Bonus post:

From Son of Childmecca, an excursion with Lomagirl and her two ridiculously cute kids! Hadn't seen them since just after Christmas, so this was fun! (I'll post more on Flickr.)

Colorful "jellyfish"

Dinosaur who sells sunglasses

A newly made bug, who seems to be getting into the part just fine

A newly made bug who is still wrestling with his identity

[The 3D show from It's a Bug's Life is terribly cute. We hadn't seen it before. It's cleverly done, and at one point, it's downright scary. It's always fun to go to places like this with little people! We get to see things we don't normally go see. These two were troopers, and I think they had fun.]

What flew in.

For scale, I include my hand, which is only slightly closer to the camera than the moth is. This was about 5-6" across, from wingtip to wingtip. I don't know if it's a small atlas moth or what. (I won't take the time to look it up now, as I have a paper to write that I've studiously been avoiding. If anyone knows, though....)

Academic Excursion, Part 2

The second leg of our trip took us to the Huntington. I could not take photos of the Ellesmere Chaucer or the Gutenberg Bible, naturally, but I did take some of various art pieces that caught my eye.

So delicate and detailed.

A detail from a tile piece about Cinderella. Quite unusual, rustic, and utterly enchanting.

Detail from stained glass piece.

A crazy European family played in the sprinklers, fully clothed, from children to mother (pictured here) to grandmother. It was hot, in all fairness. They made a fun spectacle.

Stone gazebo (or whatever it's called) and roses

Nice ass!

Nice, uh, triton!

From the Japanese garden

Walkway detail from the new Chinese garden. Love the intricate stone work.

Bridge from the Chinese garden. Overexposed, but it seemed unthinkable to exclude it.

Design from Chinese garden.

Design from Chinese garden.

The giant greenhouse, with surprisingly visible mountains behind. (It was a quite a clear day.)

Lovely.

Lovely.

Academic Excursion

Over the doorway at the Clark Library.

The painted Steinway in the great room.

People in the great room. (For scale, the two middle persons are both over six feet tall. This is a large room)

I just finished writing and submitting a paper on this poem. We got to touch this 1730s first edition. Way cool.

Heaven will look a little something like this (with an added comfy sofa and/or window seat).

The exterior of the Clark.

(I'll post more from the series on Flickr.)

BoldKitty Conquers the Tree!

Yes, I am a tigress, stalking great tree prey!

Her action shot! (No, her tail is not bent away from the camera. That actually is the size of her tail. It's about six inches long with a crick in it.)

Her album cover pose.

More news

I just learned that Pauline Baynes, illustrious illustrator of Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia and the Middle Earth wall map, among many other things, died this week. How sad. The official obituary her friend published is very thorough and quite moving, but I found his blog tribute more powerful because of the images of her artwork that he included. I cannot tell you, in looking at the tribute, how many of her images are fused into my brain from childhood exposure! Is it weird, then, that one of her images is what I was considering for my tattoo (or at least as a starting point for it)?

[I initially learned this at my friend's blog, The Painful Nowning Process. Thanks, Elizabeth, for posting about it. I hadn't known.]

News

We are indeed looking through the misty window for rays of light. The bad news today is that POM's sister, SurvivorMommy, received results from a PET scan today and learned that her cancer-free status no longer applies. One lesion on her lung and several on her liver are again active and growing.

Background: She had been diagnosed with stage IV metastatic colon cancer a year and eight months ago, had a colon resection, over a year of chemo, over a year and a half of self-assigned alkaline diet plus other dietary measures, and a year and eight months of international prayers and faith and a positive outlook. She is just a couple of months off liver surgery and a clean bill of health.

We are petitioning God for a complete cure and healing. We know this is possible because it's already happened once. We may be selfish, but we tend to think her five kids need her. If you're of the praying persuasion, we covet your prayers. If not, we'll take your positive intentions. Thank you. Updates as they are available.

New Addition P.S.

Thought you might be interested in seeing BoldKitty's face. She was ready for her close-up today.

She seems to enjoy nestling into the apple basket that we use for newspaper recycling. Unfortunately, she also seems to enjoy the high ground afforded her by the breakfast nook table. We do not like this. She always gets off when we firmly tell her to, but mysteriously she always manages to find herself back up there. Hmmm. Funny that.

She's still eating like the dickens. Here she is, licking her chops after a tasty second breakfast.

At some point, I'll have to get a picture of her gronky tail. The poor dear.

LB Photowalk

It got nailed.

Tree and sunburst on shoreline

Public service announcement

Sky blue telescope

(Click to embiggen; to the right of the former Spruce Goose dome

you'll see faintly the three red smokestacks of the Queen Mary.)

Beachy lunarscape

This isn't your average Charlie Brown kite-eating tree.

Juxtaposed anachronism

My favorite kind of grass! I want this in my lawn!

Trodden (hydrangea detritus on cobblestone path)

New addition?

She was hungry and she wouldn't take no for an answer, even in the face of two rather hostile resident felines. We're calling her something akin to BoldKitty, because she is. I'm happy to report she's gaining weight. We're taking her to the vet on Friday for a thorough checking. As you can see, she's made herself perfectly at home in our home.

Through a cloth brightly

The light this week has been captivating.

Sailcloth clouds

Playing catch-up

Well, I fell behind again. I blame school entirely. This session has seen a rather unwieldy reading load, and now papers are coming due. I did a presentation on Huck Finn this week, which ended up being really kickass, so that was fun; but I have a paper on Pope due Friday and one on Huck due Tuesday. Add to that my attempts to determine what exactly I'll be doing my thesis on, and top it with relatives from out of town, and you have my excuse for falling behind in posting. Heh. But it has been fun.

We're going on Friday to both the Clark and Huntington Libraries, to the former to see original manuscripts (Pope, Swift, etc.) and to the latter for tea. I'm pretty excited! I hear they do a great tea. And I'm looking forward to the company and conversation that will complement this event. I've only been to the Huntington once and never to the Clark. I'm sure I'll post about it after the fact.

That's so fair!

The Orange County Fair, that is!


The skytram, through a haze of barbecue smoke.

Peggy Sue, POM's friend and occasional classmate, gives a pottery demonstration.

Colorful umbrellas protect the ceramics area.

Mama Sow is smiling blissfully in her sleep. Her five piglets were sleeping all in a row at her belly.

Well, there's a use for a piano I had never considered!

The other side of the goofy photo cutouts.

Read these signs carefully. Chicken Charlie's not only features a multitude of chicken products; they also fry twinkies...and they fry White Castle's burgers! OMG, this is beyond heinous! Don't get me wrong -- I love White Castle's. But I sort of thought they were already bad enough for us in their original incarnation. Deep-fried White Castle's. Truly there is no shame left in the world.

I seem to have a ferris wheel theme going this past week.

Glowing arms.

That's a landmark OC Fair fixture.