MY SQUIRRELS ENJOYING SOME FRENCH FRIES AFTER THE FIRST SNOW FALL

I've always 'heard' squirrels will eat just about anything that is thrown at them - at least I know they will eat french fries!

After our first snow fall of the season (Autumn isn't even over yet, winter arrives December 22), some hungry squirrels came out and I ran out of peanut butter to feed them but I had some left over, homemade french fries. I almost felt guilty feeding them these fries but it was either that or chocolate chip cookies. (I think they would have eaten them also.)

They were waiting for me as usual at the door and after that early snow fall, they were probably very hungry and forgot (or were too lazy), to look for all that food they buried all over my yard, the neighbour's yard and probably the entire park behind us.

Sometimes I try to 'shoo' them away but they always look so innocent standing there on their hind legs with their front paws turned in and close to their chest making you feel guilty and all. Eventually, I tossed them some fries to see if they would eat it and sure enough they did! They were enjoying them so much, after awhile, they were eating them 2 at a time.

THE DELECTIBLE-LOOKING CHOCOLATE BATHROOM SUITE!

Now what would you do with a bathroom like this?
It is said the Brits have a hard time searching for “bathroom suites” because they’re typing in “bathroom sweets“, as BathroomSweets explained. As a result of this, they have created a site named – “Bathroom Sweets”, which literally includes an entire bathroom suite made out of, well, sweets. One hundred percent Belgian chocolate to be precise.

KELLY LEE DEKAY: The Gal with the TEENY-TINY WAIST (6 Photos + Video)

Not sure if you guys have heard about this Kelly, 27, from New York, who has been downsizing and sculpting her waist since she was 20 years old. Downsizing to a mere 16-inches! It has become an obsession – inspired by her favourite comic book characters such as the voluptuous Jessica Rabbit and Marvel super-heroine ‘Storm’.

THERAPY OF A DIFFERENT KIND: #PopupTherapy: TRANSPARENT DOMES - IN THE CENTRE OF FIFTH AVENUE

How awesome is this installation?! Confronting mental issues and the ‘stigma’ behind it by talking to a therapist – through texting – in a transparent setting, literally!

A young woman sits alone in a wooden armchair, in a transparent, inflatable igloo-shaped dome at the busy Manhattan intersection of Fifth Avenue and 23rd. She remains focused with an iPad in her hands, temporary oblivious to the city’s iconic sirens, cabs and pigeons flying by, and the people who stop to look and take snapshots with their smartphones. Little do those people realize that the woman is actually in the middle of a therapy session, texting with the Talkspace app, which offers digital, real-time mental health support from licensed therapists.

Betabeat’s Jordyn Taylor texts with a therapist at Talkspace’s #PopupTherapy event in Manhattan on Nov. 5. IMAGE: MASHABLE, CHRISTINA ASCAN

IMAGE: MASHABLE, CHRISTINA ASCAN

MY HALLOWEEN PHOTOS OF A VAMPIRE BRIDE

So Halloween has come and gone but I’m sure you’ve all captured your favourite photos of some great costumes. For me, the scarier the better so when I stumbled upon this Vampire Bride (who also had her mom dressed up for Halloween but not as intense), at a local Long Term Care home, I just had to take a few shots. Some people were actually afraid to look at her. It’s those eyes I tell ya!

It took ‘Lisa Mc’ just over 3 hours to make this awesome creation!

21 PHOTOS OF ANIMATED CINEMAGRAPHS BY Julien Douvier

I've featured Julien Douvier's animated cinemagraphs before and you know how I love these types of photos so I'm excited to bring you more of this incredible artist’s work as he’s known for his obsessive attention to detail. He films and edits every image utilizing a variety of techniques to bring us these amazing cinemagraphic photos which we could just stare at forever!

18 WONDERFUL PHOTOS OF ANIMALS PEERING THROUGH WINDOWS

The animals peering through the windows whether it's from the outside looking in - or inside looking out, are wonderfully captured in these series of photos. My most favourite has got to be the last one for obvious reasons you'll know, when you see it!

THE DEEP-FRIED MAPLE LEAF SNACKS OF JAPAN

OMG! All this time we've been raking those leaves instead of deep-frying them!

This unique treat from the Osaka area in Japan called ‘Momiji Tempura’, (named from the Japanese Maple tree with the same name), is made by dipping your clean Japanese maple leaves into some sweetened tempura batter and then deep frying them in hot vegetable oil. How much simpler can it get?
Some people even preserve the leaves for a year in salt barrels before frying them, according to Kotaku.

So if you want to whip some up and want a more detailed recipe, check out this link.

Hisakuni-Sen Do

31 AWESOME 3-D DRAWINGS

Who doesn't like 3-D drawings. Here are 31 I've found to amaze you guys with! With just a pencil and paper, a lot of practice and patience, these skilled artists are able to achieve the ultimate in 3-D drawings that will leave you doing a double take.

1.

Created by Julia Barinova

16 AMPUTEES WITH A GREAT SENSE OF HUMOUR

Maybe we can all learn a thing or two from these guys.
Don’t mistake this as a sign to make fun of amputees. It’s only amputees themselves that are allowed to create these kinds of awesome photos that we can ALL laugh at.

Shark Attack

28 OF THE MOST COMICALLY AWKWARD BABY PHOTOS EVER TAKEN

You either love 'em or you REALLY love 'em. Remember having photos like these taken or laying around? Just looking at them I felt so bad for the parents but then when you think about it, they will probably make for some great memories and stories someday.

I'M LOVING THE LOOKS ON THESE 3 STYLISH-LOOKING BIRDS

Lol. Check out these characters. These series of photos entitled Coiffure le Bird were digitally manipulated by photographer Rene Mesman and Dutch photo studio Souverein.

GREAT UNDERWATER DOG PHOTOS BY SETH CASTEEL

Who knew such extraordinary photos could be taken about dogs underwater? Apparently Seth Casteel did! The award-winning photographer and the New York Times Best Selling Author of Underwater Dogs, the best selling photography book of 2012 weren't given those accolades for nothing. Check out these amazing photos of dogs underwater!

CHINA: PEOPLE SNOOZING AT THE IKEA STORE - LITERALLY!

Now this is really trying out the merchandise before you buy it! This viral was really funny and amazing guys. I couldn't believe they allowed this at the IKEA store in China. I wonder if we could get away with it here?

For Getty photographer, Kevin Frayer, this act of Chinese shoppers taking a nice long snooze in a display room, was so amazing to him (and me!), that he captured it with a series of photos.

IMAGE: KEVIN FRAYER

AWESOME LIP ART BY LAURA JENKINSON (29 Photos)

So have you guys seen these lips yet floating around the net? No? Well these lip art are from London-based artist Laura Jenkinson and I think they are absolutely wonderful! I'd have to say this girl has some incredible talent! Check them out!

1. Genie

25 SAD (and Disturbing), ANIMAL FACTS THAT WILL RUIN YOUR DAY. Sorry.

Guys, I didn't mean to ruin your day with these animal facts but since they were viralling, I had to share. Some I knew already but others, well, I wish I didn't!

1.

EVIDENCE FROM MY SQUIRRELS

So I was out watering my hanging plants today and was thinking about my squirrel friends. I haven't seen them for over a week. My husband told me he hasn't really seen any also but he still tosses out some food for them every once in awhile in case they do come around. I was just curious if they've been near our yard lately and I soon found out the answer to that question.

THE NAUGHTY NECKLACES of Takayuki Fukusawa

These naughty necklaces by Japanese designer, Takayuki Fukusawa, are tiny figurines diving into women’s breast and if you think they’re ridiculous, or better yet, ridiculously funny, well, he has accomplished his goal of being not only a unique designer but one with a unique sense of humour!

Takayuki designs are all about creating humour and uniqueness and the 30-year-old designer has even started a campfire campaign (the equivalent of Kickstarter), to raise funds - 400,000 yen (about $4,000) for his naughty designs.

AAAW: 31 ADORABLE BABY ANIMALS WITH THEIR MAMMAS

When you have some time, check out these adorable photos of animal babies with their mammas.

34 AMAZING ANIMATED PHOTOS

Some are eerie, some are unique while others are just plain awesome.
Animated photos or animated photography (or cinemagraph), is a new form of visual art that is a mix between photography and video.
Capturing the micro-movements of living people and objects into eternal loops creates an illusion of extremely life-like experience. The viewer is magnetically enchanted and feels the presence of the subject that was never possible with static photography.

UNIQUE ANIMAL MARKINGS

Check out this collection of unique markings found on animals. Some of them are cute, some are funny and some are just plain weird!

CAN YOU SPOT THE SQUIRRELS?

So I was out relaxing on the back patio the other day, enjoying a beer, (I'm still searching for one I really like, by the way), when suddenly I heard ruffling in the trees and tiny leaves or something falling from it. After a few minutes of intensely watching the trees, I realized it was some squirrels. Of course! What else could it have been?

I haven't seen them for so long - since the weather got warmer actually, so I totally forgot about them. But as you all know, I love taking pictures of them so I ran back inside to grab my camera and started shooting away.

It was hard to spot them at first but if you look closely, you will see them. Whatever they were eating, they were sure enjoying it and it was also so fascinating to see how adept they were at eating upside down. Oh! Check out the animation also that was created by Google+ way down below.

37 CELEBRITIES WITH THEIR PAST LOOK-ALIKES

I'm sure you guys have seen these images floating around all over the net so I had to include it in "MY VIRALS". They call this 'phenomenon', doppelganger. I wonder who my past doppelganger was and who it is today. Hmmm...

1. Peter Dinklage… and Diego Velazquez’s “Portrait of Sebastián de Morra”

Doppelganger is always a fascinating subject. It makes you wonder if there is a parallel universe and if time travel is really real and even more scary and intriguing – who was or is your doppelganger. Doppelganger are said to be either the spiritual doubles of a person or their downright evil twin. And they don’t have to be of the same sex either as you’ll see in a few of the photos.

The Doppelganger comes from the German word Doppel (double) and Gänger (walker) . The singular and plural forms are the same but English folks tend to add the ‘s’ on the end to show the plural form.

Some of these photos I've seen many times viralling around the web but others were new to me. Either way, it's fascinating to see these celebrity doubles.

Check out the other 36 celeb doppelgangers below.

THE REALLY BLACK CHICKEN - INSIDE AND OUT!

Have you heard about the black chicken? No I mean the really, really black chicken. Not only is it so black but it's black from head to toe, inside and out!

Talk about dark meat!

These rarely kept bred of chickens are called the Ayam Cemani chickens, (Ayam meaning “chicken” in Indonesian and Cemani - “completely black” in Javanese), which originated from the island of Java, Indonesia. Dutch breeder, Jan Steverink first imported it into Europe in 1998 and there are stocks that are currently kept in the Netherlands, Germany, Czech Republic and Slovakia. There is also several varieties one of which includes the Swedish Black Chicken.

UP CLOSE WITH A BEAR DURING SALMON HUNTING

Check out these photos of a grizzly bear salmon hunting in Kamchatka, Russia. I can't believe this guy was able to get that close to one.

They say grizzly bears are usually peaceful animals who mostly prefer vegetarian food, but during the salmon spawning season, even they like to indulge every once in awhile.

Michel Roggo, who you will see further down below among the photos, tried to watch the body language of the bears to see if they do not mind its presence and it seems to me they didn't. Well not this one anyways.

Wow. I wish I was able to take photos like these with my camera! I found this incredibly fascinating that I had to share!

CHINESE DOCTORS BOWING DOWN TO CHILD WHO DONATED ORGANS

So I came across another short,but heart-wrenching story, this time coming out of China of a boy who had dreams of living it big and the doctors who were grateful for what he did in the end of his short-lived life:

An 11-year-old primary school student, Liang Yaoyi, from Shenzhen, China who suffered from a brain tumour decided to donate his kidneys and liver shortly before his death.

He previously wanted to become a big boss who made lots of money so this way he could take care of his mother, but since the tumour, his wishes had change and said if he could have lived he would have became a doctor to cure everyone’s illnesses.

His wish was fulfilled on June 6th, when his organs he wanted to donate, saved several lives.

The above photo shows him in the intensive care unit, where little Yaoyi had already lost consciousness and was no longer able to close his eyes by himself, so the nurses put a thick layer of medical cream onto his eyes.

In a touching act of gratitude, after the operation, the doctors pushed the boy’s body out of the room and bowed down three times to him with his mother grieving in the background.

AN UNUSUAL PHOTO REQUEST FROM A GRIEVING FATHER

I'm sure you've all heard the story by now of a father who sent out a request to some Reddit users in regards to having a photo of his baby girl Photoshopped. The grieving dad's daughter was always hooked up to tubes before she passed away at only six weeks old and he wanted a 'normal' photo of her.

Little, Sophia passed away from a liver tumour and Nathan Steffel wanted to remember his daughter.

(Photo: Nathan Steffel/Reddit)

THE MINIATURE PAINTINGS OF HASAN KALE

So today I came across an artist from Instanbul - Hasan Kale, who paints on things so small an unimaginable that I had to post it on here. Take for example peanuts in a shell. He doesn't paint on the entire shell but rather on the peanut itself! Half a peanut at that! He'll paint a drawing on a piece of the shell, not the whole shell. Nothing is too weird or too small for him to paint on! Amazing!

THE NIPPLE ARTIST | THE NEW YORK TIMES

Wanted to share this interesting story I came across a few weeks ago about an amazing artist of another kind.

Vinnie Myers

This is truly a unique and inspirational story coming out of Finksburg, Maryland of a tattoo artist turned breast cancer savior. Little Vinnie’s Tattoos do the usual tattoo designs ranging from swordfish and skulls to complex Japanese-style art. But women with breast cancer who come to visit him, from far away as India,come to him for one reason and one reason only – to get a three-dimensional nipple tattoo by the owner, Vinnie Myers.

As women with breast cancer know all too well, finding out you have breast cancer and then losing a breast to it, can leave them feeling alone, devastated and feeling ‘ugly’.

Usually after a woman undergoes a mastectomy and breast reconstruction, the new breast is like a blank canvas since the sensitive skin of the nipple and areola is often removed entirely. The operation can recreate the size and shape of the patient’s natural breast by using her own body tissue or implants, but it cannot recreate a nipple. And doctors who do do tattoos of nipples are not tattoo artists to begin with and should leave that to the professionals.

As word spread of his skills, Myers became so inundated with clients that he had little time for his ‘regular’ tattoos. He said that in 2010 he decided to stop doing nipple tattoos. Then something happened:

“The morning that I planned on telling the guys to stop taking appointments for them, my sister called to tell me she had breast cancer,” Myers recalled.

He took it as a sign and has been doing it ever since.

Video

5 FRIENDS WHO TOOK THE SAME GROUP PHOTO EVERY 5 YEARS FOR 30 YEARS!

How cool and eerie is this? 5 friends who decided to take a photo together one summer's day back in 1982, at a cabin in Capco Lake in northern California, took the same photo every 5 years, for the next 30 years. They got the idea to do so by the 2nd photo shoot. They would pose exactly as they did in the original photo, with the same object(s) and in the same order of seating... for the next 30 years!

I say eerie 'cause let's be honest, I'm curious to see how long they will be able to keep this up. Maybe for another 30 years or more? Maybe not. Who will go first? Either way, this is so cool and extraordinary since most of us lose contact with most of our friends later on in life. It's also 'neat' to see how they have aged over the years.

CREATIVE WORLD CUP SOCCER DOGS (PHOTOS)

This must have taken a great deal of time to create such interesting photos of dogs representing their countries for the 2014 Fifa World Cup Soccer. These photo manipulations, from Life on White entitled Soccer Nation Dogs, even had complimentary background colours which I thought was a nice touch!

Portugal – Portuguese Water Dog

REMEMBERING THE STORY OF THE BABY SQUIRREL DISCOVERED IN A BAG OF MULCH...

So Today I came upon a heart warming story that I wanted to share with my viewers. You all know how much I love squirrels since I'm always taking photos of the little critters and posting them on here. So you can just imagine my delight when I came across this story.

What would you do if you stumbled upon a baby squirrel, and I mean baby as in newborn? Where would you even begin to start? We all know taking in and caring for any baby animal of the wild is never a good idea for numerous reasons, but stumbling upon a newly born baby squirrel while gardening - well the alternatives are... hard. Do you just leave it there to fend for itself when you know very well it may die. Or do you take it in and try to care for it? The human compassion in us trumps any rational reasoning. We have to care for it. And that's exactly what one couple did when the husband came across a baby squirrel trapped inside a bag of mulch. They named him Zip.

This story is over a year old now but is always worth mentioning over and over again. The pictures below speaks volumes. Zip was eventually set free.

FRAMBOISE BOON - Raspberry Lambic Beer

A raspberry flavoured Belgian beer.

Next beer up on my quest in finding that perfect beer that doesn't... uhm, taste like beer but 'acts' like beer is the BOON FRAMBOISE (Boon Raspberry).

Lambic is a type of beer brewed only in a certain region of Brussels. Unlike the previous beer I tried (Fruli), which was more fruity, this beer had a bitter aftertaste.

The beer pours a dark, ruby red with a tall fizzy head of pink foam which disappears quickly. As for the smell - you can smell the fresh raspberry aroma immediately upon opening it with a bit of 'barnyard funk' as the experts call it, a kind of sourness aroma which is derived from this particular yeast strain. This beer is brewed with 300 grams of raspberries per liter of liquid.

2 bottles were purchased at around $5.85 a bottle. At the time of purchase, the staff at the LCBO mentioned they were new to the store and were disappearing quickly off the shelves!

Overall, it was a bit too tart for me but would probably be more appreciated by beer connoisseurs...

MY LATEST PHOTOS WITH MY CANON-EOS REBEL T3i

Hi guys!
I have been busy a lot lately with work and my other website(s) but I wanted to share some random photos I took with my Canon EOS Rebel T3i camera...

My Backyard Birds
These series of photos were taken through my patio door, believe it or not! It was the only way I could capture these birds without scaring them away!

ENJOYING A BELGIAN FRULI BEER...

After working a hectic week, (with still 2 more days to go this weekend), I thought winter was over when a terrible snowstorm struck a few days ago. I must say I'm happy I purchased winter tires a few years ago because I swear, if it weren't for them, I'd be stuck more times than I would care to count.

It's Friday, my one day off this week, and I've decided to treat myself to a Belgian Früli beer. Hmmmm! Yummy! Strawberry flavoured beer never tasted so good!

TRYING OUT MY NEWLY ACQUIRED, (USED) ZOOM LENS + LEARNING ABOUT 'APERATURE'

A few days ago I purchased a used zoom lens, (since buying it new was totally out of the question), for my Canon EOS Rebel T3i camera. As most of you who bought the kit know, the Canon EF-S 18-55mm IS is the standard lens that comes with the camera. And for those of you who have been following me all along on my interest in photography, know that I am no expert and I don't pretend to be one. Hence, excuse the retardedness that some of you professional photographers will see on my blog from time to time. There are many reviews on these types of lens out there so as usual, I won't go into that aspect of it. My goal here is to show you, my viewers, my way of learning to use a camera, from a newbie point of view! I am teaching myself photography through online help as well as my famous 'Press Buttons Now, Ask Questions Later' way! One thing I've learnt when it comes to learning photography - or anything for that matter, online or even in a book, is that they always make things more complicated than it has to be. My attention span is very limited and if you start using too many words I don't understand I'll just close the window, (or the book) and look somewhere else... or just start pressing buttons. Explaining things in its basic form is how I operate. I do that in my job when training people, I do it with my children when explaining how to use something, I do it in every facet of my life. Why make things complicated when they don't have to be. Professionals are so used to what they do that when explaining something, they forget to stop and think that the person they are explaining it to has NO CLUE to begin with and should try to use words in layman's terms and not 'professional' terms. It's like learning how to drive... "to get up to speed on the highway, depress the accelerator slowly". Why not just say, ".. to go faster, just step on the gas pedal... slowly!"

My first camera!

This aperature business, it was so confusing in the beginning. I understand the concept NOW, after reading it over a million times! The aperature, which plays a vital role in photography by the way, is the size of the opening in the lens when taking a photo and according to how wide or narrow the opening is, determines the amount of light that gets in. Fine, that I understand but when they start saying things like - the bigger the aperture/f-number the smaller the opening which in turn results in a larger depth of field - my mind starts to wander. Then they will go on to mention that large apertures (where lots of light gets through) are given f/stop smaller numbers and smaller apertures (where less light gets through) have larger f-stop numbers. The problem is our brains, (well mine anyways), equate smaller opening to mean a smaller number and not the other way around. So f/2.8 is in fact a much larger aperture than f/22.
So one thing at a time here. Let's just first worry about lighting before tackling depth of field. When it comes to understanding aperature in terms of lighting, just remember this (thanks redbubble.com/):

Higher numbers mean more restriction, and harder to get enough light in and lower numbers mean less restriction therefore lots of light can get in! In other words, Lower = LOTS of light!

Ok, so now that we have THAT out of the way, the next thing to learn is that adjusting the aperature also means adjusting the shutter speed. They go hand-in-hand and if you change one without adjusting the other, you will get something like the picture on the right above. But that's another lesson. For today I'm just learning the basics of aperature and how it changes the depth of field. So the low number which lets lots of light in also means that only part of the image will be in focus and the rest will be fuzzy aka bokeh imagery such as in the example pic I shot below.

MY YOUTUBE FINDS: So papa, how do you like the iPad we got you?

Although in German, no translation is necessary...

I don't think papa is the only one doing this, perhaps mama too? Funny video!

AAAH! IT'S THE INVASION OF THE PEANUT BUTTER SNATCHERS!

I woke up this morning and as usual, made my coffee before starting my day. I pulled the curtains back on my patio door and lo and behold, who was all waiting out there? Those cheeky squirrels! Not one, or two or even three but FIVE of them waiting for me to give them some peanut butter with toast.

Usually they come one at a time. I really wished I could have captured them all at once to show you guys but they never really stayed still long enough for me to do so. By the time I ran to grab my camera - they all scattered! It was a great chance however, for me to try out my new Canon camera - capturing them in motion.

In the beginning, I was only able to capture at most, three of them at one time - through the patio door, so these did not make for the greatest pictures...

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