sea note

I'm in NY now, but there are these traces of attempts at capturing the fog and the brilliance of the day. Meanwhile, I'm still snarfling and must to bed./

to the shore

Vacation was already in the air as they waited for their flight to Cancun. The bathing suits and sandals were packed and there was nothing left to do except relax and look forward to using them.
I haven't been taking pix this week. The view from my bedroom window of surfers' waves is sterling, but I have grown a bit bored with it. I guess I'm mending!

goose redux

Really after

Like, last I saw

Barring another flood, this is after for now.

A year ago tomorrow, the Eleven Point River wiped out the town of Thomasville, Mo. (Hannah had a horrendous car accident the same day, but that's her story to tell.) So we know that April is flood season, as it has been since I bought my little piece of rural America ten years ago.  But that was a  flood and a half. You can revisit it here.
   Hopefully the Goose will be spared this spring, because Changping has decided to spend her  vacation there. Well, there and at Graceland. The plan is to meet up in New York and road trip to Mo on the 9th or 10th June. Thence to Memphis for a few days before she has to be back to Boston on the 23rd.
   Changping is a city girl and I think she will be horrified by T'ville and the Goose and the local cuisine. So friends in Missouri, we have to show her a good time. Otherwise I'm doomed to spending longer in Memphis than I care to.

bed rest

There are worse days and places to be in bed with a cold. It's rainy and chilly outside, and the fireplace is on inside. The sound of the rain pounding on the roof is pleasant, and it's toasty under the duvet.
And in more Block Island news, this article in, Coastal Living, a former Time Inc title and now?
Also, Block Island friends have finally put their house in DC for sale. Fully renovated: see it here.

miss sparkle eyes

 A few things happened. Got the water turned on at CSC. Had Hannah et all. Unfortunately, as I turned on the dishwasher after dinner for ten, the drain hose popped open and water went all over the floor. The phone didn't work, of course, nor the Internet, but hey we have a workaround hotspot now. Water co (below) arrived to turn on the water TO the new house. Remains to find someone to tun on the water IN the house. But the DSL there is working! Please note the new "garage" next door, which is like Johnny's big barn in miniature.
   And we had three glorious days, when it actually got too hot for the propane stove. Carpenter came by and said he couldn't get to my leaky windows. And I am down for the count with a horrid cold like the one I had all December. In bed today. Hope Miss Sparkle Eyes doesn't get the gradoo.

home again

brooklyn, again

 Yes, this is the Brooklyn Bridge, headed towards Brooklyn. Just want to put that on the record, since I get so many complaints. Yes, I had a ride. Ed kindly came to fetch me (and some hundred volumes of books I was offloading).

 After lunch at Ed's usual place, I wanted to go for local color. He said there was a former Korean nail salon that had doubled as a house of prostitution and was now a bar/restaurant. The new owner had decided to own the heritage.
  And how! We were escorted to the back room, a boudoir with black satin seating and a bed. What the heck, Ed's foot needs elevating anyway. Everyone else who walked into the back room backed out hastily, except the bartender who was happy to shimmer in with shrimp and, um, cocktails.

stormy weather

After listening to the bullets of rain and the lightening and the sirens and the crashes, probably of trash cans blowing into cars, all night, and the blat of flooding alert warnings on my phone, and the word that the Block Island ferry was cancelled for the second day, I changed my NYC-PVD train reservation to Wednesday and went back to bed. And when Lynn Brown sent this pic of the seas on the mainland, where she is stuck at the moment, it was certainly clear why the boat isn't running.

not all work

The last meetings are today, and we leave tomorrow ayem. But don't be thinking that all we do is go to banks and lawyer's offices. Yesterday we went to La Gruta, a hot springs paradise where you can eat, drink and swim in pools of varying degrees—the hottest being in a dome with skylights. I am told that the gringas of San Miguel used to have nude swims there under the full moon. Perhaps they still do. All I know it is has been 20 years since my mother went! We kept our suits on, however, as did everyone else. At ne point it rained, and it was amazing to see the steam rise off the pools.

casa de abuelita

 Our tenant invited us in to see the changes she had made to our house. She hadn't made many—mostly just moved furniture around. The poinsettias were blooming their heads off in the garden, and the monsteras were still monstrous. Barbara, the tenant, owns the casita down the street where we are staying, as well as a hotel and a lot of other properties. The house was shining thanks to Rosio's care, and everybody seems happy. Rosio has stopped hearing my mother's voice calling her from the bedroom.

animals

 This is the first time I've seen a Weimaraner at a botanica. I had gone to fetch the tepezcohuite (mimosa bark) ointment that many friends favor for freshening aging skin, and there was the guard dog. She sat silently, occasionally gazing out through the doorway to solemnly regard passersby.
  The parrots, however, were not so silent, particularly once they recognized me as the sister of the man who always gives them peanuts.

destination wedding

 San Miguel has become the place for weathy city people to hold destination weddings. I have seen as many as three in one day, with throngs and processions of guests and musicians. Yesterday, however, was a very private one—the bride and groom and their photographers, going selfies one better. It's likely that the actual wedding is taking place in another venue, and this was just one of many satellite shoots.

virgin's hideaway

Hang a left at the Virgin de Guadlupe in the alley, and you will find our casita, behind the near invisible door in the shadows. Inside is Barbe's Secreto, a pocket garden with an ancient chinaberry tree and other hardy plants that can withstand the heat of the sun and the desert dry.
  We had a great time yesterday at La Gruta, a hot springs resort outside town, with Rosio and family. Today we begin the work of trying to sort through the bureaucracy of inheritance. We will know more after a meeting with a lawyer this ayem.

a couple snaps

 And flashback to last Sunday, when it was Easter. Here is Milla in a dress designed by Hannah for herself when she was a child and sewn by my mother, I believe. Meanwhile, Barb (below) took one look and said Milla appeared to be a homeschooled fundamentalist Christian. However Barb herself got into the Easter spirit and dyed eggs.

flashback

 It must be an age thing. Seems like everybody I know has been going through books and photographs and reaching out to old friends. Laura, a friend from college, sent me some pix of the two of us in Kauai. Which in turn set me to calling old friends in Kauai. And then, of course, to thinking how much I wished I was in Kauai Right Now!

At Lumahai beach with Hannah and Sam.

How about that water, huh! That's where the river goes across the sand to the Pacific.

who are these people?

 They live in a tatty blue velvet covered album. All but a couple loose pictures were made at Sparhawk's Studio in West Randolph, Vt. The people seem to be of an era and mostly of a generation,  so I wonder whether this album was like a look book for the studio. In any case, this is one of the perils of cleaning up my bookcases. I checked on eBay and there is one similar photograph for sale. Then I emailed the Randolph Historical Society to see if they might want it. It would have been far easier to consign these folk to the dumpster.  I just couldn't.