London Spring

We were told that spring arrived 5 weeks late in London.  Well,  I was glad we arrived at the same time.  It was beautiful.  Especially coming from So Cal, which is already dry and brown.

There was only a sprinkling of rain later on in the week. Our tour guide in pink just used her umbrella for identification.

English Bluebells.

Flowers of St. James Park.

Even the grass had flowers.

Flowers of Whitehall Gardens.

I'm enlarging the next one for my wall.

Flower stand outside the Gloucester Road underground station. But £40 for a bouquet? Ouch! Around the corner by the Waitrose market were less expensive flowers.

Brainsss?

Home Alone

For the first time in 10 days, I am alone.  (Cats don't count!)  For an introvert like me, I find it restful and recharging.  In an hour, I will venture out to Zumba, but for now I am savoring the quiet.

Handy and I had a fantastic trip to London.  I have over 900 pictures from my big camera, and quite a few on the cell phone too.  I want to share some of them with you but it is a little overwhelming figuring out where to start!

We both fell in love with the city and want to go back again someday (next year?). I am already checking out flats on airbnb.com.

It looks like we saw Madeline in London.

Tesla

The company my husband works for was sold recently, and the founders (too bad my husband was not one of them), came into a nice chunk of money.  They are all great people and I don't begrudge them their good fortune at all.  They earned it.  I do respect that they have not rushed out and blown it on lots of showy stuff.

One man is buying a moderate house, not a mansion.

Another did spend a bit on a new car, but it's the electric Tesla.  My husband could rattle off all the specs of this car but most went in one ear and out the other for me.  Close to 300 miles on a full charge sounds pretty darn good.  Handy got a ride in in last week and was quite impressed.

What would you do with a big windfall?  I'd pay off all the bills and bulk up the college funds, that's for sure.  And maybe re-do my patio, which you can see from the previous tomato pictures is having an upheaval.  

Braincake

There's cheesecake, there's mancake, and then there's what I like to call braincake.  Smart people.  I like them.

We heard one of them speak last week.

Here he is with my favorite author, Hugh Howey, who is also braincake.

from Hugh Howey.com

Here I am next to my favorite author.

Can't find me? I'll crop in a little bit.

So you've heard of Bacon numbers, right?  (How many degrees one is from Kevin Bacon.)  So if there were Tyson numbers, mine would be 2.

Who's your braincake?  Who do you admire for their smarts?

Tomato Time

I joke about my brown thumb but I do manage to keep a few tomato plants alive each year.  I planted these about two weeks ago.

And they are still alive and growing!  Now the question is, will my non-tomato-eating son remember to water them while I am away?

Photocrush.com offers a free calendar every month.  May's just happens to feature tomatoes.

The Security Cat

Every day I, Homer, am responsible for fending off interlopers.  The threat is most severe around dinner time.

This one again.  Well, she can have a little snack.  She usually leaves some for me.



Got to keep an eye out, just in case.



What's this thing yelling at me for?  I'm just doing my job.

Western Scrub Jay

Hey, you're distracting me from my duties with all that petting.

Oh no, that bird broke through the perimeter and is stealing the kibble.



That's what happens when I let my guard down.

The Lunchroom Cat

Homer, the former factory cat, is always curious about what my kitchen the cafeteria has for lunch.

Chicken panini?  Not his favorite.

Roast beef on sourdough.  A little better.  He prefers pink meat to white.

Fruit and salad.  You've got to be kidding, he says.

C'mon, give a working cat a break!

At last, a hot dog with bacon.  Homer Heaven.  (Don't worry, I only gave him a tiny bite.  Just a nibble will satisfy him.)

It's just funny, the things he likes.  

Saturday PhotoHunt: Zoom

Another set of PAIRS for Thematic Photographic, and it also works for Saturday PhotoHunt's ZOOM because I took them all with my zoom lens, either in my yard or across the street.

A pair of cranes.

A turkey couple.

A vulture duo.

Thematic Photographic: Pairs

A pair of hedge plants did not make it through the winter.

Here are their replacements, waiting for us to dig a pair of holes.

Inside the house, I now have a pair of Kindles.

When I was a child, this was my favorite pair of books.  I got them out recently to re-read the story with the four winds.

Cafe Press has had a fantastic deal -- 16x20 photo canvases for only $38!  Ernest had long wanted enlargements of two of his pictures from Ecuador/Galapagos Islands so I had this pair made for his birthday.

Carmi at Written, Inc. hosts Thematic Photographic.  Stop by to see more pairs.

The Daily Drive: Sunny Sunday

Ernest was gone for 4 days to a leadership conference.  We didn't want him to leave his car in the school parking lot that long, so we told him we'd drop it off on Sunday.  After we did so, we went out to lunch.

Grilled Octopus and Calimari with Beets.  Our favorite!  For quite a while, we would split one order and it was never enough.  Finally I had the bright idea to order two, and split a salad instead.  Brilliant.  I congratulate myself every time.

Then we walked around the even smaller town.  We saw a horseshoe tree

and a Michael Jackson shrine.

On the drive home, there were vineyards

and miniature horses.

The highlight of the day's drive, as far as my Handy Husband was concerned, was seeing this McLaren MP4-12C.

We had plants to put in the yard, but it was too darn hot.  Yes!  I know!  And it's only April!

Homer also had an eventful afternoon, bringing in a lizard's tail.  I have spared you the video which included the tail moving by itself and Homer actively pouncing on it.  Instead, you can enjoy this still photo which includes my poor carpet.  In addition to trying to change the color from black to white by stealthily depositing white fur all over it, Homer and Francine are also trying to modify it from low pile to shag with a vigorous daily application of claws.  Since I only paid $99 for a floor sample, I can live with it.

Hope you had a great weekend, too.

At Seventeen

He's learned the truth at seventeen

That life is meant for those who dream

Blue-eyed boy with clear skinned smile

Childhood lasts just a little while

Spreading wings both far and wide

Life is an adventurous ride

For young men like him, at seventeen.

(with deepest apologies to Janis Ian)

Ernest didn't want a big fuss for his birthday.  He'd already gotten his present:  a winter coat and a plane ticket back east to visit his girlfriend.

But we decided he should have cake anyway.  I was going to get a bakery cake, but you know Frank. Frank's cakes are much better.  This was an apple spice cake with cream cheese frosting.  Here's the link to Anne Burrell's recipe.  Frank left out the nuts because he doesn't like them, and used dried cranberries because we were out of raisins.  It was fantastic.  Dense, moist, not overly sweet.  I confess to having a piece for breakfast the next day.

Oops, I forgot to cross the T.

So we only embarrassed him a little.

I'm sure his wish was for another plane ticket.

Homer loves cream cheese, didn't you know?

Happy 17th Birthday, Ernest!

Time warp Tuesday: Imagine Yourself In A Field Of Flowers

Thank you to Jenn for hosting Time Warp Tuesday.

I apologize for the blurry last minute-ness of this.  Today's restorative yoga visualization was "imagine yourself in a field of flowers."  So this is where I went.   Grass Mountain, a field of California poppies, and a beloved little Batman-clad boy.  Twenty years flies by so quickly.

Catching the Wind

It's a blustery but sunny day today.

Funny thing, it was the same last Monday.  I had returned from my restorative yoga class, where we lie around for an hour supported by blocks and balls and pillows and things, while our lovely and gracious instructor massages our necks and whispers sweet visualizations into our ears.

The visualization was "think of a time you had fun" and the sound of the wind reminded me that I dream of flying.  Not in a plane, but I often dream I can physically fly myself through the air.  Like swimming, but more upright.

Many of the fun times that ran through my head involve air and wind.  Ferris wheels, roller coasters, Segways, paragliding, glider rides.

Some of the music took me to an ancient temple, where I was the goddess of the winds.  The winds' fingers twined around me, massaging me and annointing me with the scents of their origins.  (This all reminds me of a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale.)    For me, the west wind brought the salty ocean air, the north pines, the east hot desert, and the south chili and spice.

What will today's wind bring?

Catching the West Wind, 2009.

Again

Yep, it was "Bye, Mom" again for Ernest's spring break.

Also at the airport, I had a "Whoops I Did it Again" moment.  You remember...this kind of moment.  I was going to draw a new cartoon but I am too lazy.  Fortunately, Ernest clued me in to the problem and I resolved it quickly.

Sigh. Today I have to take my car in for service.  Again.  And take Ernest's sax to be repaired.  Again.  What else is going to repeat itself?

Separated at Birth #5

I saw this great GIF of The Rock's eyebrow going up and down. I wanted to save it for Debbie. But my phone only saved a still picture.

This is the absolute truth: The very next picture I took was Homer with the same expression.