst:
That oak branch is a structural miracle, much more so in person, where its sixty feet of wind-tossed weight has twisted and waved for a century.
Of course, there have been patches of brilliance, even Rubiliciousness, if I may be so bold. Distressed maples, like these flooded specimens in a swamp in Florida, gave it up to the Color Gods:
Even the ferns went a bit red as they prepared to call it a year and fold up shop.
And then there was the occasional stray throwback to the Days of Color, to my childhood, when every autumn struck me dumb with wonder. The skies would pile high with clouds while the farms below blazed in a seasonal Swan Song:
Seems like we used to have more of that.
But now it’s less boisterous, more measured. Here’s a view of the Connecticut river flowing southward between Sunderland on the left and Deerfield and Whately on the right, taken from the tower on Mount Sugarloaf:
The ruby-clad walker right of center doesn’t really show up at this resolution, but trust me he’s there.
Well that’s all I got for ruby, or at least reddish.
‘Till next week, I mean.
Visit Mary over at Work of the Poet for more of this rubilicious meme!
Ruby Tuesday – The Bishop, CA Edition! September 28, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Art and Nature, Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: Bishop, Buttermilks, CA, Ruby Tuesday!, Sierras
6 comments
Half way up California’s fabled East Side sits the quintessential Western town of Bishop. I’d driven through there once before, ’round about 1980, but all I recall about that particular trip was that the brownies were absurdly green.
Ahem.
Fast forwarding to March of 2009, I had occasion to stop there with my buddy Lizz on our whirlwind tour of Southern California, ostensibly in search of wildflowers but taking in anything which was visually Not Massachusetts. I’d expressed my desire to see Mount Whitney before descending into Death Valley, expecting the geographic contrast to possess a certain power (which it did,) and Lizz did me one better by first humoring me, then spiriting me a little ways farther north to Bishop, where Galen Rowel’s Mountain Light Gallery exhibits some of that photographer’s astounding work.
People. If you’re ever in the area, make this stop an imperative. You’ll be transported by one of the visionaries of modern photography to places which we mortals can barely imagine, exquisitely rendered by an artist of rare stature. I bawled like a baby before half a dozen of his works.
By the time we left I was trembling, partly with desire to see what Galen saw, and partly out of the fear which comes from knowing how rare that gift really is.
We drove Up West ’till a late season snow storm made continuing imprudent, then parked and wandered around beneath the thick grey skies, benefiting from the dry air of the high desert as it ate the falling snows, leaving us to swim in the turbulent air below great granite massifs piercing a blanket ofy winter sky.
And amidst all of this, hints of Ruby enlivened the austere majesty of the High Country:
I bet you thought I forgot to dance with The Meme What Brung Me, courtesy of Mary.
No way, Mary. I;m clumsy, but I’m not a cad.
Ruby Tuesday – Falling Into Autumn! September 22, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: autumn leaves, autumnal equinox, cattails, deerfield river
5 comments
Just a quick break from sorting my life into piles of “pack” and “pitch” prior to my upcoming move.
Here are a few shots demonstrating why folks in these parts look forward to the autumnal equinox.
An ordinary utility pole becomes a beautiful lady in her gown by Virginia Creeper:
A swamp in upper Florida shines its lights on a steely sky:
…and a view along the Deerfield river:
It’s going to get better before it gets done, but I expect to be more or less tied up and might miss a lot of it.
But I’ll share what I can.
Thanks to Mary over at Work of the Poet for this rubylicious meme!
Ruby Tuesday – Non-Thematic Edition! September 14, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: Bridge of Flowers, Burlington moose, moss, Thompson Chapel
12 comments
Tonight, a Meme Without a Theme.
OK, maybe it has a theme, but if so, it’s a mystery to me. Despite prior protestations to the contrary, I’m whoring out a jumble of photos whose only commonality is that they have something red in them. It’s not my best work, either as a blogger or as a photographer, but it’s RED, DAMMIT!
I like red.
Anyway.
Flowers on the Bridge of Flowers:
You have to look at this view every time I have to go to Shelburne Falls to do my laundry. Call it “shared sacrifice.”
Another returning subject, on accounta I work in that area on a semi-regular basis, The Thompson Memorial Chapel in Williamstown:
While the Japanese maple in the lower corner allows me to claim this as a “ruby” photo, it’s really a Fun With Elliot photo. Elliot’s my new toy, a funky lens which allows for perspective adjustments, e.g. the elimination of the vanishing point which ought to apply to this tower. The result feels to me like a visceral sense of the structure’s mass.
I know, that’s TMI for a Ruby Tuesday post. Time to shut up and show you the rubys.
American amaranth on a farm in southern Vermont:
…along with a bajillion othe kinds of flowers in shades of red ruby, and the odd pumpkin.
Closer to home, (!) sphagnum moss getting in touch with its Inner Rubys:
Rubiliciously lush!
And at the risk of being labeled a One Trick Moose, here’s another moose loose on the streets of Bennington, VT:
Unlike most of the moose-art on display thereabouts, this one was unlabeled, so I call it Self Portrait with Moose.
The nerve, eh?
Thanks to Mary over at Work of the Poet for this fun meme, and go visit if you haven’t, there are lots of ruby things to see every Tuesday!
Ruby Tuesday, Goofy Edition! September 8, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: Big Indian, goofy as all get-out, moose, rooster
9 comments
Driving around my part of the world this past week, I was reminded of the John Prine song, “Big Old Goofy World.”
And as a lot of the goofiness was, um, Ruby, I thought I’d share it with you!
What passes for “art” in nearby Bennington, VT:
This guy, “Mystical Moose,” is one of fifty-something meese gracing the streets of The Ben as some kind of Vermont promotional deal.
They were all pretty cool, but this one went beyond cool into rubiliciousness!
And while we’re in “goofy mode,” here’s an eight foot rooster hanging out at a Lanesborough farm:
I mean, What The Baawwwk???
And my favorite “big dude,” the decidedly P.U.* mascot of the Big Indian (tacky) Gift Shop in my own home town:
Yep, twinty feet o’ honkin’ Redman. We locals call him the B.F.I.
[*that be politically UNcorrect. Which is, of course, uncorrect.]
Anyway, that’s about all the goofiness I can handle in one sitting. Thanks to Mary over at Work of the Poet for this fun meme!
Ruby Tuesday, Random Edition. September 1, 2009
Posted by littlebangtheory in Ruby Tuesday!.Tags: bridge, church, mailbox, mushroom
14 comments
A few things Ruby crossed my line of sight this week, and I bagged ‘em.
Mind you, I don’t just go around shooting random things because they’re Ruby. That seems somehow exploitative of an unearned attribute.
But I do shoot random things because they speak to me, and if they speak Ruby, you get to hear them here.
The Bardwell’s Ferry Bridge over the Deerfield, here photographed in a gentle rain:
A mushroom in evening light:
I’m not sure what kind, I’m too hungry to look it up right now, it’s late and I haven’t made dinner yet.
A mailbox at the mouth of Potter’s Lane, where the mail truck doesn’t go:
And St. Luke’s Stone Church in Lanesborough:
A few things Ruboid in Western Massachusetts.
For more Rubiliciousness, visit Mary over at Work of the Poet. She’s the reason I’m a Rubiphile.
