Midwestern Snow, Dec. 27

California Seasons

Yep, we have 'em, despite all rumors to the contrary.  Here's photographic proof from my walk this morning.  It was an obscenely beautiful day, fresh from a rain drenching.  The fact that it was my first day off for Thanksgiving break made it an especially sweet gift. 

The rest are available on Flickr.  I tried a visual discipline;  I tried cropping one frame in multiple ways to see how many different ways I could see just one image.  I like this practice and think I'll try it some more. 

In other news, I am still trying to decide what to do about blogging.  I'm considering starting a new one under my real name, but we shall see.  I have been writing, but I have not published any much of it.  And that's okay for now.  Like California, I have seasons, too, and I am satisfied to live in them and see what they bring. 

Worship

Worship me like the Egyptians did.

Somehow Spirit; and human nature

Yes, it's blurry.  It was from very far away;  I was up on a hill.  I leached all of the color out of it.  But I like it this way.  I could not tell from that far away what the bird was -- all I know is that it was white, and it was a bird of prey, and it had just left being chased by a persistent crow.  But I'm ok with not knowing, actually.  It opens the door to a more symbolic interpretation for me. 

Palm Sunday is hard, or at least weird.  It's disingenuously joyous and exuberant, because we already know our fickle ways;  we already know that in less than a week we're going to be calling for his unjust death;  we already know that we're going to give in to mob mentality, because that is the human way;  we already know that we're going to claim the consequences of our passion and our lack of foresight for our children ("let his blood be on our hands and on the hands of our children" -- What? Thanks a lot!  Speak for yourself, they say.).  So what else is new?  We keep doing this, exhibiting tragic lack of foresight, mortgaging our future generations' futures, offhandedly claiming the consequences of our actions, until those consequences start to hurt a little, and then we cry, "Yeah, but we didn't know then what we know now."  Why should we expect anything different from ourselves?  It is the human way.  And I am definitely human.  God have mercy upon me.

OK, just one photo

The morning we left to return home, we swung through town to see the amazing, ephemeral, ever-changing sunrise. I had to jump out of the car to snap just a couple more. No, really, I'll only be a minute. Well, the 40-degrees-but-colder-due-to-wind (sans jacket) really did keep it to just a minute or two. (Nothing the butt-warmers in the new car can't handle in a moment's time.)

Sheesh

How was that for a hiatus? Sorry to all, and I will do some sort of update soon -- bullet points, most likely, but at least it'll be something! I've got to get my discipline back!

In any case, we are kitten mommies and I just had to share to photo with you! BoldKitty has had five little sweeties! Yay! More later, I promise! I hope everyone on teh nets is doing fine. I've missed y'all.

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.

The Day's Excitements (Tuesday)

• We had an earthquake -- originally reported as a 5.8 but revised downward to 5.4. I was in a nice, new building on rollers, and it didn't get too bad there. None of us even left the building. No damage in our area or our house, though I couldn't make a cell phone call for about half an hour afterwards. I found that rather disturbing, because isn't that the reason most of us say we have cell phones -- for emergencies?! Sheesh. Anyway, a small mirror fell off the wall at the house of the friend whose dogs we're feeding this week. That was all. Just a reminder that yes, indeed, one day we will fall off into the ocean and so we had better be prepared. It was rather fun hearing Kay Hutton, supremely competent earthquake goddess of Caltech, again after a hiatus. I hope the next ones will continue to be these little pressure relievers. (Let it be so, lord!)
• One note of hilarity -- in the building where all of my classes are held, the director of our program came running out into the hallway during the actual event and, in his inimitable British accent (tinged, apparently, with African and German notes), started shouting (for comic relief), "We're all going to diiiiiiiiiiiiiiiie!" And when the occupants of that building (a considerably older specimen) had amassed in the courtyard, he proceeded to bellow, "It's every man for himself!" It's a good thing to be able to laugh where an earthquake is concerned.
• My little bunny buddy visited me as I was catching up on reading Alexander Pope at an outdoor table after lunch. He wasn't a yard away from me. He is not a tame bunny, by any stretch of the imagination, but he posed for my pictures and held eye contact with me for a bit before hopping his cottontail bunny butt across the walk and into the ivy. It was a small gift.

Disturbance. Suspense. Potential.

(Click to embiggen.)

Wildlife!

It was only my second ever blogger meet-up. I was so giddy! I was especially excited because she is the first blogger I ever emailed offblog and the first to whom I became unanonymous. (Is that a word?)

She wisely suggested we do something outdoors. It was an excellent suggestion, and there's so much to do here in SoCal that it would be a shame not to. Besides, we all know good and well that otherwise we'd just center everything around the event of eating. (Isn't that what all good former-Baptists do?)

We decided to go to the Bolsa Chica Wetlands, which is a fabulous restoration project here in SoCal. POM and I had been several times in the past, and it was really cool, but it had been some time since we'd been back. Last year they did a huge expansion project, and the newspaper just published a story indicating that it had proven extremely successful and that the animal population was undergoing a huge explosion. Awesome! We were so there!

The newspaper story didn't lie; it was better than we had remembered it. The bird population had extremely multiplied. We saw more life in the water than ever before. This is an amazing project!

This egret was the first up-close wildlife we saw as we crossed the boardwalk. (We think it's a Great Egret, but we could be wrong.)

This is the nesting ground of the tern population. (I think most of these are Least Terns. Again, I could be wrong about that.) These guys were noisy noisy noisy! They're hilarious. They constantly talk to one another as they fish the waters, totally giving away any stealth they may have hoped for. They dive -- splat! -- into the water, sometimes unexpectedly, with great splashes. When they fish, they fly in loose groupings; when they fly up high, it's in pairs, in perfect precision, with acrobatic speed and liquid skill. Their babies are grey fuzzpoofs, most of whom are learning to fly just about now.

(How much more quintessential SoCal does it get?)

We saw so many different species -- small sharks, round stingrays, unknown fishes that jumped and rippled the waters, terns, black skimmers, pipers of various sorts, sparrows, brown pelicans, egrets, a blue heron, and others whose names we did not know. Several of these species are endangered or threatened.

The black skimmers proved to be our consensus favorite. They fly over the water, then swoop down directly above it, open their beaks, and literally skim the water open-mouthed for food, lining a trail behind them in the water's surface. It is amazing, quiet, beautiful -- it is mystical and holy somehow. When they fly in twos or threes, their calls to one another are deeper and more resonant than the raucous soprano terns. The skimmer's call calms, pacifies.

We spent the time strolling leisurely, snapping pictures, talking, ogling nature, and marveling at God's creativity and sense of humor. We mused about the various behaviors and thought-processes of the birds we beheld. (The egrets who kept their faces in the water for literally ten minutes at a time surely must be depressed and suicidal, we speculated. The fish who were brazen enough to jump in the faces of all these hunting birds must surely know they are too big to fit in the gullets of these bird breeds and so flaunt their freedom. The piper with the ridiculously lengthy beak flew away when we joked and commented on it, so we were sure he was sensitive and offended about our remarks on the size of his...appendage.) The plonking-diving-splashing terns never got old and never failed to elicit a laugh. The skimmers evoked either low exclamations of amazement or reverential silence.

Just as the sun sank below the horizon, we left in search of sustenance and further conversation, which we were successful in finding. By the way, those three shadows on the island there are me, Linda, and POM...and an apparently depressed egret, poor dear.

We're hoping for breakfast tomorrow before she leaves our sunny clime, and you can be sure you'll see additional pictures of this event soon. There's more where that came from!

P.S. Click to embiggen any of these to ridiculous sizes for more detail.

Like sails

Thoughtful and lively sun coverings at the student center study patio.

Around town at twilight

The light-spot is a streetlamp. I think my tree looks like a fork with salad on it. I think my ass looks like...well.... I'm workin' on it.

Going gardening

A few more scenes from the Descanso gardens seem to be in order.

Sometimes I'm a fan of overexposure. I like what it did for this plant.

...And for this one. I'd like to go back and have several more goes at this one.

I just want to dive into this one and tread its pillowy water. I want rub my legs all over it the way the nieces do with their silkies (blankies). Click to embiggen it for the full effect.

Bark pattern of coastal oak. Its bark is better than its bite.

This one's got tracks, and I ain't talking heroin.

I am boo-ful.

Baby E. Welcome, sweetie.

Garden

There'll be more photos from this trip to Descanso Gardens. It was a lovely late Christmas present. I like spreading Christmas throughout the whole year. We decided to do that as a family, and it's been nice.

Join me...

...in a shriek at the horribleness of these frightening mannequins! I prefer the faceless, featureless, or even headless varieties to these freaky monstronsities! Yikes!

Being Tracked

Tracking the shadows.

Martian-head shadow. (My kingdom for a macro lens!)

Favored Glade

I look at this as I read my assignments each morning. The hummingbirds, fat bees, bunnies, squirrels, and even a woodpecker this week populate the air physically and aurally. I take a lot of stare-breaks from my reading.

I see the light