No Wax

Or

What Happens at the Car Wash Stays at the Car Wash

It's been an intense week. Trying to maintain equanimity with preteen: don't back up too far, don't scrutinize too closely. Learning communication skills at school and having the process devolve to public weeping (not me or mine). Preparing for social events for the week and tying up loose ends left by my attention deficit disorder. (lol).

 

Turns out that those 10 minutes at the car wash are reaffirming, cleansing, calming. Who knew?

Unexpected Art

This is in my friend Greg's piano warehouse. He cleaned the place up, built a stage, hung art and lights, and threw a fabulous party. Oh yes he did. The music and dancing were divine.

The warehouse was overflowing with amazing art. Never seen before anywhere. It was done by one of his employees who has since passed away. The man was quite the colorist.

So here we are, in this big space with these hulking shrouded pianos all around and this crazy vibrant exciting art on the walls. Combine that with some great sounds and room to dance and needless to say, it was a lot of fun.

Thanks, Greg and Linda!

(I'm up to my old tricks. My camera was full of photos all stuck up in there. I'll try to trickle them onto the web slowly.)*

Tomorrow, The Carwash.

Wisteria

Our seasons are subtle here. They're not just winter, spring, summer, etc. They can be broken down more precisely: rainy, foggy, sunny, etc. And those can be broken down even further: tulip and daffodil season, wisteria and fremontodendron season, but no lilac season (dammit), at least not super fragrant lilacs. Drive a few miles, to places that have hard freezes in the winter and you can smell the lilacs. But not in the immediate SF Bay Area. Sad.

The wisteria will have to do in the early spring purple category.

All Those Spring Flowers and . . .

I go Bananas.

This is the third day of only posting one (1) image to Flickr. Learning to self edit. What a concept. Not easy, I tell you.  Why have just one when you could have 5.  Or 25?

Girls and Dog

My girl is starting the dance of teenage separation. It's a two-steps-forward-one-step-back kind of dance. This is a head's up to me to focus on my own interests but remain available and steady for her through the process. I want to stay on her executive committee for the long term.

The poor dog and her giant lump! It looks like a mountain when she lays down on the other side. I feel a tad defensive that we didn't have it dealt with early on but surgery to me seemed too invasive just because the lump was unslightly to us. Sigh.

It's sweet that Scout hangs out with the girls. Love that.

Happy Rainy Sunday

Expectations have been drastically reduced here. Nothing is expected of the great outdoors anymore. I'm trying to look at the upside:
No pressure to do anything, to get anything done. Love that. A little reading, a little computer time. Went through my shoes and took a bag to Out of the Closet. Quick trip to the store. Oops, no bread for lunch tomorrow; didn't get to Acme in time.
The new disposal is on board, thanks to plumber Ed. He said he had to step outside a couple of times to calm down so he wouldn't either curse (preteen girls in the house, although they were fairly warned) or bust something. What a guy!

Off to reconstruct my kitchen . . . I don't need my rainboots for that.

Sky Phenomenon and a Pretty Truck

Saw this on the way to school yesterday. 

It was not predictive of increased collective faith, the apocalypse (been watching too much Buffy), or fine weather for the weekend.  (Brrrrr.)

And then the happy truck up the street:

I loved How to Train Your Dragon in 3D.  Craig Ferguson is one of the voices.  Love that guy. But since when do Vikings sound like Scotsmen?

The 2.5-year-old garbage disposal sprung a leak.  Sheesh. Can't life be about taking pictures and making lovely meals?  And Spring?

Banana Blossom by Kate

Banana Blossom - For Claudia
 My friend Kate took this photo in San Diego recently. Way to go bananas, Kate!

Kate encourages this flower obsession I have. While I beg for intervention, she enables. Maybe she's right. Flowers are like snowflakes: no two are the same. Can there be too many botanicals? Unwilling as I may be, this is the pursuit of the most beautiful sunny hopeful living delicate (or ponderous) colorful geometric . . . flower. Leaves welcome too.

Thoughts on Flickr

I've been thinking about Flickr for a couple of weeks now. I post scads of stuff on Flickr. Some junk, some gems. And I don't get it when great photographers only post one or two things there. I tend to overnourish. Should I or how do I restrain myself?

Flickr is gluttony. No question. Do I enjoy getting lost in it for hours? Um, kinda. It's like Thanksgiving dinner: delicious but deadly. Flickr is the big conversation, the external not the internal.

A blog is a smaller conversation: with yourself, your friends and followers, etc. My blog is my diary; I'm still trying to figure out if it's words or pictures or both.

So maybe this Flickr/blog tension is a question of priorities.  Or of editing. And what the heck role does Facebook play? This is a conversation on hold.

Here's one of my favorites of the photos I just uploaded to Flickr.

Last week; between the raindrops

See?  We had a taste and then it slapped us down.  (Yeah, yeah, I know.  I'm overreacting. So what?  For those of you who can't or won't, just leave it to me.)

This is the start of our jaunt to Sebastopol last week.  The Richmond Bridge, gateway to Marin County.  San Quentin is over there on the left.  (Such lovely real estate for the condemned.)

Just a taste of how beautiful it was -- before it became so sucky and gray over the weekend. And here I thought I'd love having the fog and soft light back.  Hmph.

And now comes the cold. Criminy.

I was ready for spring.  Had the bike out.  Rode a couple times last week.  Thought about getting the warm-weather clothes out. Yesterday was a typhoon.  Today I had just finished moaning (see below), opened the door and it was pouring.  And now the rest of the week will be icy cold. Until it rains again.  This is not what I signed up for. I'm actually hankering for the predictability of East Coast weather.  What!?!

Thank goodness we ran between the raindrops and spent a day in Sebastopol last week. At least I have pretty pictures to look at, dream about.

I am sick of this weather. Sick, I tell you!

Everything is gray.  I left my knitting in Petaluma; I'm taking books out of the library that I've already read.  Oy!  So, don't want to reread the books and don't want to watch tv without the knitting.  Don't want to go out in the rain and am sick of being inside.  FMD.

Yes, there is light ahead but I trust nothing.  Illustration:  Dead or Alive?