Well, things have been happening in Portland and everywhere

I love, love, love this image.

It is not mine, but a screenshot from FB, with attribution to where it came from, and who made it.

dt sent mercenary stormtroopers to Portland Oregon, to attack and get rid of PEACEFUL Black Lives Matter protestors. They did attack, with many injuries. They committed the war crime of destroying medical supplies. They had no insignia, no identification. They kidnapped people in unmarked vans and disappeared them overnight. Veterans came out to protect the protestors. Dads came out with leaf-blowers. A Wall of Moms came out to protect the protestors. They got tear-gassed and pepper-sprayed, shot with rubber bullets.

Meanwhile, dt said he was sending more 'feds' to other Democratic cities. These weren't 'feds', they were private mercenaries run by betsy devos' brother. (The education secretary who wants all the kids back in school, so they and their families can catch the virus and die. Well over 200 kids 12 and over, and staff have tested positive for the virus from a Georgia summer camp at which all the participants were pre-tested, but kids weren't masked.)

The GDP is down 33%. In the 'great depression' it was only down 15%. 150,000 have died in the US, but that is an undercount. The numbers are still going up, because of states re-opening too soon, and trump-cultists and other idiots who have been holding mass events, unmasked. Even here, after being in Sacramento first. And some few restaurants here refuse to distance, clean, or wear masks. Their operating permits have been revoked. 

dt says he wants to delay the election. He cannot do that legally. He is trying to destroy the Post Office to prevent Voting by Mail, since as he said right out, with higher turnout from easy voting, repubs would never win again. He has filed a suit to eliminate ballot drop-boxes, so everyone would have to vote in person, in long lines. And risk getting the virus and dying.

Black Lives Matter protestors have thought their cause was enough to knowingly risk their lives, not just to the virus, but to police and other murderers. 

dt supporters, on the other hand, have been stupid enough to attend his rallies in crowded indoor locations, since they had drunk the dt koolaid and didn't believe the virus was that bad. Now many are sick from the rally in Tulsa Oklahoma, and at least one has died, dt's most prominent black supporter.

If the dt supporters, including our local anti-vaccers / anti-maskers /and extreme right-wingers were only going to kill themselves, I'd say "Great. Nominate them for a Darwin Award." (given for being stupid enough to wipe out the winner and all his potential/actual progeny). But of course they won't just be killing themselves and their families, but innocent neighbors, bystanders, grocery clerks.

So, the first question is, if dt tries to illegally delay the election and declare martial law, or if he loses the election and refuses to leave office, claiming fraud, will the real military support him? Maybe not; they swear to defend the Constitution.

And will the rest of the reality-based community be as brave and together as Portland has been.

The mercenary storm troopers have left. The nightly protests are completely peaceful again.

If Tina were still alive, I think she would have been out on those streets.

Between Every Two Pines

Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world.  John Muir

I found this wonderful quote by John Muir for the booklet I did for Mom's memorial service. It's something like the way I always felt, thinking about going back into the woods on my own, when I was a kid.

I took the picture in a graveyard up near North San Juan, after another funeral; I was looking for two pines.

Now I have made it a transparent picture for dark t-shirts, and like this for cards and journals. (Photoshop online made available by the college, whose students can't come to campus to the library now.)

Maybe with the quote below it instead of interrupting the sky...

OK Kelvin, if these aren't interference patterns, what are they? Republished 2/6/2018

Photo taken in February. First published for Feb 28, 2009

My brother is a physics professor, who teaches optics. He said years ago that I couldn't be seeing interference patterns on a macroscopic scale, from light coming through a narrow crack in a door hinge.

Here, the light is coming sideways through a narrow gap between a curtain and window frame. The bands certainly look like interference patterns to me. (When I was an oceanography student, I used to watch the waves reflecting off the sides of the ship canal as I walked to school. They made interference patterns as they crossed. I also knew all the types of wave patterns I could get in a coffee cup from my hand shaking as I walked across the cafeteria.)

This is a South-facing window, and the photo was taken on 2-28-2007. It has been photoshopped only to bring out the best in the image. I think that if the light is coming sideways to the opening, you can get the effect of a very narrow slit.

Or, if these aren't interference patterns, what are they?


The vertical lines are possibly from the vertical bars on the porch railings. Although the railings are less than waist-high; the early morning sun would have to be very low down to cast light through them up to this ceiling. I don't think the sun through the trees could be that low; maybe a reflection off a pan of water?This is early morning light, by the angle, and it comes through a lot of trees, so it is often a focused beam, coming through a narrow gap between the trees, as can be seen sometimes casting wavery light through the old float glass windows. (Pictures previously published.)

Partial Solar Eclipse Aug 21, 2017

Partial solar eclipse photo through the bottom of a colander

written and back-posted April 26, 2020

I would have had to drive north to see a total eclipse, it was just partial here, so I used this colander to watch the shadow cross the sun in the round spots of light that came through the round holes.

When I was a kid there was a partial eclipse, and Dad made something like a pinhole camera with a box, and aluminum foil, and a pinhole, for us to watch the spot of light.

Somewhere in the late '70s, there was a total eclipse visible in Washington. I was home at the time, and Mom and I drove halfway across the state looking for a hole in the clouds. We found one near a farm, and pulled up just as the eclipse was starting. As it darkened, Mom said the cows started 'lowing', and they moved towards the farm buildings. I think there were birds calling too, like at dusk.

The eclipse itself was spectacular too.

Totally worth traveling to see.

Summertime, and the living is easy

New sailboat, summer 1969

Summertime, and the living is easy......and the cotton is high.

It's easy to guess that the person who wrote those lyrics had never picked cotton.

Neither have I, but my first job was as summer field labor in an experimental barley field. That was in the pre-sunscreen era, and it took only one day for me to figure out that someone as pale-skinned as I needed long sleeves and a hat.
(Why  it took me that long I don't know, I always burned badly.) And summertime work out in a hot sunny field is not easy at all.


The year I was a freshman in college, the woman who graduated as  the valedictorian that year had earned her way through college picking fruit in the Wenatchee Valley. I was very impressed.


The little sailboat is from a few years later. That's me, and our dad behind the mast, and a brother. And one year an article had been published about PABA (para-amino-benzoic acid). So Dad mixed up some in alcohol, and my sister and I tried it while sailing across the lake. We were amazed that we didn't sunburn at all.

And around here, the living is not so easy in summertime.

True it's not between 42 degrees F and 52 on the main floor (I used a refrigerator thermometer to check that, since the thermometer on the non-functional thermostat only goes down to 52.) Sometimes 52 degrees is a lot colder than other times…

And not between 50 and 60 degrees on the top floor. The higher temperatures are after several sunny days, or when there's been a fire in the woodstove.

And I'm not wading through a foot of snow to carry firewood from the garage to the house and upstairs after several days of the power being out, like a couple of years ago. (Normally I try to carry firewood up between storms.)

Yes, it only takes 5 minutes to dress in one layer of clothes, but more baths/showers and more laundry.

But the main thing is that it takes half an hour to go around morning and evening closing/opening curtains and/or windows, and turning on and off fans and sprinklers. And when it's hot, it's hot.

When the living is really easy here is right now, spring and fall, in the weeks when the temperature is fine and the windows can be left open to screens all day and all night. Between rain or snow storms. Before the weather gets too hot. With fresh spring vegetables or fall harvest at the grower's market.

Except it's pollen season now, or just finished. Drifts of yellow everywhere. Can't leave the windows open to let that blow in. Can't leave them open again until I've cleaned and vacuumed window-sills, porches, low roofs. Then I will be able to see if it's really over. The recent rains might have finished it, but the pollen cones haven't fallen off the pines yet.

I was alone today

Picture from 12/12/2009, 5:04 pm.

I was alone today, in this house where we often spent Christmases together, Mom, my sister Tina and my two brothers & I - and one memorable year, Mom's niece & her son Jeff, plus Tina's husband and my brother's wife. Mom, Tina & Jeff are all gone now.

My brothers were here for 2 days on the weekend, and they will be back for a couple of days for the memorial service. Otherwise the cats & I are alone here. They have started sleeping with her teddy bears on the chest that used to be at the foot of her bed. Except Tiger who has lost a lot of weight for unknown reasons, and seems very ill.

I should have called my family, I know. I didn't.

My friend called in the evening at his usual time.

Calm Seas

My mother died this morning.

She was breathing peacefully & quietly all day yesterday, and last night, when I whispered "Goodnight, love" at about 2:30 am.

She was gone this morning at 8:30.

Goodbye. We love you.

I arrived here

On October 25. Well, not on heron-back, although I did fly. I usually take the train, which I love. It's not that I don't like flying, which I do. It's the getting to the airport, and all the fuss there which I don't like.

This time, flying meant I could bring frozen Cornish pasties, which are a specialty of the old mining town I live in, where my mother was born. We enjoyed them for dinner that night. (Although I suspect Spinach-mushroom-cheese, my favorite, is not a traditional flavor... My mother was surprised by it. She said, "Who would guess spinach could be so good".) She sometimes made pasties when we were kids.

If I flew back, I could take yakisoba. The refrigerated kind, which are the only ones I know with the real seasoning packets, are not currently available where I live.

I got out for a walk for the first time today - but she came back early from her meeting; she collapsed after lunch and asked to be brought home. She doesn't remember it, but I don't think she's going out again.

Larry & Tom at Bridgeport

My walking/photographing companions. As you can see, we do more picture-taking than walking.

Well, the wildflowers and scenery at Bridgeport California in the spring are worth a lot of attention.

These photos were taken on April 19th, 2008.

Happy Day 1892

An email from my Mom reminded me I meant to share this picture I retouched in Photoshop class last summer.
Happy Day was Grandfather's first cousin. The info is from the back of the picture in Grandpa's handwriting. I kept the charming old photographer's card, and added a leather frame scanned from the cover of the album. Click on the small pictures to go to the full-size image and download it. (On a Mac, just click on it & drag it to your desktop.)

from her email: " If you do a google search on "TOWER HILL CEMETERY, BRIMFIELD
MASSACHUSETTS"
you will find an interesting article about the Hubbard House. That
is the original Hubbard homestead which I once visited with my Dad.
The house had 3' wide boards hand hewn on the walls! Yes, New
England must have once had big trees!

I remember my Dad talking about visiting the farm in
summertime. He mourned having no brothers and sisters but played
with his cousins Harriet Day and Gladys Day Deland in the summers
when they visited together at Brimfield. Dad grew up in Chicago."



Isn't she a beautiful little girl. And those interesting ringed eyes. Of course I had no idea of what colors her hair or eyes were. From the photo not blond or black or dark brown. So I used light brown hair like mine was as a girl, before I started working outside and it decided to be blond. And for those ringed eyes, they could be light blue or hazel. I've seen a picture of someone with ringed hazel eyes, & I had a cat who had blue ringed eyes. So I used light blue like Grandpa's and my eyes. Well, brighter than ours.

There're a lot of blending modes used to get the metallic and pearlescent effects on the headband and beads. And just getting rid of all the mold spots took a lot of doing. It was a fun project, but very time consuming.

This old house

My grandfather's house, built in 1917 in the Northern California foothills. My mother was born here. Arts & Crafts style simplicity: lath & plaster walls, wood floors, wood baseboards, trim and picture rails. The most flattering paint style is to extend the ceiling off-white down to the picture molding. That way the contrast shows. It's not period to have landlord-white walls. There were many layers of color on them.

There are many built-ins: china cupboard in the breakfast room, buffet in the dining room, large linen cupboard upstairs, small one down. Built-in bookcases besides the fireplaces. Porches: screened dining/living room porch, sleeping porches, entry porches, a balcony upstairs.

Many "places", individually planned & built spots with character: the top floor window seat, the schoolroom toybox/window seat and flanking bookcases. This room has a toybox/seat, and in the closet, a small door that goes back in under the eaves to a private playroom. (well, extra storage, if you're a grown-up) Under the stairs, which was the telephone closet originally, are two small doors, going back further in. It feels friendly when you walk in the door, although everybody turns the wrong way trying to go somewhere, for the first 6 months.

There's a basement apartment my grandfather made when he was 80. Shored up the foundations and poured new concrete floors. Well, he had been a mining engineer. I've lived here for 25 years, this Constitution Day.

The yukata hanging on the closet door was my sister's. We bought them during a year in Japan, my senior and her freshman year in high school. She's gone now.

The house is about to go up for sale.