You Are My Sunshine ...

“You are my sunshine, my only sunshine

You make me happy when skies are gray

You’ll never know dear, how much I love you

Please don’t take my sunshine away …”

       ~ “You Are My Sunshine”

           ~ 1940

 ~American standard of old-time & country music & one of the official state songs of Louisiana

     ~ Its original writer is disputed. According to the performance rights organization BMI, by the year 2000 the song had been recorded by over 350 artists & translated into 30 languages. Its best-known covers include a recording by Johnny Cash in 1989

 

The beauty of these sunflowers is as bright as the sun on a late May afternoon in Allentown, Pennsylvania.       

 

Young sunflowers move to face the sun, a movement called heliotropism. Mature sunflowers generally stop moving and remain facing East, which lets them be warmed by the rising sun.

 

The sunflower (or “soniashnyk”) is Ukraine’s national flower and has been grown on its central and eastern steppes since the middle of the 18^th century. And today, in light of Russia’s horrific invasion of Ukraine, the sunflower is a symbol of “I Stand With Ukraine!”

 

summerscape video ...

 

The beautiful, sweeping “Love Theme from Picnic” by George Duning from the wonderful 1955 film “Picnic” sets the mood for this celebration of summer – my most favorite of seasons – showcased in my original photos.

My greatest joy as a photographer is harmonizing my favorite original photos to music to create a lasting snapshot of the season … Enjoy!

Also on my YouTube channel, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1FsrWK1Bvo

Prints, Gifts & Décor of images available on my Fine Art America /Pixels site, http://tami-quigley.pixels.com

Wrapped In A Hot Bun ...

 

“…I fell in love with you and then you went away

But now you’re coming home to stay

Hot dog, soon everything will be all right

Hot dog, we’re gonna have a ball tonight

I’ve got a pocketful of dimes

It’s gonna be just like old times, hot dog …”

        ~ “Hot Dog”

    ~written by Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller

   ~ recorded by the great Elvis Presley

   ~on the 1957 album “Loving You”

Hot Dog! A hot bun, warm autumn sun and the American Flag wrap around a hot dog treating himself to ketchup and mustard atop Yocco’s West at 2128 Hamilton St., Allentown, Pennsylvania on an early November afternoon.

Yocco’s ~ the self-described “Hot Dog King” ~ has been a Lehigh Valley tradition since Italian immigrant Theodore Iacocca founded the original downtown Allentown location in 1922. Area residents, predominantly of Pennsylvania Dutch (Pennsylvania German) descent, had difficulty pronouncing I-a-co-ca and instead pronounced it Ya-co-ca, and the name Yocco’s subsequently stuck. Yocco’s has six locations across the Lehigh Valley.

The Iacocca’s are relatives of the late Lee Iacocca, the American automobile executive and Allentown native who passed in 2019 at age 94. Lee Iacocca graduated with honors from Allentown High School (now William Allen High School, my alma mater), in 1942. He attended Lehigh University in neighboring Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, where he graduated with a degree in industrial engineering.

For more information on Yocco’s visit http://www.yoccos.com/.