Adventures of Nefertiti

For most of my adult life, I’ve completely been against subscribing to premium movie channels. In the past, I’ve felt that if I really wanted to see a good movie and if I failed to see it in the movie theatre, well then I should just visit Blockbuster and rent it. This mindset changed for me a few years ago. Upon my relocation to South Carolina, I decided to invest my money in a little at home entertainment. Now with my basic cable and internet package, I also have one group of premium movie channels, and that is with HBO. HBO has been good to me, although my monthly bill is a bit too high, I’m still pretty content with their selection of movie choices and original shows. True Blood and Entourage are can’t miss summer thrills. And very recently, I’ve been really impressed with what HBO has had to offer. Within the past few days, I’ve watched three fantastic shows that have been educational, enlightening, and entertaining. Those three are... Something the Lord Made Sugar Treme Something...

Sometimes I don’t feel comfortable in this small town that I reside in. Although most of the time, I think it’s just me. Over the past few years I’ve become a bit paranoid and feel sometimes that pairs of eyes are trying to get a hold of me. Now it doesn’t help here that South Carolina is a conservative red state and that from time to time I’ve seen a confederate flag hanging over the balcony of the apartment across the parking lot from me. Nor does it help that at one time my office was so charged politically that I called in sick the day after President Obama was elected. Still despite all of this, I have felt relatively safe in my surroundings, albeit a bit uncomfortable. But tonight I experienced something so unsettling that I’m just not sure how I should label it. Lately it seems I’ve had a taste for barbeque. A few weeks ago I was intrigued by a quick conversation on identity with the cashier in the drive-thru at Jim N-Nick’s BBQ and today, I decided to visit a new barbeque resta...

There’s not much to do here in Bluffton , South Carolina, but there sure can be loads of picture taking moments. I moved here a few years ago when my job relocated my office to the resort town of Hilton Head Island. Hilton Head is a sea island off the tip of south eastern South Carolina. And Bluffton is a tiny historic town on the mainland across the bridge from Hilton Head. It takes me maybe twenty minutes to drive from Bluffton to Hilton Head for my office hours. Since I moved to this area, which is also known as the low country, I just haven’t ventured out much. I’ ve hit all the sightseeing spots back on the island, but haven’t had a desire to check out the historic district of my new home community in Bluffton . So today, on this fine Easter Sunday, I decided to drive around the corner with my Canon SX 120 and park the car and take a walk. Only five minutes away from my apartment, what I found here, is a photographer’s dream come true. Of course I took lots of pictures and I...

I hope I don’t get in trouble, but I had been putting off filling out my 2010 Census Form, and now that I have filled it out, I may not have given the response that the government wanted to see. I had been aware of the controversy regarding the word Negro, and I wasn’t too eager to deal with it. Still, I completely expected to have the opportunity to check a box that read Black, or a box that read African American or a box that read Negro. Instead, last night as I sat down to fill out my form, I discovered lumped together under one box to check, read the line.... Black, African American or Negro. Hmm... So have we fully embraced this new millennium or have we traveled back in time to the 1920’s? I remember last month talking with my Grandmother regarding the latest census and asking what she thought about the word Negro being added, and her response was; “Why did they bring that word back?” My point exactly! The reasoning behind that was because the Census Bureau felt that some older g...

This past weekend my brother spent Friday and Saturday evening in the hospital with his baby girl. My 3-year-old niece Dezi was running a high fever Friday afternoon, and after a call from the daycare, my brother Tommy, rushed her to the hospital. She’s fine now, but when I talked with my brother Sunday afternoon, they were still at the hospital and my brother hadn’t had any sleep. He says he was afraid to take his eyes off of her, even for one second. I wish I could have been there for him, because I hate that he had to endure that anguish alone. But I couldn’t, because he’s in Florida, and I’m in South Carolina. My mother is in Kentucky and my father is in Indiana, and they couldn’t have been with him either. My brother has lots of loved ones in Orlando, but no blood relative. While talking with my brother, I asked how Dezi was handling being in the hospital, and he said that she was demanding to go home and that every time the doctor came by to take blood, she would give him the evi...

A few weeks ago, I decided to visit the old Angel Oak Tree on John’s Island and I found her just south of Charleston, South Carolina. To get to her, I eventually had to travel down the roughest dirt road I’ve ever been on. The road is unpaved and is filled with potholes, I swear a mile deep each. The journey to visit with Angel Oak is well worth it though. She’s estimated to be over 1,400 years old, one of the oldest organisms around and is the type of creature to have withstood the test of time. She’s weathered lightening strikes, and hurricanes, and yes even nearby earthquakes. She’s 65 feet tall and 25 feet and a half round. Her branches extend outward to welcome visitors and are so heavy and thick that some of them rest easily on the ground. She’s strong and her roots run deep. She symbolizes the children whom she greets everyday with open arms during park visiting hours. She represents Mother Earth and her love that will forever endure the test of time. She is a sight to see and a...

My cat is traumatized. I dropped him off at the kennel for a few days, so that I could go to Charleston to see John Mayer and Michael Franti in concert. When I made my way back to the kennel today to pick up my little Jake, he was buried in his cage under a big pillow, hiding. The attendant said she put the pillow in his cage to make him feel better. And she suggested I bring him in more often, so that he could learn to be a bit more social. Anyway, he's been meowing like crazy since we've been back, and has been asleep at my feet on and off all afternoon. During his brief periods of sleep, he's moaned and cried out and tossed and turned like he's having nightmares of me dropping him off again. He wakes when I get up to move about and he cries out and loudly meows at me. He is so spoiled. I thought he would have a good time. When I left him there, it was to a room full of other cats and kitties, including two ferrets. But I guess being in a room full of other feline cr...