Hot or Not

It’s been hot here for the last two days. How hot you ask? Turn on the ceiling fan hot. Take the down comforter off the bed hot. Wishing I had a cold beer to drink out on the balcony hot. Lazy cat hot. Coming home to find the cheese I had forgotten to put on my sandwich; which lead to a lunch so unsatisfactory I had to have a Strawberry Crème from Starbucks in the afternoon breaking my no two Starbucks a day rule; turned all gooey and has to be thrown out hot.

But because I’ve lived in more extreme climates I also know how hot it’s not. It’s not need to take a shower every ten minutes hot. It’s not can’t sleep because my blood is about to boil and the sheets are all sticky hot. It’s not can’t move because the heat is draining all energy hot. It’s not eat a whole pint of Ben & Jerry’s hot. And I certainly don’t miss the heat – except it would be nice to have an excuse to eat the whole pint of Ben & Jerry’s.

Wikipedia Adventures

Checking the Wikipedia page today I noticed that one of their recent featured articles was on the Andrea Doria. My dad had a ticket to Europe on the Andrea Doria late in the summer of 1956. A young man on his first trip to Europe. He of course never got the opportunity to sail on the luxury liner and went by airplane instead. When he showed up at the airport to fly home the PanAm agent checking him in said oh, your ticket was for yesterday we were paging all over the airport trying to find you. PanAm put him on the flight for that day and he arrived slightly late and embarrassed at having mixed up the days. These days I doubt the airlines would be so understanding.

Klondike Tales

Jack London’s Klondike tales is a wonderful, vivid collection of the harsh life of the Klondike during the gold rush. Never have I felt in such danger of starving or freezing to death while reading.  The Klondike was a brutal place populated by Indians and hard white men and women seeking their fortunes, or escaping their lives. The Great Cold, the Great Silence, the Fear of the North it doesn’t sound pleasant. People would travel hundreds of miles over the snow with their dogs.  When the food ran out first they would eat the dogs that were too weak to continue, then boil up parts of their moccasins and skin on the inside of their fur coats and eventually collapse into the snow from weakness and freeze to death. London joined the Klondike Gold Rush for a summer in 1897, which provided the inspiration for his stories. Though knowing some of his background I would guess most are actually someone else’s stories. Definitely worth reading even if you don’t enjoy every story. Going through just a few tales will make you glad of your hot supper and warm bed every night.

Beginning of the End

The wildly sweet blueberries have disappeared from the farmers market. As have the succulent summer squash. The peaches and nectarines are in full swing. The plums are scarce, the raspberries still there but the quality has diminished. The potatoes are starting to make an appearance and the artichokes are plentiful. Soon will come the apples, various squashes and assorted root vegetables. It’s the beginning of the end of summer.  

No Wonder

No wonder I didn't get picked for jury duty. I noticed this sign posted on the door to the jail a few weeks ago.Apparently amid some controversy the city jail has been closed. Having grown up in Ossining, residing down the street from the jail doesn't feel unusual. Living near the Oakland jail I have learned the importance of my bail bond rights. The bail bond places (there must be a better name for these places) tend to advertise late at night educating the insomniacs. Since I walk by the storefronts on my way to work and know all the company names I pay attention to the commercials. I've decided on Aladdin Bail Bonds if I'm ever in need. Anyway, with the jail closing I was concerned these places would go out of business but as it turns out the prisoners are just moving down the street to the county jail. The construction crews are already in the process of tearing apart the old jail. Not sure if it's a remodeling project or a tear down. Is this soon to be the next city block to become part of Jerry Brown's vision?

How Harman Kardon changed the way I listen to music

Two years ago I discovered music. I had just gotten the ultimate driving machine and spent a lot of time in the car listening to the radio. Suddenly I started hearing more sounds in the songs, sounds I'd never heard in the song before. I finally understood why every guy I ever knew always told me I needed a sound system with good speakers. I'm sure nobody would have thought I'd get a car with a 12 speaker Harman Kardon sound system. It was beautiful, everything sounded so full and complete. I wanted to listen to my CD's in the car, I bought new CD's for the first time in years. But really remembering to bring a new CD into the car, changing CD's while driving that's no fun. Then last fall I read that if I had an iPod I could plug it directly into the ultimate driving machine, all my music at my finger tips. I didn't even own a CD player that wasn't in my computer. So I took the plunge, bought the iPod, bought a new laptop to install iTunes, took the motorcar to the shop to have proper gadgetry installed. And voila no more flipping radio stations when they are all playing commercials at the same time. No more having to buy whole CD's, I can buy a song or two here and there, I can download a free song every week. I might even appropriate songs from other people, if my morality was of questionable standards. I hear a song on the radio that I like, I go buy it. I listen to the iPod walking to work, I listen to it at home, of course I listen while driving. I spend less time driving now but on days like yesterday when I drove down to the far reaches of the Peninsula listening to songs I chose very loudly with the windows open, hearing every note, weaving in and out of traffic, it's almost fun.

P.S. I will save my rant on Apple's Nickel and Diming of America for another post.

One

After spending most of the day walking around by myself taking pictures of office buildings for work I took a few of myself reflected in a building just for fun. Not a terrible way to spend a day at work but very solitary walking around office buildings filled with people yet knowing noone. Lately I've been thinking about how I've worked at the same place long enough for everyone to know my name - the FedEx and UPS guys, the security guards, the parking lot attendant, the baristas at Starbucks, the guy at the Soup place, the building engineers. It's about the time I would usually start feeling the itch to move but right now I'm happy to be settled one more year.

Beam Me Up

That's how much I paid for a gallon of gas today $3.09. I'm not really complaining, I can afford it, I don't drive much and my car gets fairly decent gas mileage. But all those people who have unnecessarily large trucks and SUV's they should pay $3.00 a gallon, they should pay more and then maybe they would buy a smaller car. Me though, I shouldn't have to pay that much for gas. I use my gas responsibly. I take Bart, buses, walk, bike when I can. Just two years ago I could fill up my tank for $13.00, now I pay $40. I'm pretty sure the CPI isn't going up that fast. Soemdays I wish my car was a Prius. Last week another reason to drive a Hybrid was announced - you can take your Hybrid in the carpool lane without passengers. I like that idea. What I don't like is the new trend of auto manufacturers touting the hybrid technology when it's used to boost the car's power but not improve it's gas mileage. Of course what we should really be working on is the transporter technology and eliminate the cars altogether!

Biketripping

Today I went riding through the port with the Oakland Museum's biketripping docents. The museum has been leading historical Oakland bike trips for 30 years. It's a great way to learn about Oakland history. Carpentier who did much of the work in founding the city was quite a scoundrel as I imagine many sucessful people were back in the day. Trains and the port were always an important part of Oakland. The history of the Pullman porters sounds interesting and is something I'll have to read more about someday. I learned more about the Oakland mole, built in 1882 by the Southern Pacific and used as a terminal for the ferry to San Francisco. Way back 100 years ago you could take the train to Oakland, the ferry across the bay and get on the cable car or another train and continue to your destination. Not too different from today. I also learned where they have some of the sideshows but I think I'll stay away from that activity until they start selling tickets.

Friday Dreaming

It's difficult to work very hard on a Friday. Especially now that the sun is coming out. I didn't sleep well last night. I missed the fine line between I'm tired and should go to bed and now I've stayed up too late and am over exhausted and can't fall asleep. Or it might have been the too much Starbucks I had yesterday. I thought about getting up and blogging or reading but I kept thinking maybe there was a chance I would fall asleep. At some point I fell asleep into a bad dream and expended a lot of energy trying to pull myself out of it. I knew if I could just move everything would be alright but I couldn't move, my body was just too heavy. Funny how when you're awake you can move your arm without even thinking about it but try it when you're asleep and the arm just doesn't move. Somehow the thought of moving the arm just can't reach the arm muscle. Which all just makes the dream worse because you can't escape it even though you know it's probably a dream. I did escape from the dream into the waking world last night. Only to face a small furry monster standing in front of my face issuing a pitiful meowing sound. Annoying yes, but vastly preferable to facing the monster under my bed.

The Otter

One would think Ogden Nash otter have written a poem about the otter, I'm not sure how he missed it but he did. I'm certainly not going to write one but I do have a few things to say about the California Sea Otter. The otter is an amazing animal. Exceptionally cute, active, energetic and just fun to watch. Usually I see an otter on his back munching on abalone but this weekend I saw one swimming and he was moving fast. He would give a kick of his flippers and glide along on his stomach then turn over on his back and flipper kick and glide again then on his front, then on his back. I suppose this keeps him from overusing the same muscles and tiring. The otter's fur is extremely soft and warm, he has no fat to protect him from the cold ocean and can easily die if his coat becomes covered in oil. The CA sea otter popoulation was listed as threatened on the Endangered Species list in 1977 and currently numbers about 2,700. Numbers dipped this year but are up slightly over the last three years. The otter is the only mammal other than primates to use tools. An otter will find a favorite rock and keep it tucked under his arm while swimming. Then when he catches an abalone or sea urchin he wants to eat he puts the rock on his chest and slams his dinner against it to open the shell. When otters numbers were scarce in Monterey Bay the sea urchins flourished and decimated the kelp forests on which the urchins feed. Now that the otters have returned to the bay there is balance and the kelp forests have also recovered. So with all that there is to say about an otter really there otter be more poems about them!

Not Quite A Rime of the Young Californian (in three parts)

How a motorcar, having first stopped at the gas station was driven through storms to the cold country towards Monterey; and how from thence the Young Californian ventured onto the Pacific Ocean; and of the strange things that befell; and in what manner the Young Californian came back to her home.

With my dad in town there's sure to be a lot of birding going on and this year I agreed to a Pelagic Briding trip on Monterey Bay. I had some reservations owing to memories of last year's seafaring adventure involve vomiting for five hours straight and every few minutes someone yelling - look a rhinoceros auklet. The allure of seeing whales and wanting to make my dad happy prompted me to agree. So Saturday we packed our loads of baggage into the car, filled the tank with gas, put air in the tires and were on our way. I was pleasantly driving down Route 1 with surf crashing to the side when water started falling on my windshield. This is August in California it DOES NOT RAIN, what was this stuff. Apparently it does rain, along the coast, drizzle would probably be a more apt description but nevertheless there was water falling from the sky.

Dad and I awoke promptly at 6:00 on Sunday, downed some coffee, breakfast and sea sickness pills. Stepping outside I realized the jacket, hat, sweater and various pieces of fleece were not going to be enough but there was nothing to be done about it. The trip started out well enough, a few birds, sea lions, seals, otter in the harbor. An hour out and we came upon whales. The biggest, closest humpback whale I've ever seen, as big as the boat and not 10 yards away. He even flipped his tale for us. It's quite a thrill to see an enormous beast emerge from the ocean, blow water form its head then disappear and have an enormous tail appear. I'm amazed by all the marine mammals, they seem to enjoy life and put on quite a show. I rather like the idea the old seafarers had of mermaids and mermen, it's such a nice thought people enjoying life in the sea like the marine animals do. 10,000 shearwaters, several albatross and numerous auklets and murrelets later the excitement was waning. The albatross is a sight - an enormous bird which glides effortlessly over the waves. The next few hours gave new meaning to the words mindnumbingly dull - grey sky, grey ocean nothing else no bird, no whale nothing. Once again I am so glad I am not a sailor by profession. We encountered a few more whales, Blue and Minke, on the way in along with the same old birds and we were finally done. Eight hours and no vomiting, not that bad of a trip.

Monday started out bleak as ever so we ventured off to the aquarium. Many of the exhibits have been renovated and it is stunning. Monday morning there were no crowds so I was able to touch the starfish, limpets, sea urchins and rays in the touch pools - very cool. I could have spent all day there but the parking meter was running so we only stayed two hours. The drive back was uneventful, quick and curvy perfect for the ultimate driving machine. The Bay Area welcomed us with 70 degrees and some sunshine.

I returned like one who has adventured,
Satisfied yet weary worn:
A happier and a wiser woman,
I rose the morrow morn.

*with apologies to Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The 10 Best Resources for CSS

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Double GGEEEEKK

Last night I dreamt I was a member of the Rebel Alliance. Darth Vader was invading our base and though we fought a good fight the Empire's forces were overpowering in the end and the rebels retreated to regroup and fight another day. I didn't have a light saber, only a blaster. The bullets mostly bounced off the Strom Troopers unless I got in a head shot. I took a few enemy forces down bhefore Darth Vader appeared and I had to flee. At which point I woke up and spent the next hour not sleeping because you never know when there might be a storm trooper lurking in your closet.

G-E-E-K

Thirteen thoughts while standing on the wrong side of a freight train

• Might as well get comfortable I'll be here for a while
• Union Pacific ... Building America - hmmm, delivering goods to America perhaps but building America, I don't know about that one.
  
• Still wondering why freight trains are stacked with the longer container on top of the shorter container.
• If my throat didn't hurt so much I would contemplate hopping the freight train
• The train is made up of unusually American container companies, no Hanjiin or Hyundai perhaps due to this being a Union Pacific instead of BNSF.
  
• Some of the wheels are held on by lug nuts in the customary round formation like the wheels on cars but some are in a more triangular formation.
• Luckily I'm not in a rush to get anywhere when the train comes by, I just get to enjoy watching it.
• Wish I had brought my camera
• What a perfect seventy degree day
• Wonder if the box of illicit materials my brother brought me from SE Asia arrived today.
• I must be able to blog about this train
• Do they really need to blow the whistle so loud when the engineer can see noone is in the intersection
• People next to me are crossing the street so the cars can move as soon as the train is done. Time to go.

Eight!

Today was the annual trip to take 88527 to the vet. If I was a bit cleverer I would have taken her yesterday 8/8 but I'm not a professional scheduler. It's always an adventure and during the past seven years we've both grown through the experience. I've learned no matter how much the howling pulls at my heart strings, just turn up the radio and it will be less noticeable even when I am lost driving around the maze of backroads in Piedmont/Oakland and think it may be preferable just to kick the cat out of the car and be done with her then bother with trying to get to the vet's office. I know now it's better not to give the vet's office the cat's full name thus avoiding the question of "oh so your cat doesn't have a name". The cat has yet to learn howling at full throttle for 20 minutes does not magically open the cat carrier, but we're working on it. She has realized panting open mouthed in the vet's office causes a lot of concern from the vet and leads to more uncomfortable questioning of the owner. Today I learned that vomiting every week is not normal behavior for a cat and prompts the vet to want to do expensive blood work, result of which if negative will prompt more expensive testing. Vomit which was being discussed in the vet's office at the exact same time it's stains were being removed from the carpet in my apartment. Clever bit of multitasking there. Maybe I should rethink that professional scheduler thing!

Spring Cleaning

It's August and I'm finally doing my spring cleaning. The furniture is oiled, the candlesticks polished, clothes taken to Salvation army, new curtains ironed hung, chair covers washed and ironed, blankets washed at the laundromat, windows washed, fish that died a year ago replaced, doormat washed, new clothes hamper in place, scads and scads of cat hair removed from various pieces of furniture. The wall was painted. The carpets get cleaned on Tuesday. Even the blog's been cleaned up a bit. The apartment feels all light and summery, should have done this months ago.
**When I spellchecked this post Blogger suggested Toronto to replace doormat!

Port News

Today in the mail I received my first edition of the Port News. I love the Port of Oakland, the ships, the cranes, the vast quantities of cargo. Oakland was the first port on the Pacific Coast to build terminals for container ships and is now the fourth largest port in the nation. There is no definitive statement that this is the first edition of the Port News but I've lived here for two years and never seen one before. It's a nice sized publication of 32 pages giving readers updates on the Jack London Square redevelopment project, improvements at the airport, environmental projects and community programs. Oakland is the first port in the nation to scan every international container for radioactive material. We have two new cranes recently installed, each can load or discharge 35 containers per hour. There is a truck replacement program to give truck owners a $25,000 credit to upgrade their pre 1987 diesel rigs to newer, cleaner models. Port tours are given one Thursday a month which I completely forgot about and need to sign up for. I'm amazed every time I look out my office window to see the containers being unloaded from the ships which came from far off lands. The containers travel across stormy seas to bring us our iPods and sneakers and bok choy. The longshoremen risk life and limb to put the goods on trains on their way to the heartland of America. Trains that travel slowly along the Embarcadero tempting me to hop aboard and ride the rails. Then I turn back to my desk and continue answering e-mails and asking everybody what they want for lunch.

The Summoning

My annual Superior Court of California County of Alameda Summons for Jury Service arrived a few weeks ago in the mail. Oh the anticipation of this year possibly getting chosen for jury duty. I'm ready, I know where the courthouse is, no need to worry about parking, I'd bring a book in case I have to wait. Unlike most things I do jury duty isn't something you choose to do it chooses you. And I've never been chosen. I called last night but whoever is in charge of changing the message doesn't do a very good job. The recording still stated that no jurors were needed for August 2nd. I thought this might be a positive sign if they don't need jurors on Tuesday they must need jurors on Wednesday. I jumped out of bed this morning and called the instructed number only to hear the County of Alameda did not need any jurors today. I have never heard of the County of Alameda needing a juror. I know a fair number of people who have been summoned but no one is ever required to report for jury duty. Someone must be serving on these juries. Do we have juries in Alameda County? A lot of money is being spent pretending that someday the county might need a juror. My "service" is complete for the next 12 months - I'll have to wait 'til next year.

Yesterday at the Farmer's Market

Ha! You thought you would escape another week without having to read about the Farmer's Market. Well, tough luck! Yesterday I bought Blueberries and promptly ate the whole pint, plums, cherry tomatoes, and that's it. I then wandered over to look at the container art exhibit. These seem to be all the rage now but this exhibit was rather disappointing. The art just wasn't interesting, I guess that's what happens when you tear down all the artists warehouses to build new apartment buildings. The area where the containers was set up was striped with flourescent green tape with slogans of do not think, do not laugh, do not work, do not pray... the same sort of tape was on the fence around the area with the word stop on it. I guess the idea is you stop and leave all your prejudices at the door before viewing the art. Anyway, it intrigued me.