Greetings from Salem

Another quick post, tonight from Salem, Oregon, where we're visiting Paul's youngest brother Jon, his wife Brooke, and their sons and dogs. Daniel, Cahaya, and their dogs are here too, having arrived in Oregon yesterday, so we spent the afternoon with three huskies and lots of snacks after a lovely drive down, past Mount St. Helens and Mount Hood, with nice views of the Columbia River and the Portland Aerial Tram plus a stop for lunch at Burger King. 

We went out to dinner with one of our nephews at a local Mexican restaurant where I ate too much, and now we're at a hotel where the only thing we could tune in on the TV that wasn't local basketball is Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, which I'm sorry to report is still enjoyable despite how much I hate JKR's rhetoric and funding of a hate movement. Hey, I loved this week's pro-Zionist Starfleet Academy, so I'm probably canceled too.

Greetings from Oz

Watching Wicked on Peacock (well, at this point all the extras -- there's a long making-of documentary, plus several shorts and a bunch of deleted scenes in various states of completeness) so I will keep this short. We didn't have a very eventful day anyway; Paul worked, I did a lot of cleaning for company this weekend, we both took a walk to the to the lake in the afternoon and watched the Terrapins win their first round game, yay! 

We saw bits of other NCAA games around dinner, and it's been all Wicked since -- so much I love in this movie. At times it makes me think of Elphaba as an X-Man on Branagh's Asgard with talking animals, and at times it makes me think Harry Potter meets The Hunger Games (and riding Snowpiercer), while the visuals are just gorgeous and even songs I don't love sound lovely. Here are bunnies we met and got to feed at Enchanted Farms last weekend:

Poem for Tuesday and The Alabaster Owl

I Do Not Collect Owls 

By Dorothy Pope 

Asking for trouble, I suppose,

to put the first one, oddly given

by a dinner guest,

on a complex set of shelves

like noughts and crosses

but with thirty-six partitions,

this a gift from someone else.

Subsequently, friends

have been filling up these squares

with owls: candidates of wood

and china, leather, felt and glass,

of alabaster, even silver.

There are twenty-seven owls now

in this assembled parliament

although, as I keep trying to say,

I do not, never have collected owls.

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We had a bit of rain early Tuesday, but the weather is supposed to improve steadily this week and reach 60 degrees, so although it was a chilly afternoon when we took an early walk, the views were lovely though the eagles were heard but not seen. I needed to walk early because my Voyager group -- whose name is changing as of tomorrow -- had reached "Endgame" a.k.a. the terrible horrible finale episode, and invited a bunch of our friends from back when it originally aired to watch with us, which made it very fun to watch though still not good. We only booed through the Chakotay/Seven scenes. 

Paul made lasagna while I was watching, which we ate afterward. Then we watched some fourth season House, which I'm finding strange; I don't really love any of the candidates, not even Olivia Wilde or Kal Penn, I hate the way Anne Dudek gets treated for aggressiveness and intelligence that everyone values in men, and I miss seeing Jennifer Morrison and Jesse Spencer more regularly, but I'm also really uncomfortable with the Hunger Games scenario in which doctors get eliminated but it's patients who suffer. People asked to see The Alabaster Owl, the magical decor store in Pike Place Market:

Greetings from the Seattle Aquarium

It rained a lot on Saturday -- an atmospheric river, in fact -- so we figured our plans had better be mostly indoors. So we went to the aquarium to see the new Ocean Pavilion, though of course we also visited the Pier 59 building with the touch tanks and local marine life, and the Pier 60 building with the undersea dome, marine mammals, and seabirds. The new building is very open and bright, with a massive reef, a mangrove lagoon, and a hatchery and animal hospital. Since we were right across the street, we also went to Pike Place Market, where we looked at the crafts and bought local chocolate-covered cherries. 

 

We also visited the Alabaster Owl, the wizard-themed shop in a side alley with fun clothing and home decor. On the way home, we stopped at Safeway, where in addition to cat food, we bought soup and crusty bread to go with our Beecher's cheese for dinner. After dinner, we watched Flow, the wonderful animated movie with no dialogue about a cat who survives a tsunami flood with help from other animals; it's both a global warming story and a fable about cooperation, and sweet and funny too. We also caught up on last night's The Way Home, in which Colton gets to be problematic in multiple eras, which makes him more interesting.

Poem for Friday and Burren Stones

Postscript 

By Seamus Heaney 

And some time make the time to drive out west

Into County Clare, along the Flaggy Shore,

In September or October, when the wind

And the light are working off each other

So that the ocean on one side is wild

With foam and glitter, and inland among stones

The surface of a slate-grey lake is lit

By the earthed lightning of a flock of swans,

Their feathers roughed and ruffling, white on white,

Their fully grown headstrong-looking heads

Tucked or cresting or busy underwater.

Useless to think you’ll park and capture it

More thoroughly. You are neither here nor there,

A hurry through which known and strange things pass

As big soft buffetings come at the car sideways

And catch the heart off guard and blow it open.

-------- 

We had a rainy Friday, which was fine because we both had dentist appointments in the morning. Paul was getting a crown, I was getting scanned for a retainer guard, and since his appointment took a lot longer than mine, I walked over to Ross and tried on a bunch of dresses; I ended up buying all three of the ones I liked because they were all in the $20 range with discounts and I will have lots of occasions to wear them next year. The rain let up enough after lunch for a walk to the park and three eagles were in the trees. 

We caught up on the season finale of Only Murders in the Building in the late afternoon, a good end for the season, though it seemed slower than last season. We also watched Disclaimer, which I would quit watching if next week weren't the finale; it revels in misogyny and the plot has ridiculous gaps in order to maximize Cate Blanchett's suffering. Now, after mole for dinner and a chocolate pumpkin muffin for dessert, we're watching Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. Poulnabrone dolmen and the limestone pavement of the Burren:

Lyrics for Thursday and Halloween

Mr. Macklin’s Jack O'Lantern 

By David McCord 

Mr. Macklin takes his knife 

And carves the yellow pumpkin face: 

Three holes bring eyes and nose to life, 

The mouth has thirteen teeth in place. 

Then Mr. Macklin just for fun 

Transfers the corn-cob pipe from his 

Wry mouth to Jack’s, and everyone 

Dies laughing! O what fun it is 

Till Mr. Macklin draws the shade 

And lights the candle in Jack’s skull. 

Then all the inside dark is made 

As spooky and as horrorful 

As Halloween, and creepy crawl 

The shadows on the tool-house floor, 

With Jack’s face dancing on the wall. 

O Mr. Macklin! where's the door?

-------- 

Happy Halloween (and Happy Diwali if you're celebrating)! Mine was fairly low-key compared to when I had kids at home, though I did wear my Star Trek uniform all day, when we went out to get food at lunchtime (Blazing Bagels was decorated for the holiday and was giving out bagel "eyeballs") and when we walked to the park (a neighbor asked me if I was supposed to be "Mrs. Captain Picard" and had never watched Voyager, bah). 

It was raining by evening, so we only had a few trick-or-treaters and now we have lots of leftover candy, heh. Only two other people from my Thursday night chat group came but we had a nice long conversation, after which I chatted with my Trekkie neighbors a bit while Thursday Night Football ended. Now we're watching Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 which is grand for Halloween night. Our day and our kids' elsewhere:

Poem for Wednesday and Rock of Dunamase

Transplanted 

By William O'Neill 

But vain I wait and listen for Rory Og is dead, 

And in the halls of Dunamase a Saxon rules instead, 

And o'er his fruitful acres the stranger now is lord 

Where since the days of Cuchorb a proud O'Moore kept ward. 

-------- 

I had a fun Wednesday despite rainy weather, starting with chat with two of my high school friends, then bagels for lunch. Afterward, Kristen and I resumed our MCU watch with the first two episodes of Ms. Marvel, which remain excellent, and by then the rain had let up enough that Paul and I could walk to the lake, which we pretty much had to ourselves apart from lots of ducks, some coots, and an eagle.

We got home in time for the start of the World Series game, which it looked like the Yankees were going to win easily, but then they made piles of mistakes and the Dodgers won the whole thing. Cheryl and I watched the finale of Agatha All Along together, which was superb despite not resolving one of the key issues of the show. Now we're watching Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. 

Here are the ruins of Dunamase Castle on the Rock of Dunamase, once the seat of the Kings of Laois, first settled in the 800s and promptly pillaged by the Vikings, though this castle was built in the 1100s and inhabited by the Norman Irish, then the O'Moores as they resisted the English, until it was slighted to keep it from Cromwell's forces and eventually fell into disrepair.