February 28, 2018 at 7:19 pm (Books, Recommended)
Tags: history, politics, reading lists, Russia
— Alexander, grandson of Catherine the Great, about his own father, Paul, Emperor of Russia from 1796 (when Catherine died) to 1801
February 28, 2018 at 3:54 pm (Artists and Writers, postaday)
Tags: art, exhibits, museum, postaday, postaweek, San Francisco, Wordpress
Last year, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art had an exhibit on Edvard Munch.
His portraits show faces erased of individual characteristics. THOSE PEOPLE ARE US.
Edvard Munch, The Dance of Life, 1925
Edvard Munch, Death Struggle, 1915
Edvard Munch, Night in Saint-Cloud, 1893
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 27, 2018 at 6:53 am (Artists and Writers, Conversations, Filipino Writers, Women Writers, Writing)
Tags: Mondays, short story, work-in-progress, writing process
Get up!
February 26, 2018 at 4:11 pm (Books, Recommended, Surprises)
Tags: history, Mondays, reading lists, Russia
Sebag-Montefiore divides his history of the Romanovs into three Acts. Act II, which self began reading over the weekend, is called The Apogee, c. 1700 – 1800.
Instead of chapters, there are “Scenes.” Below is an excerpt from Scene 2: The Empresses.
p. 154:
More scenes of depravity to follow.
Stay tuned.
February 25, 2018 at 6:50 pm (Flowers, postaday, Sundays)
Tags: California, Garden, indulgences, postaday, postaweek, Redwood City, Wordpress
Spring is just around the corner. Buds are beginning to open.
Here are a few of her flowers, just “faces in the crowd” :
In Bloom Today: Japanese Anemone
More on their way:
More Blooms Are on the Way
Plum tree’s covered with tiny white flowers:
Been Blooming for a Week Now: Plum Tree
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 24, 2018 at 10:57 pm (Books, Recommended, Weather)
Tags: California, history, reading lists, Redwood City, Russia, Saturday
Self is now on p. 86. There have been many great individual sentences.
Nevertheless, she must get a move on.
It is extremely cold here in the San Francisco Bay Area, and she needs to exit the house tonight, to pick up someone from SFO. Lacking a parka, she must layer. Not only must she layer, she must wear her UGG boots, which Marie Claire told her years ago was only suitable for under 30s. She hopes she doesn’t encounter people with rheumy coughs, as she did yesterday at Walmart. She wanted to run screaming out of the store, but she was stuck in line and had no choice but to stiff-upper-lip it.
Here’s the Sentence of the Day:
The Jolly Company were toasting the trip at Lefort’s palace when, as General Gordon wrote, a “merry night” was ruined by “the accident of discovering treason against His Majesty.”
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 23, 2018 at 10:13 pm (Artists and Writers, destinations, Places, postaday, Traveling)
Tags: art, Fridays, London, museums, Paris, postaday, postaweek, Wordpress
Love this week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge. Self has tons of “faces in the crowd” pictures. TONS.
Here are three more:
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 23, 2018 at 4:58 pm (Books, Conversations, Recommended)
Tags: Fridays, history, reading lists, Russia
Hugely enjoying this massive tome, so much so that self took it with her to Black Panther, and kept reading until the theater lights went down.
Chapter on Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, also known as the “Young Monk” :
Meschersky found the chief armourer Bogdan Khitrovo, nicknamed the “Whispering Favourite,” guarding the Red Staircase, brandishing his jewel-encrusted staff of office to hold back importuning crowds. He punched Meschersky.
“You shouldn’t strike me — I’m here on duty.”
“Who are you?” asked Khitrovo, who knew perfectly well.
“The patriarch’s servitor.”
“Don’t make so much of yourself. Why should we respect the patriarch?” and with that he smashed him on the head with his baton, sending him bleeding back to Nikon.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 21, 2018 at 10:39 pm (Artists and Writers, Books, Conversations, Links, Personal Bookshelf, Traveling)
Tags: art, Cee Neuner, London, memories
Self loves participating in Cee’s Fun Foto Challenges. This week’s challenge is BIRDS.
Since self is a writer, she has a lot of books. When she travels, there are more books in her suitcase than clothes.
Two years ago, in London, self was trying to heft a suitcase onto a double decker. The bus driver actually left the wheel to help her (This would never happen in San Francisco. Or Redwood City, that’s for sure!). Self tried to warn him. He took one tug at self’s bag, gave her a sharp look, and said: “I tell you, it must make you feel really good leaving home, knowing you’ve brought all your books along with you.”
When she’s in London, she always stays in Bloomsbury. Which means, of course, frequent trips to the London Review Bookshop. She was so good, this last trip. She only bought four books. One of them was a book of Amazing Rare Things: The Art of Natural History in the Age of Discovery, by David Attenborough and Susan Owens.
Here’s one of the illustrations: Frigate Pelican, by John James Audubon, from his groundbreaking collection The Birds of America (published 1822):
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
February 21, 2018 at 5:54 pm (destinations, Explorers, Holidays, Links, Places, postaday, Recommended, Traveling)
Tags: art, Christmas, exhibits, London, memories, Paris, postaday, postaweek, Wordpress
This week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge is “a face in the crowd.”
Self has a lot of pictures of anonymous people, because she travels a lot by herself.
In December 2017, self visited London’s Barbican for the first time. She went to see the Basquiat: Boom for Real exhibit. Life-changing.
Before that, she was in Paris:
Cinema Mac Mahon, on the Avenue of the same name in Paris, December 2017
Christmas Day 2017 in the Tuileries, Paris:
Paris, December 25, 2017
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
 | anthropologist on Twisted: Belmont, CA Farmer… |
 | Michael on Twisted: Belmont, CA Farmer… |
| anthropologist on Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge… |
 | Cee Neuner on Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge… |
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