Smell the Roses Pt. 2

Another batch of photos to show how beautiful nature can be if you take the time to look.

Up Up and Away

Even though I have lived in Reno all my life, this is only the third time I've ever seen Dawn Patrol at the Reno Balloon Races. But every time I do it takes my breath away. There is a certain kind of glamour in seeing a hot air balloon light up the predawn that is almost magical.







This year seems to have had a lot more interesting shaped balloons. The last couple years have been a bit disappointing. But aren't the kaleidoscope of colors against our lovely Nevada sky beautiful? It is a highlight of the year to get up in the morning and see the sky filled with rainbows.

Walk like an Egyptian

I saw this sarcophagus at a museum exhibit and I absolutely love it. It belonged to the Egyptian prince Pa-seba-khai-en-ipet who paid a pretty penny before his death to have his coffin painted. It was created somewhere between 1075-945 B.C.E. and made from wood pinned together with pegs, plastered over and gessoed. Depicting various deities and aspects of the afterlife the colorful images give a really great insight into Egyptian aesthetic.




Because I was at the exhibit with the intent of learning about Egyptian fashion, I was very excited to examine this artifact. The images below show two women wearing gorgeous patterned dresses. It is possible that this is an open-work beaded dress on top of a typical linen wrap dress.

 


Some other things I noticed about the images were the shape of the clothing (very form fitting) and the difference between our modern idea of modesty and the ancient Egyptians. For example, some of the images depict women with their chests uncovered. The accessories are also amazing, notice the patterned girdles, jewelry and shawls.

Ancient Aliens

I was able to visit an Egyptian exhibit at my local art museum recently. The exhibit mostly consisted of artifacts from Egyptian tombs but I was pleased to discover that the whole back wall was a great Science Fiction mural. The quote on the wall said that it was based on the works of Science Fiction author Bruce Sterling. The mural was a fabulous rendition of egypt from a Sci-fi perspective, complete with flying saucers over the great pyramids. The art style was like a cave or chalk sketch but it almost looked like a blueprint and there were little captions all around describing aspects of the image. It was a bit more impressive in person than the photos because the room was large and dark and the mural spanned a tilted (almost like being inside a pyramid) wall across one whole side. Anyway, I wanted to share, it's not often I see something so wonderfly geeky at our art museum.

Mochi Mochi

Last year when we were in San Francisco we found this really great Japanese sweets shop. It was a bit pricey but they had some of the best mochi I've ever had. Mochi is Japanese glutinous rice pounded into paste and molded into a shape. You can get a lot of different flavors and I tried the sakura (cherry blossom) flavor. It was pink and yummy. The whole place was adorable and worth seeing even if you don't try anything.