wet

Very wet!  Not that I'm sorry to see the rain - but it's not just wet, it's cold.  And it was a long day.  Two search discussions and voting, one in each of my departments; long meetings.  And rain.

This isn't actually the photo I thought I'd be posting.  I was splashing from class to meeting, and saw a slightly chilling sight: two campus cops, with a large, menacing, growling dog who was being trained to attack - luckily the object of the attack seemed to be a large wedge of cardboard, but you wouldn't want those teeth anywhere near you.  Very shortly afterwards I saw in Annenberg Media that an unhoused man with a history of sexual battery had been arrested on campus.  I'm suspecting the two things are linked.  But here's my question: given that we are paying security services for a secured perimeter that's a total pain to work within (having to check back in with a USC card when we've walked fifty feet to mail a letter, for example), why are there arrestable people on campus in the first place?  Anyway, they were probably trying to keep dry.

In any case - as I tend to do if I see armed police anywhere near students, doing anything unusual, I got out my cell phone as a kind of reflex action - thought I'd taken a pic, but no.  Maybe Elon Musk got inside my phone.

 

contemplating the future

Maybe I should stop on my way to or from USC and ask for a reading: I find (as, I'm sure, do half the country) that I wake up at 3 a.m. (assuming that I've been able to sleep, in the first place), thinking - what next, what next, what next?  This regime's incessant battering of seemingly everything I value in this country is exhausting, infuriating, and doubtless it's meant to make us feel like that, so that we shut ourselves down so as not to engage any more.  Well, no.

 

stairwell

Another day; another job candidate visit; another trip to the bathroom at Manuela so that I could take a photo of the tastefully decaying warehouse architecture ... This evening's discovery was the date ice cream ... 

 

the shadows of an afternoon walk

Unintentionally, I seem to have captured the shadows of a pregnant lamppost.  Plus some bougainvillea, and its accompanying leaves; all projected onto a weirdly colored pale lime green wall.  

Jolted just now by a 3.9 earthquake, which did everything it was meant to do (loud boom; sound as if a train was rushing into the house; windows rattling alarmingly). Gramsci fled; I dived under the dining room table; Moth carried on eating, and Alice "wasn't sure what that was."  I guess Grammy and I come across as the novices, here ...

 

Jackson Market

A new discovery!  Jackson Market, in Culver City (or, to be more exact, Park East), which is like a funky neighborhood deli in - oh, I don't know, somewhere mid-sized and quirky, like Columbus Ohio (friends in Columbus will tell me it's nothing like it, I'm sure - I plucked that out of the air, but it reminds me of the US 25 years ago, being busy but small scale and completely unpretentious), with a little yard in which to eat at the back.  "Eat" - I'm still on the not-chewing-very-much routine, but the tub of guacamole was delicious.

And this was with my oldest friend, whom I've known for ... a bit under 68 years.  Photo courtesy of the people sitting next to us - I don't know why I've slumped so ... it both seems a long time since we were, say, galloping down the beach at Deauville on retired racehorses, and on the other hand, not a minute ago.

 

nature red in beak and claw

A strange scene by the reservoir this morning.  A beautiful red-tailed hawk was sitting close to the path, on a tree branch - I was just pulling out my phone when s/he took off into some taller trees, seemingly in pursuit of ... crow eggs?  crow young?  S/he was on a mission. A half-minute later, there was a screech - and the hawk exited, pursued by two, then three, then two hawks.  

It looked like a fairly typical savage raid.  But just as we started off walking down the path again, I realized that there was a very dead hawk caught in the fence - and indeed, although I hadn't realized this at the time, I think one can see it in the image below.  My assumption - but who knows? - is that it had become irrevocably tangled in the barbed wire.  It was certainly bloody.  But had the crows been doing their ecologically sound carrion-removal activity?  Had Hawky 1 been seeking revenge on the post-mortem mutilation of their mate?  Were there any connections to be drawn at all?  It was somewhat baffling, and in the end distressing.

In other news, USC's Office of Diversity and Inclusivity has been merged with the "Culture Team," which will "continue to develop our shared sense of community."  And tomorrow - still obeying the purchasing boycott today - I'm going to order a whole lot of sunflower seeds.

 

behind closed blinds

So what's going on in there?  This is the office of our Provost.  He is more or less in charge of The Institution at present, since the outgoing President is a compound of useless with lame duck status; a ball of cottonwool combined with a cheerleading persona that kids no one - not even the actual cheerleaders, or Song Girls, or whatever they're called, with whom she loves to pose, presumably reliving her glory days.  She issued (but who knows who wrote it?  AI? McKinsey?) a "Dear Trojan Family" statement yesterday that said absolutely nothing, other than a commitment to excellence, blah blah blah, and the ominous lines "Moving forward, we will continue to review our programs and practices to ensure both that their direct relationship to our academic mission is clear, and that we comply fully with evolving legal requirements."  Uh huh?  Maybe they didn't think that we'd read that far?  The whole email ends "When I walk across our campuses, I see a place like no other, where joy, creativity, success, and excellence thrive. It’s the Trojan Spirit in action – and I know we’ll continue to do great things together for our community, for our country, and for humanity."  All I can say is that our President absolutely can't have encountered any faculty on her walkabouts.  And our contact with her second in command is about as direct and effectual as tapping on that window would be.