dawn to dusk

Waiting for my Uber in Santa Monica this morning; outside our front door this evening - and in between much nursing of my very sore jaw, and indeed - atypical for me - sleeping.  Am hoping that I may be closer to normalcy tomorrow ...

 

bits of sea

A beautiful chilly grey morning gave way to something sunnier later on: seaweed is a nod to research.  And in dental news - all's going as well as I dare hope, and I seem - cross all digits - to be able to eat a little more normally - even if tenderly - than I've been able to for a long while.  But there's a long long way to go - though not on this trip.  Onwards!  

 

corners of color

Thank you, dear friends, for your dental concern ... all went well, and I'm satisfactorily full of pain killers that are tamping down the discomfort both in my lower jaw and my sinuses (no alcohol allowed for a week.  That tells you how strong they are ...).  This is an ongoing process - very ongoing - sorting out stuff that was done twenty years ago (my jaw had an unusually bad reaction to cement that was used on implants then, which resulted in much bone loss - hence bone grafting - and so on).  Next step, tomorrow - and then, fingers crossed, nothing until November 4th, the day before the election, which may mean that my blood pressure reading won't be as good as it was today ...

But I got to walk around Santa Monica! which I don't normally do - and could walk to the orthodontal surgeon's office, and then went and sat on the beach in the early evening to nurse my wounds, which was beautiful, and restorative.

 

*I am emphatically not on vacation*

Well, yes, indeed - palm trees, beach ... - but if I were to tell you that the next two days involve some extremely unpleasant and doubtless painful dental surgery, rendering me unable to eat solids, talk, etc., you will understand why I might head to lodgings very close to my Westside dentists, and where I can gaze at the view while dealing with tenure and promotion cases (a real pleasure, this year) and nurse my numbed and bleeding (I anticipate) mouth.  I'll be very glad to be the far side of this ...

 

a bit of sky

from our back yard this evening.  It's still rather too warm - no storms today - but that doesn't get in the way of its beauty ... 

 

sunflower

I went up to the Eldorado Farmers' Market this afternoon with some very specific purchases in mind: some small bedding plants for the pots that are otherwise a morning glory monoculture (well, and catmint); some apricots - a bag of delicious small ones that doubtless had come straight off the tree belonging to the women who sold them to me from the back of their truck came back with me; some scones from the new Santa Fe scone bakers (green chile and cheddar - not sure yet whether my teeth can cope, but I'll break them down into tiny crumbs); and some flowers.  These sunflowers are ... huge.  

 

in solidarity

with Childless Cat Ladies everywhere.  Such is the political imperative in standing together that Moth and Gramsci are even prepared to share the top of the (often contested) kitty palace.  Be like Moth and Gramsci.

 

two very different cats

Or maybe not so different, given that they both have stripes.  Gramsci, however, has a longer tail, without a magnificent white tip at the end of it.  Here's a wonderful bobcat, seen on this morning's walk (we know there's a family around at the moment - various neighbors have posted pics of bobkittens on their roofs).  It's always a real privilege and treat to see one.  And - well, Grammy, enjoying the leisurely view from the kitty palace.

 

dead tree

Yet another wild and stormy evening that didn't actually result in a storm - although the clouds were dark enough: dark enough to make it absolutely certain that our neighbor's tree is definitively dead.  The same is true of plenty of other things today - our internet, for several hours-long chunks at a time; our air conditioning (blown circuit board of some kind)    But none of these things are as definitively finished as this poor tree.

 

the annual?

I swear that I post a photo of this sunflower every year - or at the very least, of a sunflower that springs up - early, compared with most of them - every year in the same place.  What's interesting looking back is that actually, I've posted a whole range of sunflower shots, though admittedly, most of them are in this (warm?) stretch of Monte Alto.  All the sunflower seeds that I planted in mid-spring? Not a sign of them sprouting.  I think - unlike 2020/21 - I simply haven't been around at the right time to water them (or the gophers got fat ...)

 

Breaking news

Just as I was going into the kitchen to see about lunch, my phone started to ping with news alerts - and yes, indeed, and at last, Joe Biden had decided to step aside - and, not on the heels of that news, was endorsing Kamala Harris.  This has come as a huge reassurance - and, one hopes, in enough time to salvage the election, first and foremost, and then Biden's reputation, for in many ways he's been an admirable president, apart from his stance on Gaza/Israel.  I'll confess - I didn't think he actually would do the only decent, pragmatic thing and step aside - I'd by now pushed him firmly into the Stubborn Old Man category - so I breathed a very deep sigh of relief, and got out my credit card to donate to the new iteration of the Democrats' campaign.

 

the return of the morning glory

When we rolled in on Thursday afternoon, it was just in the nick of time.  Although the monsoon rains have, supposedly, arrived (all of today, however, they've been circling Eldorado without actually producing anything more than a sprinkle), the garden seemed to have received very little, and the morning glories and the catnip (about all that make it from year to year) were wilting.  The morning glories truly are wonderful, self-seeding year after year - I'm so glad that we didn't let them down by failing to supply water because of our very late arrival this year.  By contrast, the tumbleweed is flourishing as a result of the earlier rain - I've cut some down in the driveway, but tomorrow it'll be the reliable, lethal assault with vinegar, salt, and Dawn.

 

typical first day back in Eldorado ...

Exhibit A: a hot Gramsci, inverted, burrito-like, in my favorite chair.

Exhibit B: the clouds, and our usual summer conversation: "do you think it's going to rain?"  Believe it or not, this particular storm didn't hit, but we had thunder and about five minutes rain two hours later - which made everything smell wonderful.  New Mexico in monsoon season is, as ever, compelling.

 

Arizona to NM

The cats were extraordinarily well behaved last night - and Moth would like you to know how very good she believes she looks against an orange wall.

Then on through billowing monsoon clouds past Albuquerque; 

and here we are with our own beautiful sunset.

However, in other news, I lost my credit card somewhere along the way, and my dental emergency's temporary fix failed, so still no solid food is possible, and it'll be back to LA very very soon (something not entirely compatible with that missing credit card ...)

Also, I have no idea how to get rid of this sudden underlining ... though it's the least of my woes this evening.

 

luggage

It's Gramsci.  If I'd taken a photo from the other side of the back seat, it would have been Moth.  Moth slept all the way to Winslow; Grammy yelled in a ear-piercing way until around Victorville, and then also decided that sleep was a better option.  Now they're jumping on all the furniture in La Posada, and will doubtless continue doing so until around 4 a.m.

 

monumental

In a day spent returning library books (hence campus), dealing with a dental emergency (yowl, and lengthy), and packing - during most of which time I forgot not just to take any pictures whatsoever, but even to think about taking them, I feel that I was lucky to come away with with even one image today ...

 

Reunited with them!

It's wonderful to be back in their company! 

 

London to Los Angeles

The view from my South Kensington window this morning; the view from the terrace this evening.  The flight itself was fine ... it was the two hour wait on the tarmac at Heathrow while they fixed "a loose wire" (they weren't specific about where), and then an hour to get through immigation at LAX that lengthened the day ... However, even though that was a terrific trip, it's great to be back!

 

Liverpool, bees, and a last night in London

A pretty early morning in Liverpool - which gave way to a torrential downpour as I made my way to the Liverpool World Museum. This is actually outside the Walker - didn't quite have time to drop in there ...

because I spent so much time in the Bee exhibition.  Seven weeks or so ago, when I visited Kew Gardens and was blown away by the Hive sculpture/installation, and decided that bees would, indeed, form the center of my book's conclusion, I started to read up about the Hive's creator, Wolfgang Buttress, and found that he was also responsible for the big bee installation in Liverpool - a somewhat irritating discovery, since I'd been in Liverpool just a few days before ... However, back I went, and it was hugely worthwhile.  Indeed, it was like walking around inside my conclusion, to a very similar loud humming-ish soundtrack, as at Kew.

There are roughly eight rooms: the first is very interactive, with lots of buttons to press to learn more about bee anatomy, or bee varieties, or whatever - much of it done through videos, so hard to photograph in a way that captures the effects of their changes in scale, in light, in depth.  One video of a cello was beautifully effective - the aim had been to use it as a beehive, and this had been successful for two years - until the bees perished, probably because of pesticides - so one's now left with a cello shell full of uninhabited honeycomb.

Coming to the section entitled "meadow," you won't need telling how excited I was to find it full of dandelions ...

... multiplied through mirrors.

The whole of the next, long section was intended to make one perceive the environment from a bee's perspective.

Indeed, I'm tempted to change out my USC homepage picture for this ...

Then a time-lapse video showing a bee's progress from egg to emerging.

And a very loud room encouraging one to feel what it would be like to be inside a bee swarm (as a bee).

Then we were asked to imagine the world without bees ... dead foliage,

and videos of flowers withering and fading to nothing.

What does it smell like inside a hive? - or rather, what does propolis, the substance bees use to mend and seal gaps in the hive, smell like? (put your head inside a skep to find out: unsurprisingly, a beeswax candle ...).

Then here are the sounds from over 30,000 bees, moving around as you move around in this particular space in response to your body, reminding us that we, bees, pollen are all made up, effectively, of stardust: wonder derived from the tiniest of things.

And the installation concluded with a slide show of all the ways in which one can help foster bees and their habitats.  I was delighted to emerge and find that Liverpool is doing just that, with a flowery meadow, outside.

And then back down to London for one last night, with a corner of the Natural History Museum visible from my window, if I turn my head sideways enough ...

 

Durham (and Crook Hall) to Liverpool

Going to see a wonderful National Trust garden, at Crook's Hall, won out over the final conference sessions this morning.  I walked there - down the banks of the River Wear, which provided an appallingly strong demonstration of the polluted quality of British waterways today - so much worse, as surveys keep showing, than 20 years ago.

The gardens are some of the most compelling traditional, old English gardens I've ever been to - I could have spent hours there.

Becoming a National Trust volunteer and spending one's time with seedlings in a greenhouse seemed like an attractive idea.

Just behind here was a fairly new garden, full of herbs, and intended for contemplation - so I sat there and drew the view of the distant cathedral ... and after twenty minutes or so a NT volunteer approached and asked if she could take my photo for potential publicity for the garden because, she said, this was exactly the kind of slow attentive activity they'd hoped this new site would be used for.

Then, rather mysteriously, there was a fabric clad sheep sculpture.

And topiary.

And vistas.

And statuary.

Then from Durham to Liverpool on one of my favorite English railway lines, the TransPennine Express - though it was very grey and drizzly -

to Liverpool - where this bar pavement told me precisely where I was not, although yes, there's a certain Gaudí-esque spirit to it.

And then it cleared - and here, from my room, is an unbelievably beautiful Liverpool vista, with the twin-towered Liver Building, where my mother worked during the war monitoring radar that was tracking what was happening in the Atlantic.  I'm here to see one particular installation - of which, I hope, more tomorrow.