Mixed Blessings, Mixed Media and Woman-Eating Snakes in Tennessee

Cell phones. They fall into the "Mixed Blessings" category here in the Grinnin household. We finally bit the proverbial bullet and changed our T-mobile plan from one that offered unlimited talking to one that offers unlimited talking, texting and web stuff. The texting is actually for the grandkids and myself. It seems to be the best way to stay in touch with the under age 25 bunch. My eldest grandchild is 17 so I thought I'd better get into the groove of things. Wait, they don't say that anymore, do they? Basically, I decided to get into the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" texting movement. We traded our handy-dandy flip type phone for a Nokia Nuron. It had one of those touch tone screens that turned into a disaster. Both GrinninGrampa and I hated it. We now have a Samsung Gravity3. It doesn't have a touch screen; it has numbers on the front so Hubby can make his calls and it slides open to expose a keyboard so I can text the grandkids and occasionally play on Facebook from the phone. Half of us hates it. I, on the other hand, am getting used to it. GrinninGrampa wants the now outdated flip type phone we had before back. That's one thing about cell phones - they are outdated quicker than you can say "SIM card". Okay, now for the scary stuff! Look what I spotted when I was pulling weeds next to the house this afternoon: (SHRIEK!!!) A snakeskin! Thank God the snake wasn't still in it. To make things worse, Hubby wasn't home to save me from it. Yes, I DO need to be saved from a snakeskin. OMG, I am SO afraid of snakes! And, look how BIG this thing is! Hubby tried to tell me it's a Black Snake. I don't care if it's Black or White or Oriental or Swedish. A snake is a SNAKE! And, I happen to know that Black Snakes bite. One bit my friend, Steve, who lives in Nashville. It was apparently trying to get back at him for stepping on it. Anyway, I've decided to never even get near that side of the house anymore as I'm 100% convinced it's either an Anaconda or a Rattler. Either way, it's bound to be a woman-eating snake. Well, my cell phone experiences left me totally weirded out as I pondered all the things it is supposed to do. My brain needed a release and I ended up making this mixed media piece. Here's a closeup of the highlighted definition above the man's head - it defines "thinking" and regardless of how smart these phones are, I really prefer to fall back on the old tried and true brain power that the good Lord gave me. While I was feeling creative, here's another piece I did using a piece of house painter's canvas that I stretched and stapled to an old wood picture frame. The woman's picture I used is a vintage photo that I plucked off the net several years ago. I've used her image many times in my art; this time, I aged her somewhat. A more mature beauty just seemed to be more at home in this garden. Oops, gotta run - our dog, Frankie, managed to get sprayed by a skunk and Hubby and stepson are giving him a tomato juice bath. No, I'm not hurrying out to help. This is an event that HAS to be documented in photos! lol