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2017’s List of Favorites 1

The year is drawing to an end. It’s time to look back and review a few favorites. Favorite Read My favorite book I read this year is I, Who Did Not Die by Zahed Haftlang,‎ Najah Aboud and Meredith May. Two soldiers: One Iraqi, the other Iranian. They meet on […]


A Million Little Heartbreaks

To be a parent is to suffer an endless loop of little heartbreaks. The loop is punctuated with the occasional large heartbreak. They leave the womb. Heartbreak. Then they leave the crib. Heartbreak. After that they go to school. Heartbreak. They get sick. Heartbreak. Then if you did well and […]


The secret life of a pedestrian (traffic light animation) 2

As I am writing a novel inspired by traffic, I find myself starring at traffic signs and signals. I try to imagine what they are trying to tell us, beyond the obvious. Today, I give special attention to the pedestrian traffic light. I imagine what would it be like if the stick man in the traffic light started dancing. What would that be like. Here is my traffic light animation.

To create the traffic light animation, I video tapped a favorite pedestrian traffic light in my neighborhood and then I proceeded to animate the stick figure walking man in the traffic light. As I started this I thought animating a stick figure would be easy. Well! I was wrong. It is much harder than I expected.

The story is like this. I am walking in my neighborhood when I encounter a pedestrian traffic signal.

traffic light animation

I press it and wait for the walking man to appear to give me permission to cross the street. First, the hand indicating “stop” appears. And then the walking man.

Instead of walking he begins to dance for me. Music magically starts to play as well.

traffic light animation
traffic light animation
traffic light animation

What am I supposed to do? Dance along? Learn the choreography? Ignore him and cross the road anyway? What would you do in this situation?


All About You (survey)

Gather around. We are sitting next to a campfire. S’mores are being roasted in the fire. The hot chocolate just arrived. It’s time for you to tell me about yourself. The evening is just about to get magical. I created this survey. I would like to learn a little about […]


Losing My Father In Law 8

I have been walking around with a lump in my stomach. My father-in-law, my husband’s father, Ali Radwan Hassan has passed away two weeks ago. At age 82, in the town of Mash-had located outside of Nazareth in Israel. There were health problems, so I can’t say that this event […]