Announcing Snocone Frenzy!!

OK, before we get started with things here at Swirling Eddies, I want to point you to Snocone Frenzy!, a companion site I've launched to help you get some tasty refreshment (and to kick me in the ass to keep posting...). There's more info there - click the How it Works link for details. Looking forward to heaping great mounds of shaved ice and syrup on each and everyone of ya...

Also, you'll note other links in the left column for other companion sites. In order to make more sense of things, I've created three other blogs, and may add more as things progress. These are just placeholders right now; I'll post notices here when there are page updates for each of these spots:

Swirling Landscapes - As the name implies, I'll be using this to post landscape photos from here and there.

Swirling Flora and Fauna - Animals, plants, and other living stuff will find a home here.

Swirling Yummies - Food and wine photos, along with recipes and reviews, etc. I'm really looking forward to this one; have lots of food photos from over the years that will look extra special nice up on that internet.

Another link you'll find in the sinistral column is to The Daily Mammal, an amazing and inspiring undertaking by Jennifer Rae Atkins. Jennyrae, as she allows me to call her, is on a mission to draw every single mammal known to humankind and post them on her website. This magnificent achievement, given that there are something like 5000+ mammals, will take over 14 years, but JR is off to a great start, with several fascinating and alluringly pelted critters already under her belt. Check it out now - check it out daily!

(Hint: if you ask real nice, and maybe offer cash or other special considerations, Jennifer might be willing to accommodate your requests!)

And finally, just a note about Swirling Eddies: the name relates to my belief that the interesting things in life are found on the edges; just as one may float downstream in the main current of a river, you'll see and learn more if you take the occasional detour off into a swirling eddy... As for Daring Teddies - well, just kinda like 'em. Who doesn't, really?

Alright - see you soon, and fairly regulalry, with any luck.

Ciao, amigo/as..

The Beginning: Rainbow Sherbet Swirl

So I'm a few months behind; I promised to post this last fall so y'all could keep track of me, if so inclined, whilst I traipsed about South America. About three weeks into the trip, and after I composed a couple of insightful, pithy, and profound essays but before I posted them, my laptop was liberated and walked into the aether in the arms of another man. Thus ended the blogging plans...until now.

Unfortunately, when li'l laptop wandered off, she took more than my heart and some incoherent ramblings with her - she also took hundreds of photos which I had downloaded but not backed up. So, things you won't find here:

1. Photos of Iguazu National Park (Cataratas del Parque Nacional Iguazú), home of some of the most spectacular waterfalls, jungles, and wildife, in the Americas;
   
2. Photos of my lovely friend Yoko, looking quite sophisticated in a breezy white ensemble as she lounges by the sparkling swimming pool of an exquisite beach mansion on the gold coast of Uruguay;
   
3. The photos, story, or setup of the scene as Yoko's brother-in-law Justin proclaims, "I'm no fluffer, I'm just there for the money shot;"
4. Hundreds of photos of street art from Montevideo, Uruguay's capital and home of some of the most prolific and profound street art anywhere;
5. Photos of framed pics of Adolph Hitler on a street vendor's table two blocks from the Jewish Center headquarters of Montevideo, or concomitant musings on the nature of a society that can tolerate such disparate poles in such proximity;
6. Photos of the skyscrapers of Buenos Aires peaking above the horizon across the massive, muddy, red Rio de la Plata from the 400-year-old Uruguayan colonial town of Colonia del Sacramento;
7. Audio recordings of birds from the jungles of Argentina or the coast of Uruguay; and,
8. Many other things that have slipped my mind at this distant date.

Many apologies for that. However...the good news, I guess, is that I do have years of other photos and tales to share. I'll be posting those regularly, though it will likely take me years to get everything out there, since I'm on the road again for the next 6 months or so and will be popping in submissions about the here and now to go along with the there and then. So...I'll still be annoying you with mails about recent updates! Sweet!