Chelsea Physic Garden

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Life on Mars, Oxford St

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The only one in England

Yes, Virginia, there is such a thing as modern English plumbing.

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Fwd: Night shot

Just talked to KDM, which was a treat. Must now work at digesting my
VERY tasty dinner.

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Back in Penzance

Reluctantly left the farm +/- 9:30, headed for the Lost Gardens of
Heligan (which you should Google). Unusual & beautiful. Weather grand.
Spent 3+ hours. Driving easier but will be happy to drop car in AM.
Hotel is like home - they gave me an upgraded room w a lovely sea view
& the tea was ready. Having dinner here & sure it will be yummy. Back
to London tomorrow, meeting fellow walker for dinner. That's it for
now....

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Hangin' in Looe

Had the full English for breakfast. Porridge tomorrow. Left the car &
walked all day - into town along country roads & lanes & (kinda muddy)
public footpath. Primroses, etc. Egrets, etc. Mostly sunny & cold.
Lots of photo ops. Looe less frenetic on a weekday. West Looe not at
all like East Looe. Lots of chatting on the footpath. Have
fascinating pix of Cornish rock wall & Cornish rock wall builders.
Lots of uphill coming back. Pooped. Good night!

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Garlic flowers

Can you smell them?

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I constantly visit .....

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Car tour goes on

Falmouth to Looe in snow, sleet & hail. Nerves shot but all went well.
My farm is lovely, down 1.5 mi of 1 lane road. Angela made me a fire
in the sitting room & gave me tea & cake. The bed linens are too
beautiful to sleep on but I will manage. There are sheep, lambs & a
herd dog.

Sat did Maritime Museum in Falmouth & ferried to Flushing as planned.
Pellew stuff everywhere. Too cool. Ate the best fish & chips EVER for
supper. Eating apples & snap peas to make up for chips & pasties.
Not to mention Cadburys.

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Remains of Cornish pasty

I had an even BETTER one, which I ate walking up the street yesterday.

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Pub view - Falmouth

From the very friendly and comfortable Quayside Inn

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Walking Tour - Day 4

Mist in the AM, clearing to blue sea & sky. Warm, in fact. Map
references - Sennen Cove to Penberth via Minack Theatre & Porthcurno.
Probably easiest day except for precipitous stone steps near theatre.
Tired but pleased with self.

Off to pick up car soon. Plan to spend tonight near Helford. Hope all
is well with all of you.

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Walking Tour - Day 3

Misty but no rain. Saw 3 ancient standing stone sites & a lovely
church @ Zennor, which has a mermaid. More strenuous walking in
between but but not as long. Socked in this AM too. Plan is from
Sennen Cove around Lands End - not sure how far. Then dinner,
breakfast Fri & we are done. I get car Fri AM. Will keep you posted.

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View of Mounts Bay

View from room. You might just make out St Michaels Mount.
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Walking Tour - Day 2

Tues walk lovely but challenging in places. If you care to consult a
map, walked from Pendeen around Cape Cornwall to Sennen Cove. Jagged
rocky coast so lots of in & out & up & down. Maybe 8.5 mi. Today is
away from coast but also up & down. Weather currently not v nice
though have been lucky so far & can't complain.

Room Visitor

This is Jerry, one of the two very friendly Siamese cats at Hotel
Penzance. The other is Tom, of course. Jerry followed me into my
room and did not want to leave....
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Walking Tour - Day 1

First day was BRILLIANT!! Incredible views & weather. Only 3 other
walkers + guide. All pleasant & interesting. 2 men, 3 women total. I
might be youngest. Hotel quite comfy. Food too good.

Pip pip,

Suzanne

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The Full English, Harlingford Hotel

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Twist the knife

:-)

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What's your story, Morning Glory?

Is it just me, or is reading and listening to the news these days depressing beyond words?  I mean, even beyond the war and the economy going into the toilet.  I'm pretty optimistic by nature but the pervasively gloomy atmosphere can really exert a drag if you're not careful.  To take one example, I may not be the best informed person in town because I can barely stand to look at The Daily Olympian's sloppily written, badly designed, commercial (ad and pop-up infested) website let alone spend money for the paper itself. (Unless, of course, I was in need of fishwrap or something for a puppy to piddle on.)

If I make the mistake of reading the "comments" posted on Daily O stories, I usually end up with steam coming out my ears.   All you seem to get, with rare exceptions, is a never-ending stream of mean-spiritedness, ignorance, sniping, and bad punctuation from a few  extraordinarily prolific individuals with too much time on their hands, opposable thumbs, and computer access.  I guess I'm not really a fan of unmoderated comments, since that model doesn't tend to contribute to meaningful debate or the public good.  It's just deeply, deeply depressing.  Apparently I'm not the only one who feels that way, either.

No wonder I tend to get my news from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The news is just as depressing, but at least it comes with intelligence, perspective and now and again a belly laugh, the most recent example being the absolutely brilliant takedown of the mainstream media (and Fox News's) "analysis" of Obama's speech on race in America.

But I digress! This post didn't start out to be a diatribe.  I was running errands on my lunch hour and listening as KPLU FM (NPR, jazz) saluted Marian McPartland's 90th birthday by playing her version of "What's Your Story, Morning Glory?" by Mary Lou Williams, among others.  (You can find it on iTunes here if you are inclined).  It just reminded me that there are such things as strength, grace, and resilience in life -- not to mention joy -- and people among  us who embody those things.  Not 10 minutes later I saw a little girl about five years old bursting out of a store ahead of her mom with a smile so full of life, so beautiful that it outshone the sun.  Then I found a great new pair of shoes. Really cheap.  Ain't life grand?

Did ya watch the Oscars?

Out here on the West Coast, it's not so much staying up late for the Oscars as it is getting home in time. They start at 5:30, and that's without the pre-game show -- you know, the red carpet arrivals with the insincere chit-chat and the catty wardrobe descriptions.  I have to say I was as engaged as I ever have been by this year's show, but then I love me some Jon Stewart. Even taking into account films I haven't seen yet, it appears to be a very strong year for performances.  And gowns, for the most part. I'd like to have seen Juno and Michael Clayton do better, but I can't say I feel anyone was "robbed."  All in all, an Oscar telecast worth staying home for.

Land of coots and cattails

And bald eagles, snow-capped mountains, Canada geese and blue sky (for a change). Took a 5.5 mile hike around Nisqually Wildlife Refuge this morning. I'm gearing up for a trip to Cornwall at the end of March that includes a four-day walking tour. It was an absolutely stupendous day -- as much birdlife as I've ever seen at Nisqually. It was cold, sunny and gorgeous in every way.

Click here to see the photo set on Flickr.

Dude! I'm in Wikipedia!

Well, one of my photos is. A fellow who was browsing for pics of Whitman College to illustrate the campus for a Wikipedia article apparently found one I had posted on Flickr. Since he asked nicely for permission to use it, I licensed the photo under Creative Commons and now it's part of the article.

If you want to see the large size version of the photo in the article (also shown below), click on the article link above, then click on the thumbnail. The large size (with attribution to the photographer -- that's me!) will open.

Took the photo last April while during a wine tour of Eastern Washington. It really is a lovely campus. Nice article, too.

Coffee, rain and caucuses

I think I've had too much caffeinated coffee today! It's after 4 and I'm WAY too chirpy. I've definitely had too much rain and also probably had enough caucusing to last me for a good long while.

To get to the newsy stuff first, in case you didn't know it, all eyes are on the state of Washington even as I write this, because the Democratic presidential race is neck-and-neck. Here in the hinterlands we use the caucus system to select delegates to the party nominating conventions in support of specific candidates --at least those of us who identify as "Ds" do. You can't just sit home and mark your ballot, or even toddle off around the corner to a church basement and punch a machine on a Tuesday morning. You've got to interrupt your Saturday, figure out where some middle school is, get cleaned up and drive over there in the middle of the afternoon, plow through the barely contained chaos of 200 people who've never done this and four who only do it every four years, and then sit down at a table with your neighbors and figure out how to do this thing. It's pretty cool when you get right down to it.

I think almost everyone came with their mind made up, but you do have the opportunity to talk about your candidate and to listen to others. You can even stay uncommitted or send uncommitted delegates to the next level. Fourteen people showed up for my precinct, which is sending 1 delegate for Clinton and 3 delegates for Obama to the county convention.

Aren't those numbers a scandal? I don't know how many registered voters there are in this particular precinct, or how many are D's, but for 14 people to decide on behalf of probably hundreds of people -- in a year when the electorate is far more engaged than usual -- that blows my mind. At least for once I can say I didn't take my privileges for granted.

Regarding coffee, what I want to say is, I have a new french press. OMG. Best. Coffee. Ever.

Oh, and about the weather? I looked at the ten-day forecast this morning: Five days of rain, followed by five days of showers. Heavy sigh. Must go check for moss between my toes .....

One life, well lived

Sir Edmund Hillary died in January. What a truly great human being he was, not because he conquered Everest first, but for the way he lived his life -- humbly, giving something back, weathering great personal tragedy, and through it all, keeping his sense of fun.

If you missed it, you can read his Times obituary here. This photo taken in 2003 shows us the face of someone whose life was well-lived. I love this picture--the expression, the colors, the room in the background. No matter what, he kept his joy!

Bits and bobs

I have some quotes I've been saving up, so here they are:

Better to write for yourself and have no public than write for the public and have no self.
--Cyril Connolly

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.
--Albert Camus

God is really only another artist. He invented the giraffe, the elephant, the ant. He has no real style. He just goes on trying other things.
--Pablo Picasso

I may have been born yesterday, but I've been up ALL night. -- Val Blumberg, High Society

If you want things to stay as they are, things will have to change. -- Giuseppe di Lampedusa

Man, if you gotta ask, you'll never know -- Louis Armstrong, asked to define jazz

You can observe a lot by watchin'. -- Yogi Berra

You cannot step twice into the same river; for other waters are always flowing on to you. --Heraclitus

This letter is long because I didn't have time to write a short one. -- Pascal

Perhaps my favorite:

Everything has a crack in it--that's how the light gets in. -- Leonard Cohen

Welcome back

Hello to you and welcome, whether you've stopped by before or not. As a brief re-cap, I shut up shop at my previous blogspot address back in November and, not unusually, it's taken me a while to get re-organized enough to open things up here at my new location. Links and whatnot in the sidebar have been updated, but there's always more to do....

Why "Peripatetic"? Well, it means "walking or traveling about", or a person who walks or travels about. That's me, or I'd like to think it is -- or maybe it's just my memory that walks and travels about. Anyhow, that's my new name. It'd be swell if you left a comment to say what you think.

Why "knickknick"? It's a variant spelling of "kinnikinnick", the Native American name for Arctostaphylos uva-ursi or bearberry, a common and attractive Northwest ground cover. There's nothing to read into this choice, I've just always liked the word!

What is it with Pride & Prejudice in Bellingham?

Just got done flying in and out of Bellingham on Skybus. The whole trip was oddly bookended by references to Jane Austen's most famous novel. When I checked into my motel on December 20, the young, Asian-American desk clerk was reading Pride & Prejudice. I asked him if it was for school and he said no, he was on a break. He just thought it was time he read it, but he was only on page 10.

On my sleepy way home the morning of December 30, I went into the Starbucks on Meridian Road and noticed this photo while waiting for my double tall soy latte. The real "Mr. Darcy" was not to be seen (isn't that always the way?), but I whipped out my cell phone to make a record of the encounter.

A different kind of Thanksgiving

Part of me misses the large family gatherings I remember from childhood. And there are other times I recall fondly, since I moved out West over thirty years ago, visits with family in Oregon, getting together with friends. Things are quieter now -- slower, more contemplative, closer to home. I like it that way just at present. It has traditions, too -- a walk in Nisqually Delta, Irish whiskey, poetry readings, Scrabble, good Northwest food and wine, maybe a movie.



This "model" may be the shape of future Thanksgivings, or they may be something entirely unexpected. One never knows. What doesn't really change is that I have many blessings. I enjoyed the Verlyn Klinkenborg's piece in the New York Times about the being at the "grown-up" table for Thanskgiving.

I hope everyone's holiday was wonderful. Tomorrow, back to work and reality!

SOMETIMES

Sometimes things don't go, after all
from bad to worse. Some years muscadel
faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail,
sometimes a man aims high and all goes well.

A people sometimes will step back from war;
elect an honest man; decide they care
enough; that they can't leave some stranger poor.
Some men become what they were born for.

Sometimes our best efforts do not go
amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to.
The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow
that seemed hard frozen: may it happen for you.

Sheena Pugh

The Real Blades of Glory

Detail, World War II Memorial, West Capitol Campus

Posted in honor of Veteran's Day. Inspired by Princess.


The bronze blades that form this part of the memorial feature ghostlike images of servicemen, which are actually formed using the etched names of Washington State’s war casualties.






Source: Department of General Administration

We've moved - Prepare yourself for some random blogging

This would be the royal "we." I've moved to a different blogspot address and retitled the blog. There are reasons. If you really want to know, ask me, but there's nothing wrong with just changing things up.

Life is currently a little less harried than recently, so look for some catch-up posts along with the keep-up ones. I may play with dates and times to put things into a certain chronology. Don't take anything as the gospel.

The Queen of Recycling

I read somewhere that every blogger in the known universe was supposed to post yesterday about an environmental topic that they're passionate about. I'm actually too pooped to be passionate about George Clooney at the moment let alone the environment.

But I will say I'm a big fan of recycling. It's a long standing habit, it's how I was brought up and it makes me feel virtuous. I don't know how much it really helps, but it can't hurt. The Queen referred to in the title of this post, by the way, is not me but my Mom. She was still hoarding bacon grease in 1963, a vestige of either the depression or the war years, I'm not sure which. But we also washed and reused plastic bags, rinsed and opened the bottoms of and flattened tin cans, saved paper and jars and string and tinfoil. I think a cottage cheese container had to split before we could throw it out. She could squeeze the juice out of a dime and that's a fact.

I'm profligate by comparison, but I'm glad I have a lot of those habits. Ever since I've lived in this house (more than 20 years), I've hauled my recycling to the county landfill, about 4 miles away: newspaper, mixed paper, cardboard, glass, cans, and plastic bottles. Hallelujah, we just got a neighborhood recycling center steps from my door! It takes dairy containers though not glass (those wine bottles do mount up) and I still have to take plastic bags somewhere, but it's pretty neat. Now if I could just let go of all the magazines I've been hoarding....

Among other recycling efforts, I've substituted those reusable fiber supermarket bags for plastic. It's a growing collection and I'm using them more and more, but I have to say I'm stumped as to what else besides plastic grocery bags or trash bags to wrap my garbage in. Paper's not real good for that, but I think I could probably make that switch.

I also use the local "freecycle" list to get rid of certain stuff I don't want any more, for example when I bought the wrong camera battery or had a perfectly good computer monitor. You can choose who gets your stuff and for some things it just seems more sensible than Goodwill, though they get a lot of my "business", too.

Mom would be proud.

Autumn on Puget Sound

Hello friends and neighbors,

It's been a long, long time. I see I stopped blogging actively around the time I took off for 10 days in Ohio (more about that soon, I hope). I definitely want to at least write a "catch-up" post about that, and I still "owe" a post about my adventures at the Yakima Firing Range on National Guard VIP Day.
Well, I seem to be saying it all the time now, but bear with me. Work has been either a sprint or a marathon pretty much every week since I got back from vacation. No point in boring anyone else with the details, but being this over-committed is just no fun.

A lot of sidebar items are out of date; I'll have to get back to updating them when I can. Just finished reading No. 14 in Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series, irresistibly named The Nutmeg of Consolation. I'm starting the next, The Truelove, along with Broken Trail, set in the Old West. And I literally just got back from seeing The Jane Austen Book Club (excellent), so I'd better read that, too.

The photo above is from a day trip to Whidbey Island last weekend. More photos up now on Flickr. It was too short and yet that was all the time I had to spare. Got some nice photos, though, and I've missed doing that. I still am not done editing photos from Ohio and must get that done.

I hope this post will help me get back into the habit of working on photos and getting them posted as well as updating the blog. By the way, I did happen to have lunch with Sandra Day O'Connor last week . . . .

This, that and the other thing

Hmmm, haven't been too good about keeping up lately. I do plan to write up my National Guard Day VIP adventure from June 24 (working title: A Tale of Two Weekends, Part I), but I've been procrastinating because I don't have all the pictures yet. If I don't have them by next weekend, I'll do the writing part anyway.

I found a great way to clip and save stuff from the web, especially various articles from the New York Times which are always cluttering up my hard drive. I subscribed to Times Select for a few months because it includes extra content plus a clipping service but I really did not use it all that much, plus I am put off by the cost.

For regular Times content you can click on "Share" and among other options, you can select a "permalink" to the article. A note says

To link to this article from your blog, copy and paste the url below into your blog or homepage. Using this link will ensure access to the article, even after it becomes part of the NYT archive.

So you can continue to have access to the whole article this way, apparently even photos and other graphics. This is great, because after Times content goes into the archive, you normally have to pay to access it.

I typically clip recipes, the odd book review, and articles on travel and technology. So if you are looking for a recipe for shrimp deviled eggs or a review of DSLR cameras, you could do worse than browse through the page I created at Tumblr. It has a few other bits and pieces to it, but it's basically a scrapbook that complements this blog.

This morning a friend and I headed out, cameras in hand, for the Thurston County Fair. Newflash, kids and animals are still photogenic. What I didn't realize is what good greeters goats make.  More photos here.

Lost and found

We were privileged to have a presentation at work this week from a refugee from Sudan, whose story is much like those of the Lost Boys of Sudan.  He was joined by a very well-informed and engaging rescue committee member and by Jonah, the founder of Darfurwall.org. 

Here is some more information on that project:

Four hundred thousand numbers cover the The Darfur Wall. Each represents a victim of genocide in Darfur, Sudan. By donating $1 or more, you can turn a number from dark gray to brilliant white and honor one lost life. The Darfur Wall has raised over $50,000 from donors in 30 countries. 100% of the proceeds benefit four Darfur relief organizations: Doctors Without Borders, Save Darfur, Save the Children, and the Sudan Aid Fund.

Stolen quotation

"When you die God and the Angels will hold you accountable for all the pleasures you were allowed in life that you denied yourself."

--Anonymous

Lifted from Princess at the cookntcher mom. (Hope you don't mind!)

Ah, how I wish certain people would take this aphorism to heart. Notice it doesn't say that you'll be let off the hook if you only denied yourself pleasure because you were scared.

My New Toy

I almost said "my new baby." I've had it just over 24 hours and love it already. My (anticipatory) 60th birthday present to me. The very first pictures, taken yesterday evening, are here. It's going for a walk with me tomorrow, too.

Freed on the 4th of July

Woo hoo! as we say in American. The BBC's Alan Johnston (see banner in side bar) has been released! It's already the 4th in the Middle East, ya know. I was just leaving a restaurant downtown, tuned into the BBC on XM satellite radio, and out of the blue heard:

"BBC correspondent Alan Johnston has been released after four months in captivity. The only international correspondent still working in the lawless Gaza Strip, he had been kidnapped on his way home from his Gaza City office on 12 March."

I am over the moon to hear this, especially after all the grim news coming out of the UK this week. Full coverage on the BBC here.

A Tale of Two Weekends, Part 2

This is backdated, along with another post (A Tale of Two Weekends, Part 1 - not yet posted) to bring my loyal readers (both of them) up to speed. I spent almost all of last weeken