The AC Menagerie Bulletin

Welcome to the August 19th addition of

 The AC Menagerie Bulletin

The AC Menagerie Bulletin is a weekly digital newspaper highlighting brief accounts of the week's happenings around the Zoo (our home) and on blogs by myself (Nita Davis). Sit back, relax and enjoy while you catch up with the Davis family.

Culinary News 
Lexi and I love our spicy food, however her kids and Skippy (my youngest daughter) are doing good to handle store bought mild salsa. Needless to say I seldom make really spicy food. But I was craving my Papi's Mango Salsa, so this week I whipped up a batch. I also made a (virgin) Mango Pico de Gallo for the wimps. 

Fresh chips, Mango Salsa & Mango Pico de Gallo

Papi's Mango Salsa

Papi's salsa is a secret family recipe, (sorry) but here is my variation of a non spicy mango salsa.

Mango Pico De Gallo (virgin)

1 large tomato (chopped)

1 ripe mango (chopped)

1 small onion (diced)

2 tbs chopped Cilantro leaves 

1 tbs Sherry

1/4 tsp cumin

Salt & Pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients together and chill 1 hour before serving. If you want a bit of spice to the Pico De Gallo just finely chop your favorite pepper and add it to the mixture.

As you can see by the photo I like to put the two together for a nice spicy chunky treat. When I realized I had eaten all the fresh tortilla chips without taking a photo I quickly fried a few more for this photo. I discovered we were out of napkins and paper towels, thus the shine to the chips in the photo is because they were pretty greasy. Oh, but were they ever yummy! 


Social News 
My poor friend Maria had been working 50+ hours per week until last week. As you can imagine she working so much she had no time or energy to socialize. Now that her schedule has eased up we got together for a fun afternoon of chatter, laughter and people watching at the mall. 

Educational News 
I have often been called a lifetime student because I am always taking classes or doing research to continue learning. In my search for continuing education I came across an educational website for photographers. The classes and books are fairly reasonably priced and even better is the fact that it also has some free things. I signed up for the site and received my first news letter which had a 30 day photo challenge. Each day's challenge has a different topic, and while some of the challenges are things I am very familiar others I haven't had much practice in. The first day was Self portraiture. This is one that I really haven't done much of. Sure I've done my fair share of Selfies, but that is completely different. This photo was my first attempt and although I do like the shot the focus isn't really correct for a portrait, so I decided to extend the first day challenge until I get it right.

Sport & Health News
With such a busy week last week I have been taking it easy this week. So no Olympic activity. The grandkids and I did go on a few walks. I even coerced them into letting me do a mini portrait session. They use to love having their portrait taken but anymore it is like pulling teeth just to take any pictures of them.

Fashion News
If you are a regular here at AC, you may notice that Lexi and I are sporting much shorter hair than usual. Trust me it isn't entirely by choice. We both have very curly hair but prefer to wear it straight. I straighten mine at least once a week and Lexi straightens hers every day. Now we have done this for at least seven years. We have also been coloring our hair for about the same amount of time. Well, this year we decided to get more creative and put some very bright color in our hair. This required bleaching first. Never, Never, Never again! The damage to Lexi's hair was the worst, probably because she straightens her hair every day. Her once almost waist length hair is now barely shoulder length. It won't hold any color and just keeps breaking off. To slow down the breakage, she is only straightening it once a week and has been putting special conditioners in it. Mine isn't near as bad but there are sections that will not hold color and the ends were starting to break off so I cut mine shorter before the damage traveled further up the shafts. Do you color your hair? Have you ever had damage like this? 

A fun look at our style

Comics 

The Blog Review

The air show dominated both blogs this week.

On Artistic Composition this week:

-SIMC: Sioux Falls Air Show Part I: This week's Sunday In My City focused on the Sioux Falls Air Show held on the Air Guard Base in Sioux Falls, SD.

- Air Show Part II: Random photographs from the air show.

- Wonders N Wishes: This week's Wonder Award went to a local young man who with the help of his mother started the non profit organization Project Donnie. If you haven't heard of this organization please hop over to the post and learn what an amazing young man this is.

 On Nita's Photography this week:

- The Bomber: A close up look at a bomber.

- Dancing With The Hawkeye: Have you heard of the E2-C Hawkeye? If not you really should go check this out and learn why I think it is the most important plane in our military.

- WW: Push The Button: My wordless Wednesday photo is of a sight I found amusing at the airshow.

- Bowen N Esten: Concert photos of Clare Bowen and Chip Esten, two singers from the TV show Naskville.

- Quiet Beauty: For this weeks 'Weekend Reflection' and 'Sky Watch Friday' I shared photos of two places that are usually very busy but I caught them when they were very quiet.

Have A Fantastic Weekend!