Suntana

I Think We're Going to Need a Bigger Boat

Wednesday, 24. December 2008, 23:41:18

It's here! It's here! It's finally HERE!
I finally have the Pic of the 20-Foot Great White Shark, which I caught while out on the Pacific Ocean in a 7-Foot kayak. I was armed with nothing, but my Wits, my Right Fist, some Duct Tape and a Rope. The water was rough as there was a merciless storm in progress. The 25-Foot waves were tossing me around and capsizing my kayak constantly. Intrepidly, I kept paddling ahead, farther from shore ... attempting to get back my Frisbee that had floated out to sea. Then as if that wasn't bad enough, I saw this Great White Shark approaching my kayak.

Don't you just HATE it when that happens?

Okay, so there was a fly in the ointment temporarily spoiling my aquatic excursion. The Great White jumped up out of the water. I caught it in mid air and PUNCHED it right in its snout!

I knocked it out cold.

I stuck the rope in its razor-sharp-toothed big mouth. I then duct-taped it shut.

I then paddled my kayak back to shore ... pulling the 20-Foot Great Shark behind me.

Heyyy, why are y'all shaking your heads? WHAT? You're not buying my story?

Damn! Y'all are onto me. Okay Okay, I confess. That was a slight bit of

prevarication.

What gave me away? I think I screwed up by exaggerating with the 7-Foot Kayak, right? I KNEW it! I should have said an 8-Foot kayak instead. That would have been much more plausible.

We'll chalk it down as my 1st foray into Fiction Adventures writing.

Anyway, let me journey back to reality.

Some of y'all read my last Post - Mayday Mayday! Fish Overboard!. I mentioned this Shark Sign that I made for a birthday party. I finally got the Pic of my Shark Sign masterpiece creation. However, trying to get it posted here in this Post was no piece of cake. I immediately ran into a problem. The Pic that I was E-mailed, was HUGE like 3.48 Meg!

Not Good. And that was already in JPEG format. I attempted a couple of tricks to try and get the File Size down, to no avail. Finally I remembered about Print Screen. That was the ticket.

I managed to get the File Size way down. I then cropped the Pic. However, then no matter how many times I kept resizing the Pic down, I couldn't get it to display here in my Post. So, I gave up on that route.

I switched over to Plan B. I created my 1st Photo Album ever.

So, take a stroll over to my Photo Album area to see ...

:::Cue In the Jaws Theme:::

The 2½-Foot Great Grey & Blue Baby Shark.

Let me know if y'all have any problems loading or viewing the Pic.
Let me know if it's too dark or too light as this is my 1st Pic in a Photo Album.

Mayday Mayday! Fish Overboard!Take This Club and Shove It!

Comments

JTazzie # 25. December 2008, 05:59

Nice job........ Saw the photo with no problem

Huggles,

Taz

P.S. You should get with my hubby about those fish stories ........ The whoppers yall would tell

Zaphira # 25. December 2008, 08:30

I didn't have problems viewing it either.

And hey - I think you did a great job making that shark. I am impressed!

Suntana # 26. December 2008, 01:03

Thanks, Taz!

And anymore fish stories, they'd definitely have to be Whoppers, Taz. That's cuz aside of my involvement in a fishing trip in my Spring Break Tangled Web Plot Busted Post, I have no other remote experience with fishing. Fishing interests me about as much as Camping, Soccer, Golf and Jessica Simpson ... which is ZERO.

Suntana # 26. December 2008, 01:35

Thanks, Zaph!

You are impressed ... and I'm am shocked!

I am shocked that I was able to pull off the drawing part. While I am very good with Windows Paint, which of course has Tools to help one be an Artist ... I on the other hand, am NOT known for remotely having any prowess with freehanded drawing. I'm not good at gauging the dimensions. I could envision myself having to do at least a dozen sketches because they'd be looking like an Anteater, a Porcupine, an Armadillo or anything, but a Shark. So I took myself by surprise when I drew a respectable semblance of a Shark on the 1st shot. I was almost tempted to ask, "Uhhh, excuse me. Did I by any chance doze off and someone else drew this Shark?"

PainterWoman # 26. December 2008, 05:53

I saw it with no problem. Cute. Do you get to keep it? You could hang it on your wall as your first art piece.

Hang up the little fishes too for that matter. I'm serious now.

I hope you got lots of food and

for the time you spent.

Suntana # 26. December 2008, 06:36

From the get go, it was meant to end up staying either with the Birthday Boy's Mom or the party's hostess. I told them to flip a coin.

From what I am aware, I think it stayed with the party's hostess since it was created with the idea of being a Street Address Sign, artistic as it was and it already had their address on it. I obviously blocked it out in the Pic. Of course, they'll have to put their address on there in some more permanent manner. Having run short on time, I had just taped a printout of the address on there ... with medical tape.

Cellophane Tape didn't want to stick on the Spray Paint coat.

They might also opt to display it somewhere on this outside Waterfall thing they have there in the front of their house. Actually, that reminds me. I have to remind her that the Shark is actually NOT made out of half inch thick plywood as it appears. It is half inch compressed cardboard. So, it is no doubt NOT a good idea to use it outside as is, lest RAIN screw up / bubble up the compressed cardboard. I don't know if there is some Sealant that can be used on this compressed cardboard that won't screw it up. Hopefully I'm not too late with the Info and the Shark is now a soggy piece of cardboard.

I'll see if they have decent Pics of the batch ... Ummm, school of little Fish used in the games.

PainterWoman # 26. December 2008, 14:18

I'm sure there is a sealant for the cardboard. However, depending on where you live, the outside elements will eventually eat through the sealant and fade the color and any moisture will start doing what it does to cardboard. Soooo, probably underneath their patio or front porch overhang would be the best bet for the shark.

The Arizona sun fades color. I found this out with my mural I painted on the concrete block wall. I used several colors of concrete stain and didn't put a sealant on it. It's been six or seven years and I can see a definite fading of the colors. When I get around to touching it up, plus extending the mural to another 12 foot section, I WILL put a sealant on it.

Since you didn't get to keep it, you'll just have to do another one for your house.

Suntana # 26. December 2008, 23:16

Update, Pam, I called today and found out that it was the Birthday Boy's Mom instead who ended up taking the Shark. She's gonna display it INSIDE ... either in the boy's eventual room or in their room where he sleeps now. So, the Shark won't be subjected to the outside weather elements.

Crisis averted.

I think Arizona heat will make even one's memory fade.

Do you have that mural in your Photo Album?

Suntana # 26. December 2008, 23:16

Crisis averted.

I think Arizona heat will make even one's memory fade.

Do you have that mural in your Photo Album?

PainterWoman # 26. December 2008, 23:33

Yes, it's in the album 'My Pets and other things at my Home".

That will be a very cute piece of art for the little boy's room. It'll be something he won't grow out of for a long time.

Suntana # 27. December 2008, 05:10

Heyyy! While limit yourself to 12 more feet, Pam? You're ready to graduate into creating some Crop Circles Art!

SummerAngel # 28. December 2008, 07:23

Great Jaws! I'm glad it stayed with the little boy. Hey, now you have two things you call fall back on if needed, WHOPPER Storytelling and KILLER Artwork:lol: It's always good to expand your horizons.

On a more serious note, next time you use your artistic skills on an outdoor theme, you might want to explore Coroplast. Coroplast is corrugated plastic that comes in an array of colors. My son stuck his college pride sign made of it in the front yard over two years ago and it has weathered great. In fact, I bought a sheet of it for a Christmas project this year.

the stuff, its so easy to work with.

Cois # 28. December 2008, 11:05

that story is totally believable

doesn't opera resize pics automatically?

Suntana # 28. December 2008, 15:58

Hey there, Summer! Welcome to my Blog!

Thanks for the Jaws Review.

Whopper storytelling? You mean stories about me eating Whataburger Whoppers? Just Kidding!

Coroplast, huh? That's a new one on me? I take it you can find it like at Home Depot or Lowe's Home Improvement ... Wal-Mart?

If I was really bold and adventurous, I COULD mouth off AGAIN

and volunteer for another project. Yep, I'm invited to another kid's Happy Birthday party this coming Saturday ... this time for a 1st Grader. The theme for this party is

Wrestling!

Apparently the kid's a Wrestling Fan. The invitations are Wrestling-themed. So, I could up and go, "Heyyy! I'll make you Wrestler Sign." But, Hmmm? I'm immediately sensing that drawing a Wrestler would NOT be quite as easy as drawing a Shark. Even if by pure luck I managed to draw a half scale version outline of a Wrestler, drawing the artwork on the cutout would prove very difficult for me. Muscles, Abs ... a Face. I'm not remotely good at drawing human faces. IF someone were to draw the outline for me, I'd no doubt be able to handle the Jigsaw cutting task and the sanding, Etc. Bottom line, I'd better keep my mouth shut on this one.

Anyway, Summer, feel free to pop in and read my Blog and comment anytime. Check back later today. Probably before lunch today, my New Post should be up. I wrote half of it last night before I got too sleepy and cold and off to bed I went.

Suntana # 28. December 2008, 16:07

From what I've read on some Blogs and on the Forums, Cois, some Opera glitch is giving a lot of people problems inserting photos in their Blogs. In my case, nothing would display. I tried inserting the Pic in Left, Center and Right locations to no avail. I thought maybe the Pic was too big. So, I kept resizing it down ... about 4 or 5 times and still nothing would display. I remembered reading about people's photo-inserting problems, so I abandoned that idea and went with the Photo Album route.

PainterWoman # 28. December 2008, 16:57

Uh oh, Carlos. Since it's a wrestling theme, maybe they are going to want a wrestling demonstration.

Re: the photo problems. Just before Christmas I downloaded the Opera browser. It was fine for a couple of days. Now, in the Opera browser, all my photos in my albums are just white squares w/ titles, there are no avatar pics, and the last one or two posts have no pics. So I am back using my IE browser where everything is exactly the way it should be. I've emailed 'help' and all they said was that it was a problem in My Opera program. ???

Suntana # 28. December 2008, 20:47

No No ... just plain

I'm NOT getting out there in those short, tight Wrestling trunks.

I don't have the almost requisite long Wrestling hair that seems to be the rage nowadays. Plus, I'm 200 pounds underweight.

Oh, I didn't know that all this time you had been navigating the OC via IE. I tend to assume that most people on the OC view it via Opera. I think since so many of us are having Photo insertion into Posts problems and / or Photo Album problems and such, it is a temporary Opera problem.

Which version of Opera did you download, Pam?
Keep in mind ... there is Opera 10 Peregrine out there right now, which is only in Alpha status. IF that's what you should happen to have installed, that one is guaranteed to have Bugs ... maybe even more like full-blown Pterodactyls.

I played with that Opera 10 Alpha version for 2 days, but then went back to my current and latest officially released Opera 9.63.

Anytime I encounter sudden glitches and problems with my Opera, I Clear Out the Private Data and perform a Profile Reset. More often than not, that fixes the problem.

PainterWoman # 28. December 2008, 21:02

I downloaded 9.63 around th 21st or 22nd. The post on the 21st is fine and still has any pics. But not the two posts after that. Plus all my pic in the albums disappeared. Clearing out the private data? Never heard of that...or profile reset. Hmmmm....maybe I'll try it.

So no wrestling for you? I don't blame you. Every once in a while I'll watch a bit of it....like five minutes. They sure do throw each other around a lot. Ouch!

Now if The Rock was still on, I'd watch a little more.

Suntana # 28. December 2008, 23:14

Okay, Pam, I'll toss you a PM and try and guide you through Private Data Clearing and the Profile Reset.