How do the pensioners in The Thursday Murder Club know about the Dark Web when self only heard about it a month ago?
She’s on p. 181.
Also, it turns out, the DCI likes Oasis. OASIS.
Normally, she would just barrel through to the end (especially as it’s getting pretty exciting), but today has had all sorts of appointments, and she’s meeting someone for dinner — DINNER! — at the Beach Chalet. Her cousin from Manila, who’s only here for a few days.
Stay cool (it’s hard, that sun’s like a laser), dear blog readers. Stay cool.
For this July #TreeSquare challenge, self is sharing more pictures she took in Golden Gate Park last Sunday, the Fourth of July. It was a beautiful day: cool! What a nice respite from the heat down on the Peninsula.
The statue is a memorial to Marie Bonner. The log cabin was something self stumbled open while wandering around the picnic area:
Thanks to TheLife of B for the #TreeSquare Challenge!
Self’s first post for the challenge are the trees of Land’s End, San Francisco, just outside the Legion of Honor. She visited the museum in June. (The trees are in the background, not the focal point, sorry)
These coastal California cypresses have endured wind and fog for many years — even, centuries. Hopefully, they will endure for centuries more!
Love this photo challenge from Nancy Merrill’s A Photo a Week.
tbh, ALL self’s shots are unedited. She takes all her pictures on the fly.
Here are a few shots she took last week at the Legion of Honor. She went to see the exhibit Last Supper at Pompeii. On the way in, her attention was captured by these Wangechi Mutu sculptures, and there was no way to take pictures of those without including the bystanders. Not the ideal, but here they are anyway. The man in the blue jacket has a starring role:
Chapter IV is about Ammonites, Discoscaphites jerseyensis
Kolbert meets a geologist from Brooklyn College in a parking lot next to a baseball field. They strike out through the underbrush to a shallow creek.
Its banks were covered in rust-colored slime. Brambles hung over the water. Fluttering from these were tattered banners of debris: lost plastic bags, scraps of newspaper, the rings from ancient six-packs.
In the “creek bed, a few inches above the water line,” was an exposed iridium layer, evidence of the six-mile wide asteroid that hit the earth in the late Cretaceous, wiping out the dinosaurs. A scientist digs out a piece of ammonite.
Kolbert goes on to describe the prevalence of ammonites: “Pliny the Elder, who died in the eruption that buried Pompeii, was already familiar with them . . . “
That mention of Pliny the Elder dying at Pompeii . . . This Sunday, self is going to see the exhibit Last Supper at Pompeii at the Legion of Honor. The exhibit traveled from the Ashmolean, where self first saw it in November 2019. It was a fantastic exhibit, she wanted to see it again but ran out of time. She didn’t think she’d have another chance, but here it is, in her own backyard!
Self has many white flowers, so for this challenge, hosted by Jude on Travel World Blog, she will push herself to look for SILVER:
Silver is a precious metal, indicating wealth. “Born with a silver spoon in your mouth”. A cool colour. Sparkling silver water. The light of the moon. It represents feminine energy, pure, emotional and sensitive.
Her MacBook Air is silver. She’s had three MacBook Airs, but this one she’s had the longest (five years)
Here is Alexander Calder’s “Fish.” Self was lucky enough to attend the Picasso/Calder exhibit at the de Young Museum in March, almost as soon as it re-opened:
March was also when self took her first road trip post-pandemic. She went to Sacramento, to visit the Crocker. She stayed in an Airbnb in an old house that used to be a laundry. For reading material (and she ALWAYS) has reading material, she brought Douglas Stuart’s novel, Shuggie Bain. The room she stayed in was white, the bedspread was white, and the book had a black-and-white (well, more like silver) cover.
Today’s challenge is from Nancy Merrill: A Photo a Week.
This week’s challenge is Circles on Circles.
Here’s a standing lamp in her living room.
Here’s the roof of the Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park. The gorgeous building was by Renzo Piano. Self took this picture from the Rainforest. She remembers there were so many butterflies (not one of which was captured by her camera, boo).
Homeland Elegies brings self back to that time of innocence, pre-Former Guy, when we thought all he was good for was palaver.
Father: He’s not going to win . . . You’re smart enough to know that. He doesn’t even want to win. He’s trying to send a message.
Ayad Akhtar: I thought you said he was trying to start a channel.
Father: Same thing.
AA: He’s running for an election he doesn’t want to win so he can start a channel to send a message?
Father: The system is broken . . . I’m saying he won’t win, so you should calm down.
— pp. 18 – 19, Homeland Elegies
And then he did win.
Self still remembers how, on the evening of Election Day, she took Caltrain from Palo Alto to the City, and the packed train car was full of anxious buzz buzz buzz. She finally asked the young woman next to her what was going on.
The young woman said: “Trump’s winning. I’m scared.” The woman held up her cell. Polls on the East Coast had just closed, and the numbers were shocking.
The next morning, when self turned on her cell, the first message was: Your representation has changed. Then, a long long list of newly elected candidates ending with: The President of the United States: DT!
That night, the smell of pot was stronger than usual from the apartment above. Self remembers there were people hanging out on the fire escape, and she could distinctly hear their conversation: “Can you believe he WON? What’s going to happen NOW?”
