More Bad News and Procrastination

My dad did not beat lung cancer. He passed away in August 2014, 14 months after my mom's passing and two years since he was diagnosed.

Those two years were the roughest I have ever experienced.

So, even though 2015 should have been the year to follow up on recovering the funky hard drive on my XP laptop, I fell to depression and inertia. I couldn't even write in any of my blogs until January of this year.

I've thought about the graphics and the website often. I really need to update a lot of things. But the new website builder software I bought is too different from what I was using. I don't have the necessary ability to concentrate and to be patient with myself to learn something new right now.

Excuses, excuses! Yup.

I really miss my parents...

An Update

Well, I'm back home but the news is still not completely upbeat.

I lost my mom to heart failure in late June, about a month after I returned to my own home. I don't think anyone, even she, knew how terribly weak her heart really was, despite having a triple quintuple bypass, replacement of the mitral valve, and placement of a pacemaker with a defibrillator in late March.

My dad is surviving, so far, with chemo treatments. Although my dad getting cancer was a shock considering he stopped smoking regularly over 40 years ago, we're hoping that because of that his chances are good he'll go into remission.

My computer: Haven't taken it to a pro yet. The big decision is should I take it to techs at a place like Best Buy or Fry's Electronics or to a small, independent shop? Should I trust opinions at Yelp for this?

Everything was put on hold in December and stayed that way.

(Edited 8/7/2019 to correct an adjective.)

Where Have I Been?

Repeat visitors to Arride Graphics may have noted that there hasn't been any new graphics offered since March 2012 or so. There are two main reasons for that.

First, my main computer's hard drive crashed in April 2012, and try as I might I could not revive it. I decided to leave that task to the professionals but I never got around to doing that. In the meantime I bought another computer. Unfortunately, the new computer has a different OS so I could not load my most-used programs onto it.

Second, late in 2012 my father was diagnosed with cancer. In trying to cope with that situation my mother ended up stressing her heart out and was hospitalized a number of times with congestive heart failure. Enter me. By late December I was staying with my parents to help my sister, who lives close-by, run our parents' household and take care of them and their dogs. I've been at my parents' house off-and-on since late December and continuously since mid-March. My mom finally got the open heart surgery she needed and is now recovering very well.

I'm hoping by the end of this month I'll be able to return home and take care of all or most of the deferred work I have waiting for me. I thank my husband, Mike, for being so understanding and helpful during the last, almost six months.

A Glitch

Wondering what happened to me and Arride Graphics? Well, I've been around but agonizing and procrastinating over the loss of use of my primary computer where my graphics, webpage builder and websites are stored. I had no backup for the graphics and sites either "in the cloud" or an external hard drive. Bad move.

So when my hard drive crashed, I was left with very little. I tried resolving the problem myself, but I think it's beyond my capabilities and patience. I'll have to turn it over to the pros. In the meantime, I got a new notebook 'puter with which to start from scratch. Frankly, I'd rather play online games than think about trying to reproduce everything in this new 'puter.

But and so: But I want to continue making web graphics and desktop wallpapers for Arride Graphics. So, after I get the procrastinating bug out of MY system, I'll try to see if the downed computer can be fixed, if not at least recover the files contained regardless of monetary cost.

Also, I bought a new webpage builder which means a new learning curve to deal with, so that's another hurdle. Thus, you may or may not see new stuff in the coming months and the new site remodel I mentioned last year.

Thanks for reading this blog and for your patience.

Happy New Year!

I resolve to do a lot of "house-cleaning" this year. As I mentioned last year there are some small changes coming to this site. I intend to work on it all year, though, hopefully it won't actually last that long.

In the meantime, here is a desktop wallpaper (out of a couple or so I'd promised late last year.) 

I don't know what it is but soon after winter sets in I'm thinking about the warm summer weather. When I was looking for starter material for a desktop wallpaper I was looking at fall and winter themes. But I got tired of feeling so cold and was wishing for warmer weather. (In my neck of the "woods" we're really in a rain drought and do need the rains and snows.)

Going through the downloads from morguefile.com I found this photo of shells on a beach taken by veggiegretz. It's different from the other beach photo I used for another desktop wallpaper so it was perfect. Using Corel Painter Photo Essentials, I tried out a variety of paint effects. The watercolor effect kept it light and airy so that's the one used for this wallpaper.

Go now to the 5th desktop wallpapers page to find this summery image for your computer. It comes in six resolutions from 640x480 to 1440x1080.

New Desktop Wallpaper: Bleeding Hearts

Despite seeing double right now, I managed to put together a new desktop wallpaper for you. In fact, I'm using it myself because I'm wishing for spring to come sooner than later. It is also appropriate to display for Valentine's Day!

The original photograph for the desktop wallpaper comes from morguefile.com and was created by a member called westminister. It's an image of the pretty flower called bleeding hearts. The drooping pink-and-white flowers do look like hearts.

What I did was surround the flowers with a nice frame, creating a dreamy image. Then the image was re-sized to six resolution sizes. All done with Paint Shop Pro Photo X2.

Go to Wallpapers 5 to find the thumbnail image and download links. And remember, these graphics are for your computer's desktop, not for web pages!

Webpage Background: RGB Side

Today's offering is a webpage background graphic featuring a left side border of small blocks in red, green and blue, thus the name of "RGB." After I created the Color Block backgrounds in June I thought about other colors than pastels that I could make backgrounds out of. I came up with this, which are the three basic colors of the original CRT color monitors.

Plain and functional. That's what this background graphic is. If you like it after viewing the sample page, download the graphic to your hard drive following the directions on the page. You'll find the thumbnail image on page 5 of the side border backgrounds page. Just follow the log-in instructions.

 

Desktop Wallpaper: Skateboards

Late today (in some parts of the world), I uploaded six (yes!) different sizes of a desktop wallpaper featuring skateboards with the accompanying legs of the skateboarders. 

The original photo was provided by website member, mnp, at morguefile.com. I applied an impressionist painting effect using Corel Painter Essentials and Paint Shop Pro X. Pretty cool effects! 

Anyway, the desktop wallpapers are sized from 640x458 to 1440x129. The thumbnail page contains all of the links. Just choose the one that best fits your monitor's resolution. Each link opens in a new, download window whereupon you follow the directions on the page.


Go to Wallpapers Page 5 to begin your download now!

Color Block Border Web Page Backgrounds

Today, I've uploaded three web page background graphics, one side border and two top borders, in the same basic pastel color blocks on white. Each graphic has space between the page edge and the edge of the border to allow for menu items and small ads (side border) or menu items, header graphic or title text, and/ or banner ad (top border - 100 px and 150 px choices). While these graphics are made for page backgrounds, I don't see why they cannot be used as table backgrounds (large file size may be a limitation).


Check out the graphics at Arride Graphics!


Color Block Side Border
Color Block Top Borders

Graphics, At Last

Valentine's on my mind for these graphics. Today's offerings are two desktop wallpapers and one webpage background with a top border. All with hearts. For Valentine's Day and more.

All of the photos for these graphics came from one of my favorite sources, morguefile.com. The photographers are, by their user names, dieraecherin, taylorschlades, and sullivan. I used the photos of the first two photogs for the desktop wallpapers and used sullivan's photo for the top border webpage background. All are pretty cool and fun.

Check out the wallpapers on the fifth page of that section, and check out the page background on the fifth page of the top border backgrounds page.

Enjoy and happy Valentine's Day!

New Desktop Wallpaper: Fan's Eye View Behind Home Plate

Now that baseball is well into the 2009 season and has started interleague play, I decided to offer a baseball-themed desktop wallpaper to celebrate. I've played around with the original photograph, which I took some time ago, in Virtual Painter and sized it in four different resolutions (sizes) to fit most monitors, desktop and laptop computers alike.

The effect you see on the wallpaper is silkscreening on washi. It's easily done with Virtual Painter and any image or photograph. I think the effects are pretty cool and fun to work with.

View the thumnbnail and the full-size desktop wallpapers beginning with the fifth wallpapers page. Each size will open a new window from which you can download the wallpaper that fits your monitor's resolution. Remember, these images are not meant for web pages, including social networking profile pages, etc., and are blanket-covered by the Terms of Use.

New Desktop Wallpaper: Monarch Butterflies (and a Ladybug)

Last offering for March is a desktop wallpaper featuring a couple of monarch butterflies and a teeny red ladybug atop some plants (I think they're sage plants but I could be wrong -- I'm no gardener nor a botanist). The photograph comes from the morguefile.com and was taken by member beglib.

We're into over a week of spring now and I felt like doing something with some harbingers of spring, like butterflies. I haven't come across a photograph of a robin yet or other birds that have struck my fancy. I like the butterflies. There's usually a ton of them swarming to Pacific Grove, California, on their migrations to and from Mexico. Read more about them at wikipedia.org.

As usual, the wallpapers come in four sizes to fit most monitor resolutions. Choose the link to the size you want to download and a new window opens up. Follow the directions for downloading the wallpaper either to your desktop (set as wallpaper) or to your downloads folder in your hard drive (save as...). The wallpapers are not meant to be used on webpages. The Terms of Use applies to the wallpapers you get from Arride Graphics. Please be sure to read it.

New! Side Border Page Background Graphic: Earthy

I can't let March pass by without offering at least one graphic. Today's graphic is a little reminiscent of the Southwest U.S. and of Arts and Crafts/ Art Deco styles, all in earthy colors. This was inspired by my visit to Phoenix and architect Frank Lloyd Wright's summer home at Taliesin West before taking in a couple of games at Spring Training camp (baseball).

The side border background is 2000 pixels wide and 100 pixels high, enough to cover most monitor resolutions before repeating the side border. Clicking the thumbnail image on the page opens a new window, after you enter the username and password provided. Follow the download instructions on the page. You can use this on any web page without charge but must linkback and credit Arride Graphics as part of the agreement to use it. Read the Terms of Use, please!

Download "Earthy" here.

New Desktop: Wallpaper: Waterfall

Every winter I go through the same thing -- I get tired of gray skies and rain, even when it (rain) is a good thing. Like last month's desktop wallpaper offering, this one is green and wet and fresh but hopeful of the coming spring.

I have on my desktop a wallpaper from the National Geographic website. National Geographic publications are known for their fantastic photographs and photographers. This one I have is of a cascading stream with moss-covered, overhanging trees and branches, some with icicles even. If not a winter scene, it is probably early spring. The photograph is by Nick Feller, an amateur photographer who contributed the image on their Your Shot (now called My Shot) page in December 2007.

While I love that image, I wanted one sans the icicles. So I scoured a couple of my favorite stock photo sites for something similar. I finally settled on the image you see on the wallpaper. It comes from ImageAfter.com. I'm not sure of the attribution because the download page really doesn't state who took the photograph. Anyway, rather than keeping the wallpaper to myself, I decided to offer it to you as well.

I paired the photo with an apt quote by Anne Morrow Lindbergh from Quoteland.com. The font I used is Lucida Calligraphy.

To view and download the desktop wallpaper, go to the fifth wallpapers page. There are four sizes to choose from. Download the size that most closely corresponds to your monitor's resolution. And remember, these are not meant for use on webpages.

New Desktop Wallpaper: Flowers and Rain

Here in California we're finding out that we may be facing a drought this summer due to the scarce snowfall in the Sierra Nevada mountains this winter. We rely on the runoff from the snowpack to fill our reservoirs, if not the rains. So with that on my mind, and me being tired of the cold, I look to spring flowers to cheer us up with this latest desktop wallpaper.

The flower and rain photograph comes from my favorite source, morguefile.com, and it was created by delboysafa whose real name is Derek Nutley. The quote I chose for the desktop wallpaper is by Rachel Carson which I got from The Quote Garden.

The wallpapers come in four sizes (resolutions) and can be downloaded on the fifth desktop wallpapers page. Choose the size that closely corresponds to your monitor's resolution and save the wallpaper from the popup download window. Save it to your desktop directly or save it to your downloads folder in your hard drive. Brief directions are on the popup download window.

Snowfall Side and Top Border Web Page Backgrounds

I've finally created a side border snowy background graphic for your web pages and a top border with the same graphic. The difference here is I'm experimenting with Cascading Style Sheets this time for the page layouts. Check them out!

This is pretty exciting for me because I've been thinking about getting away from tables-based web pages. While I'll still offer backgrounds and sets using tables for layouts, I will be basing sample pages more and more toward CSS layouts. So right now I'm working on changing my own web site to a CSS layout, for the most part. That means I won't have time to offer any more new graphics for this year.

Wow! Can you believe 2008 is almost ending?

Well, here are the links to the pages for "Snowfall":

• Side Border Background
• Top Border Background

Hope you enjoy using either one or both of these backgrounds. Finally, here's wishing you a Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas and Happy Kwanzaa!

Coordinated Web Page Graphic Set and Desktop Wallpaper

This latest graphic set and desktop wallpaper are created from a photo I took a few summers ago of some koi fish swimming in a resort hotel's garden pond. The photo was treated to some artistic, silkscreen rendering with Paint Shop Pro. It gives the resulting image an abstract look without rendering the fish unrecognizable.

Initially, I made this photo into a web page graphics set with a top header for my own use. Then when I decided to distribute this at Arride Graphics, I wondered if the entire altered photo would look nice as a desktop wallpaper. I think it does. So there you go!

To view and download the web page graphic set, please go to the Top Headers page.

To view and download the desktop wallpaper in one of four sizes, go to page five of the Wallpapers section.

These two graphic offerings complete my releases for the month of October.

Start at the main page to see what other graphics are offered at Arride Graphics.

Arachnophobic: A Top Border Background

Here's a new top border background suitable for the upcoming Halloween Friday, a personal page or maybe a science page about spiders. The spiders sit at about the 100 pixel line from the top but still provide plenty of space for your header information, such as your website's name or maybe even a small banner ad. The graphic's total size is 100X3000 pixels so there's a lot of space for your content before the spider border repeats itself.

Interested? Well then, go to the fourth page of the Top Border backgrounds to find the thumbnail for the download. You'll need the username and password info found on that page to get to the download page. The download link opens a new window.

Shades of Gray Background Tiles

Today I'm releasing some background tiles in shades of gray to complete (maybe) the first page of the solid color tiles. The four existing tiles were a bit lonely without more grays. So I added four more.

Hopefully, someone will find some use for these tiles.

To view and download the new tiles, go to page 1 of the solid color tiles section.

Also, in light of my missing releases in September, I'll offer a new/ old set and a new desktop wallpaper this month. Boy, is it hard to get back into the swing of things after returning home from vacation!

Check out some existing webpage backgrounds, too, in the Halloween spirit on the following pages:

• Side Border Page 5 - jack o' lanterns, 2 styles
  
• Top Border Page 2 - skeletons
• Top Border Page 3 - jack o' lantern
• Top Border Page 4 - cats on a fence
  

New Desktop Wallpaper!

As promised earlier this week, a new graphic in the form of desktop wallpapers are here to decorate your computer monitor. I whipped this one up from a photograph I took of nasturtium flowers in my garden. Sometimes I fiddle with photographs using Virtual Painter in Paint Shop Pro, but this time I left it untouched. So what you see is what I took.

A little bit of info about nasturtiums: these are orange flowers, but they come in other colors, too. I also had some in a light yellow or cream color. Nasturtium is also known as tropaeolum. The young leaves, flowers and unripe seed pods are edible, having a peppery flavor like watercress, and can be used in salads for color.* They're really easy to grow and re-seed themselves. Unfortunately, for me anyway, snails and slugs love to eat them, too, so I had to remove them to avoid having to deal with those slimy critters; nevermind eating any of the flowers after they've nibbled on them. Yuck!

The desktop wallpapers come in four sizes to fit monitors in most of the common resolutions my visitors use. So go to the fifth wallpapers page to download one of them. Remember, they must be saved to your desktop or your computer's hard drive, or set as wallpaper directly. They're not meant to be used as web page backgrounds.

* Information on nasturtiums: Sunset Western Garden Book, 1995