Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Greetings from Seahurst Park
We spent most of Monday flying from Sea-Tac (worst managed TSA of any airport I've experienced) to Dulles, but before we returned the rental car, we stopped for a morning walk on the beach at Seahurst Park, where herons competed with gulls and crows for crabs and ferries headed toward the Pacific Ocean. It was chilly but beautiful and we once again got to see Mount Rainier. I finished Origin on the plane; it was better than Inferno and really made me want to go to Barcelona, but if you can't guess who the villain is before the mid-point, you have never seen a movie. Now I'm dealing with a million chores and have to get ready for tomorrow -- Happy Halloween!
Monday, October 30, 2017
Greetings from Puget Sound
While most of Seattle was fixated on the Seahawks game, we spent the day at parks and seashores -- the Issaquah Fish Hatchery, Snoqualmie Falls, Golden Gardens park and beach, Ballard Locks and fish ladder -- followed by a visit to the Armory's Day of the Dead celebration, dinner at Cactus, and Skyping with Adam. Here are some photos; more from home tomorrow!
Sunday, October 29, 2017
Greetings from Pike's Place
I got to walk around Capitol Hill on Saturday and have lunch at Mirch Masala with fandom friends with whom I could talk old Star Trek stuff! And walk around the piers beneath the ferris wheel, take a boat ride around Elliott Bay, and shop at Pike's Place Market! And eat dinner at Daniel's apartment, and play games, and watch Ghostbusters because he hadn't seen it! And I would say more but now I am being rushed, so here are some photos!
Saturday, October 28, 2017
Greetings from Lake Union
We started Friday morning walking around Amazon's neighborhood, seeing the biospheres and having lunch from the famous Cheese Wizards lunch truck in Denny Park. Then we walked to the water and boarded the Argosy for a tour of Lake Union and Lake Washington, including spectacular views of the floating houses, sea planes, houseboats, bridges, Mount Rainier, the Cascades, and lots of waterfowl including cormorants and bald eagles! When we disembarked, we walked to the Olympic Sculpture Park to see the indoor and outdoor artwork, then came back to Belltown for dinner at Mantra and some South Park and San Juan at Daniel's apartment.
Friday, October 27, 2017
Greetings from Pioneer Square
Apart from an early morning walk through Belltown to the Space Needle and dinner back in Belltown at the Meekong Bar, we spent most of the day in Seattle's Pioneer Square area. Here is our day in photos, including the Seattle Underground tour at the original level of the city, covering most of its history and lengthy catalogue of misbehavior; the totem poles in several city parks; lunch at Cafe Paloma, with awesome Mediterranean food; a stop at Klondike Gold Rush National Park; and a visit to the Sky View Observatory at the top of the Columbia Center, with views of the surrounding volcanoes, lakes, and landmarks:
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Wednesday, October 25, 2017
Poem for Wednesday and Brookfield Pumpkins
Lost
By David Wagoner
Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. you must let it find you.
--------
In several hours we are flying to Seattle to visit Daniel, several weeks later than we had planned after all the chaos, but I am so excited to be going! So Tuesday involved a lot of chores and laundry, some food shopping, and lots of attention to the cats.
We watched The Flash's let's-revamp-half-the-cast episode, then we watched the World Series, which is not stressful but also not exciting since I don't really care who wins. From Brookfield Pumpkins last weekend during the Frederick Festival of the Farm:
By David Wagoner
Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. you must let it find you.
--------
In several hours we are flying to Seattle to visit Daniel, several weeks later than we had planned after all the chaos, but I am so excited to be going! So Tuesday involved a lot of chores and laundry, some food shopping, and lots of attention to the cats.
We watched The Flash's let's-revamp-half-the-cast episode, then we watched the World Series, which is not stressful but also not exciting since I don't really care who wins. From Brookfield Pumpkins last weekend during the Frederick Festival of the Farm:
Tuesday, October 24, 2017
Poem for Tuesday and Summer Flowers
After Hours
By Howard Altmann
We were searching for
ourselves, after logic
for no good reason,
jumping fires to take
the heat for walking,
wishing the blue night
not to fall into the blue
sky and darken what
remained. We were
holding on to music,
playing the solemn
string the healing horn,
rolling back the meadow
to give innocence one
more tumble, waiting
for the breeze to send
the screen door slamming
open. We were rushing
with the sea of people
tiding over curb and
sidewalk, twilight running
out of light, a city pacing
its expansion into the sky,
block by block, new
views burying the old,
thinking not thinking
about the dead. We were
who we never thought
we’d be, at the corner
of expectation and desire,
the world kind and un-
kind, the rabbits scared
the palace in ruins,
language failing the earth
in transition, the infinite
sky divided the clouds
dispersing premonitions.
Come evening come
shade, float us to your
constellation, let the void
draw us still; the radiologist
turn off her light and go.
--------
"I wrote this poem during a time when I understood that my uncle was dying," Altmann told Poem-a-Day in a column that weirdly enough ran this morning. "Whether that compressed the fractious into something whole, or solidified the fragility of things, it was breath to the word, hope in the foregone."
Another quickie since I had a lot of chores to do on Monday, plus a Shutterfly calendar to finish while my coupon was still good, plus photos to scan, print, and pick up at CVS to bring to my mother's when we went to sit shiva for her brother at her house in the evening, with about 30 of her friends plus a local friend of my uncle's and my friend Linda whom I've known since elementary school.
Cantor Manevich from Washington Hebrew did the brief service and my mother read some of the memories that Uncle Larry's friends posted on Facebook and mailed to her. It was nice seeing some of the longtime friends of the family, though obviously sad for the reason for the gathering. Jews don't usually send flowers, but here are some Lewis Ginter summer blossoms:
By Howard Altmann
We were searching for
ourselves, after logic
for no good reason,
jumping fires to take
the heat for walking,
wishing the blue night
not to fall into the blue
sky and darken what
remained. We were
holding on to music,
playing the solemn
string the healing horn,
rolling back the meadow
to give innocence one
more tumble, waiting
for the breeze to send
the screen door slamming
open. We were rushing
with the sea of people
tiding over curb and
sidewalk, twilight running
out of light, a city pacing
its expansion into the sky,
block by block, new
views burying the old,
thinking not thinking
about the dead. We were
who we never thought
we’d be, at the corner
of expectation and desire,
the world kind and un-
kind, the rabbits scared
the palace in ruins,
language failing the earth
in transition, the infinite
sky divided the clouds
dispersing premonitions.
Come evening come
shade, float us to your
constellation, let the void
draw us still; the radiologist
turn off her light and go.
--------
"I wrote this poem during a time when I understood that my uncle was dying," Altmann told Poem-a-Day in a column that weirdly enough ran this morning. "Whether that compressed the fractious into something whole, or solidified the fragility of things, it was breath to the word, hope in the foregone."
Another quickie since I had a lot of chores to do on Monday, plus a Shutterfly calendar to finish while my coupon was still good, plus photos to scan, print, and pick up at CVS to bring to my mother's when we went to sit shiva for her brother at her house in the evening, with about 30 of her friends plus a local friend of my uncle's and my friend Linda whom I've known since elementary school.
Cantor Manevich from Washington Hebrew did the brief service and my mother read some of the memories that Uncle Larry's friends posted on Facebook and mailed to her. It was nice seeing some of the longtime friends of the family, though obviously sad for the reason for the gathering. Jews don't usually send flowers, but here are some Lewis Ginter summer blossoms: