August 2, 2017 at 5:29 pm (Artists and Writers, Family, Food and Drink, Links, postaday, Surprises)
Tags: art, California, discoveries, exhibits, memories, museum, nostalgia, restaurants, San Francisco
This week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge (posted every Wednesday) is TEXTURE.
Photos have “a tactile element, too,” Ben Huberman says. As an example, he provides his shot of “tangles of seaweed . . . across the wet sand at low tide.”
Here are three of self’s own examples of texture:
- The lace on a ladies’ hat, circa 1900 – 1925, in the exhibit on Impressionism and the Milliner’s Trade at the CA Palace of the Legion of Honor:
Maker identified only as “French, Madame Georgette”
- Look at the wonderful texture in this salad arrangement!
Le Pain Quotidien, Claremont, CA: July 2017
- Discovered in the exploration of son’s room: a frog that squirts water. Self loves that the frog’s skin is so pebbled. It has a degree of realism you don’t often find in other toys.
Plastic Frog! Found in Son’s Room in Redwood City, CA: This used to be one of his favorite toys.
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July 31, 2017 at 3:22 pm (Artists and Writers, Food and Drink, Places, postaday, Recommended, Traveling)
Tags: Chinese food, coffee, London, memories, Mondays, museum, restaurants, San Francisco
Self scoured her archives to find illustrations for this week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge: SATISFACTION.
She’s feeling nostalgic.
Capuccino Break, British Imperial War Museum, May 2017
Chinatown Love, October 2016
Eating with Emily at Fabulous Chéz Nous, 22 Hanway Place, London. We waited for this meal: it was a promise we made to each other when self left London last July. Emily’s daughter directed the Wonder Woman movie.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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July 29, 2017 at 4:30 pm (Artists and Writers, Dearest Mum, Family, Flowers, Links, Lists, Places, Plays, postaday, Traveling, Women Writers, Writing)
Tags: Annaghmakerrig, Cork, Events, Ireland, London, memories, Paris, postaday, postaweek, Readings, Sacramento, Saturdays, Shakespeare, summer, Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Washington DC, Wordpress
- Share a photo of something that brings you satisfaction. It can be monumental, minor, or something in between.
— Jen H., The Daily Post
For this post, self decided to kill two birds with one stone. She’ll look back at her fondest memories of 2017 (thus far) — the moments that gave her the most satisfaction.
From Shakespeare’s Globe, her last night in London, June 2017
The Eiffel Tower: May 2017
Quarterly West reading at Sixth Engine, Washington DC, February 2017
Bus Stop (near the Cathedral of Notre Dame)
Waiting for the beginning of Kenneth Macmillan’s beautiful, stunning ballet, “Mayerling”: Saturday, May 13
The Main House, Under a Crescent Moon
The Forest Seen From the Lake: Early March
Going to the Globe and seeing Tristan and Yseult; sorting through old photographs of Dearest Mum; seeing the Eiffel Tower up close; reading her story First Causes at Sixth Engine in Washington, DC; watching Mayerling at the Royal Albert Hall; visiting Cork; Tyrone Guthrie Centre
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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July 24, 2017 at 6:04 pm (Artists and Writers, Conversations, Places, plans, Traveling, Women Writers, Writing)
Tags: artists residency, British authors, Edinburgh, fantasy, Hawthornden, inspiration, memories, Mondays, Scotland, short story, writing process
Just to show you how mind-numbingly slow her mind is, there are stories she’s begun five, even 10 years ago, whose words sit in her MacBook, languishing.
Five years ago, while self was in Hawthornden, she met two British poets: Joan McGavin and Jenny Lewis.
After dinner, while we all gathered in the parlor, these two would talk. And if self did nothing in that whole month she was there (June 2012) except listen to the stories, she would count that month well spent.
She also remembers visiting the National Museum in Edinburgh, and seeing there a figure of Dolly the Sheep. And dreaming of a giant Dolly the Sheep looking in through the manor windows.
Dolly the Sheep was the first successfully cloned sheep. She was born on 5 July 1996 and died on 14 February 2003.
Self was channeling sheep apparently because she even began writing a Dolly the Sheep story, which began:
- The ghost of Dolly the Sheep, and three dun-polled cows.
Hawthornden was the place where self worked on editing Magellan’s Mirror for J Journal. And that is quite a fantastical story (The Philippines populated by a race of giants).
Then she began going to Ireland and started writing dystopia.
Goal for today: Finish that Dolly the Sheep story!
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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July 20, 2017 at 6:38 pm (Artists and Writers, Dearest Mum, Family, Food and Drink, Links, Pianos, Places, postaday, Recommended, Surprises, Traveling)
Tags: Filipino food, memories, postaday, postaweek, Sacramento, Wordpress
This week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge is:
UNUSUAL
The prompt comes from guest host Lignum Draco: “Experiment.” Try something “unusual.”
Don’t know whether self is interpreting this week’s Photo Challenge correctly but, without further ado, self’s takes on “unusual”:
Gina’s Filipino Café, 1101 Twelfth St., downtown Sacramento
- There is only one Filipino restaurant in downtown Sacramento. And it just so happened to be very close to the apartment self was renting. Adobo is the quintessential Filipino dish. Anthony Bourdain said the best pork he ever tasted was in the Philippines.
Still can’t get over the fact that this bridge over the Sacramento River is such a vibrant, fun yellow! Cool!
- It’s all there in the caption.
Dearest Mum was the reigning superstar of her day (She won the New York Times International Piano competition when she was just 14). In spite of that, she was very demure.
- Photos from a stash self had in her closet. She stumbled across them just two weeks ago. Dearest Mum as a shy flower. Before self was even a notion. She went on to marry Dear Dad, who took her home to the Philippines (She had grown up East Coast, mainly New York City) and with whom she had five children.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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July 18, 2017 at 6:06 am (Artists and Writers, Books, Dearest Mum, Family, Food and Drink, Lists, Personal Bookshelf, Pianos, Places, postaday, Relatives, Surprises)
Tags: birthday, California, Los Angeles, memories, Mondays, postaday, postaweek, restaurants, summer, Wordpress
Everything Summer 2017:
- Discovered an old stash of photographs of Dearest Mum in her younger days.
- Explored the inside of son’s closet in 2431 Hopkins Ave., Redwood City.
- Rediscovered one of self’s most treasured books.
- Had dinner with Jennie, son’s fiancée, at Himalayan Café in Old Town Pasadena.
- Found artwork by son (when he was in grade school).
- Got a Birthday present (for self) from son and Jennie: Nude Awakening (Self is so WOKE!).
- Amused by a giant stag at the end of a driveway in the Pasadena hills.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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July 13, 2017 at 11:50 pm (Artists and Writers, Dearest Mum, Family, Pianos, postaday)
Tags: memories, New York, New York Times, postaday, postaweek, Wordpress
Here are a collage of pictures of her, taken in New York City.
She attended Curtis, won the New York Times International Piano Competition, and played at Carnegie Hall when she was just 14.
Self’s nephew, William, is getting married this September in New York City. Not sure if Dearest Mum, who lives in the Philippines, will be strong enough to attend, though.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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June 26, 2017 at 6:00 pm (Artists and Writers, Conversations, Lists, Movies, plans, Recommended, Surprises, Traveling)
Tags: action movies, England, Fort Bragg, humor, London, memories, Mondays, Naomi Watts, Oxford, performances, praise, summer, summer movies
Self has been so starved for movies.
In a prevous life, she’d be in her local cine-plex every other day.
The past couple of years, though, unless she feels really driven, she’ll go months without seeing a movie.
Here are some of the ways she shows her movie geek street cred:
Oxford, UK: She gave up seeing the Ashmolean in favor of watching Captain America (In all fairness, the movie theatre was so conveniently situated: just across from Gloucester Green)
London: She walked — walked — in full summer heat, from Russell Square to Shaftesbury Avenue, simply to watch X-Men in the Odeon.
Fort Bragg, CA: She went during a lull in a storm. The movie? Kingsmen, with Colin Firth. When she came out of the movie, the wind was blowing flat out. Self thought she was going to be swept into the ocean.
Now, in the past four days, she has seen three movies:
- Band Aid
- Beatriz at Dinner
- Wonder Woman
Sorry to say, she nearly fell asleep during the action sequences at the end of Wonder Woman. But woke right up again when she saw, in the closing credits, the name of her friend’s daughter:
DIRECTED BY PATTY JENKINS
Of the movies she’s seen so far this summer, her favorite would be Beatriz at Dinner. For Connie Britton and John Lithgow’s performances.
Today, she’s going to see The Book of Henry, even though it hasn’t gotten good reviews. She loves Naomi Watts, even though she’s been so under-used by Hollywood lately.
A long time ago, self met a Mills College student at one of her San Francisco readings. Chatting with the young woman after the reading, the student revealed she made money by working part-time as an exotic dancer. And self happened to mention how much she liked Naomi Watts (What’s the connection to exotic dancing? Nothing), and the young woman said even though Watts had turned 40, if the young woman were a man, she’d definitely consider her hot.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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June 17, 2017 at 3:37 pm (Artists and Writers, destinations, Family, Flowers, Links, Places, postaday, Relatives, Traveling)
Tags: England, flower photography, Gardens, London, memories, photography, postaday, postaweek, Saturday, Wordpress
This week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge is FOCUS.
David W. asks:
Are you a stickler for getting in close to your subjects and capturing every detail, or do you prefer a more ethereal look that illustrates the sensations of the moment? Or both?
Self definitely falls into the latter group.
Much has happened in the world in the four months self traveled through England, Ireland, and France. She took this picture standing on the steps of London’s St. Martin-in-the-Fields, where she’d gone to listen to a candlelight Pachelbel Canon concert:
Iconic Double-Decker: London, Early June 2017
Before London, self was in Paris. She spent one day at Monet’s Garden in Giverney, which was awash in blooms:
Blooming in Monet’s Garden in Giverney, Early June 2017
Finally, Versailles. The lines were incredible. It took all of her niece Irene’s ingenuity to get us both inside. Self took this picture staring through the gilt iron gates at the front entrance, on a very hot afternoon in late May:
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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June 14, 2017 at 5:27 pm (Artists and Writers, destinations, Links, Places, Plays, postaday, Traveling)
Tags: Emma Rice, England, London, memories, photography, postaday, postaweek, praise, Shakespeare, summer, Wikipedia, Wordpress
The bokeh that resulted give the lights of the city a magical quality and creates a unique look for a heavily photographed location.
— David W., The Daily Post
Self had to look up the definition of “bokeh”, here.
Last night, self saw “Tristan and Yseult” at Shakespeare’s Globe. Such a beautiful, high-energy production, Emma Rice’s last as Director at the Globe.
Audience Leaving the Globe After “Tristan and Yseult”: Tuesday, 13 June 2017
Leaving Shakespeare’s Globe after a performance of “Tristan and Yseult,” Tuesday 13 June 2017
Going home, over London Bridge, she snapped this shot of Big Ben:
London Bridge Last Night, Around 10 p.m.
And this one of the London Eye:
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
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