A Leopard Cannot Change Its Spots

This one is a little bit hard to see but the raccoon was hilariously playing with the hose. I was a little worried about the hose when I saw the clip but I did a close inspection and it was fine. It’s a pretty nice hose so either it was built to withstand raccoon teeth or the raccoon wasn’t trying to destroy it.

I had the feeders down over the summer but put them back up in the fall. It’s especially active out there now. More than once I have seen a cat wander through. I think they like to troll the birds. Sometimes they sit under the feeder and relax like little jerks.

The other morning I was sipping my hot chocolate and went to look out over the activity but instead of birds, there was Noah the cat, sitting under the feeder. A little bird stopped to checkout the fly-through feeder and 1-2 pounce! And my little guest was caught. Noah took his prey and scooted back over the fence to his house.

I was very sad. I never saw the cats actually going after the birds so this feather-shed was upsetting. But also: nature, baby.

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Last Post of the Year

These are from my Atlanta trip at the beginning of the month.

I can’t remember the last time I was flying cross country and sitting in a window seat and it was daytime and it was clear.

It was glorious. It was an ass-crack of dawn flight and we were flying into the sunrise. It was so beautiful flying over the mountains. And being able to look out of the texture of the landscape. It was magical.

When we deboarded the Captain was standing there and without context I told him: THAT WAS AMAZING!

This picture doesn’t capture it. I had some reason I took this and I don’t remember what it was — something familiar?

(Aside: also during this trip I saw 2 planes passing by what seemed like really, really close for having the whole giant sky available.)

I do remember this. All across the country there were big spreads of these huge white buildings. This is nearing the Atlanta airport. The land of fulfillment centers.

When I was going through security I needed 2 bins but my hands were full and I was juggling electronic devices and a coat and I broke my rule about only taking 1 pair of shoes because we were going to a party and I wanted to look pretty. So I had big shoes.

(Also aside: but the set up was stupid because it was like an assembly line — to the person at the front of the line got to fit their bins in. Then that person left, a new person went, and that person filled their bin and pushed it into the line. Those of us further down were at the mercy of some slow person who left some open space for our bins.)

I threw my laptop in the lower conveyor and thought it would be fine while I got the other stuff settled and of course security is made of people who can’t stop telling you that you’re doing something wrong. Then he starts bugging me about my laptop and I go to grab it but it’s moved down the conveyor belt line.

And the next person in line is some sort of Bhuddist nun. Everyone is completely deferential. Good costume for travel.

I grabbed my laptop bin. Made Mr. Nitpicky happy. Waltzed through and was able to return home.

This is the imp, Arky, crawling on his favorite dog, Clover. Arky is an adorable monster.

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The Christmas Post

I’ve had this sitting on my desktop for a week. I was going to post before Christmas. Then Christmas Eve. Then Christmas Day.

HAHA. I couldn’t get around to it. I still haven’t done my cards, either. If you usually get a card from me — it might still happen.

These are the Christmas ships on the Columbia River.

I have never gone to the local tree lighting. Honestly, I didn’t know we had one. This was something like the 33rd annual.

For part 1 we went to the river to watch for Santa’s arrival.

Look! Santa and Mrs. Claus on the tugboat, or push boat or whatever those are called, on their way to the tree lighting.

It was a lovely night. No rain. Not too cold and not crowded.

I don’t know why I so consistently take terrible pictures.

This part got a little chaotic with grown ass adults elbowing each other out of the way, shrieking, “Santa! Santa!”

From here they got on a fire truck and joined a parade of Christmas cars to make their way to the tree. We didn’t really see this part because we did a different walk to get to the tree. Next year we want to try to see the parade.

The tree lighting area was less fun. It was super crowded and chaotic and the music wasn’t that great. But it was fun to countdown and watch the tree light up.

If the weather is good we’ll be back next year.

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Girls On Film

There’s a Duran Duran documentary on Netflix that I decided to watch last week. And I *LOVED* it.

Wow. The memories. Not just the music, which is really vivid. I bought all three of the first albums and played them to death. Songs that I haven’t thought about in eons popped back into my head, lyrics and all.

But the whole thing. The videos which were on all the time. The fashion. The insane pop stardom. I had photos on my college room wall.

It’s a great documentary. They are so charming now and told a great story.

I never saw the band live. And I never saw Power Station or Arcadia.

Except.

I remembered that I went to an in-store at Licorice Pizza — I want to say this was in Ventura and it was probably 1985. Maybe 1984. I remembered these amazing photos.

We didn’t get inside. We waited around the parking lot and I don’t remember who all was there except for John Taylor. Maybe he was the only one?

Please enjoy these amazing photos of John Taylor. What a day! hehe.

I kept a journal back in those days and I dragged it out and paged through it so see if I could dredge up any details. The info *might* be in there but the journal is terrifying and should be burned. It mostly talks about how badly I thought I needed to lose weight and how much I partied.

FOR PAGES AND PAGES.

I finally joined a streaming thing — I know, what is the opposite of early adopter? I don’t know why the idea of a monthly subscription irks me so much since I used to buy 2-3 albums/CDs or similar media per month. CDs were $15-20 each in the 90s and sometimes I was replacing media I’d already purchased in an earlier format.

But also I hardly ever listen to music anymore. But maybe I will now. Time for my Duran Duran playlist. (Or songlist, as I called it earlier when I was talking to Bob.)

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December is Upon Us!

(I misspelled the plural of tomatoes on my photo and it took me forever to figure out what the problem was. It pains me to leave it but too many steps to fix it. Oh well! See the manager for a refund. xo )

If everything goes as planned I have scheduled this to post while I am in Atlanta on my trip rescheduled after my last trip was postponed due to hurricane.

These are the last of my measly summer tomato crop. I need to clean this out since some of those are hopeless. The skins are thick and chewy and the tomatoes are tart. But it’s still a little special bite of summer.

Since we ripped out the bedroom carpet to expose the hardwood floors I am amazed at how much and how quickly fluff collects under the bed and in the corners. I suspect it has to do with the flannel sheets. I have hardwood in my office room and there aren’t nearly that many dust bunnies.

I am going to take the last few minutes of daylight to do some quick garden chores.

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Stripes Never Go Out of Style

I made it. 30 days. I am completely out of juice, though.

This photo is from 1971 and is from a series my dad was doing for the annual Christmas card.

I love everything about this. My bangs in my face. My asymetrical ponytails. My giant ear.

The striped matching outfits!! My coat is buttoned but my sister’s is opened, revealing a dress that matches the coats. White tights and black patent leather shoes.

Adorable!

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The Alarm

This is on Highway 96 in Orleans

Did I ever write about that time the alarm was going off at Little Tree?

There was a restaurant nearby that we really liked called Little Tree. We were really bummed when they closed. They seemed so conscientious and had a great menu. They probably went out of business because they didn’t cut corners.

One night we went in there and the alarm for the building was somehow going off. It was a terrible sound. You couldn’t have a conversation.

There were people having dinner in there. One guy had rolled up paper napkins and stuck one end in his ear and the rest just hung down like wilted ears.

It was strange — almost like a candid camera or something to see how we would react.

At first we were going to stick with it but we told them we’d come back another time.

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Another Cart Bites the Dust

(edited to add: I can’t even do calendars right. Clearly Tuesday was not “the day” — today is the day. Happy Thanksgiving. xo)

Three more posts — I am running out of juice.

Another one of our favorite downtown food carts just ended their business. This has been our go-to burrito cart for years.

There are still a few carts close to the office but the food cart culture is mostly elsewhere these days.

We’ve been going to Fuego (the cart) once a week since we found out they were closing.

Another long gone cart: Go Fish — they had really yummy soup and made these little cheesy biscuit things in the shape of a fish. There was Shelly’s burrito cart. There was the whole giant pod on SW Alder where a fancy hotel/condo building went up and they were supposed to create a space for food carts but mysteriously it hasn’t opened yet.

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Charlie Hill and Dittos!

I had to get a medical test down by the south riverfront (is that what they call this area?) and took a few photos from the hallway. This was a couple of months ago. I completely forgot I had these. This one is looking south — you can see the tram tower. The photo below looks north and you can see the Willamette River.

Bob gave me a book called “We Had A Little Real Estate Problem” (Not an affiliate link, I don’t have those anymore.)

The book is about Native comedians and quite a bit is about Charlie Hill.

At one point, Charlie Hill is in an episode of The Bionic Woman. which I *loved* as a kid. I went and found the episode on Roku channel and watched it.

It aired in the 70s so obviously Charlie is a magical NDN and there is a magical amulet and lot of goofy “my soul your soul” talk that’s super ridiculous. At that age I think I was oblivious to NDN representation in the media. I have no memory of seeing this so I can’t create some tale of how I was moved to see a Native person on TV. The episode was kinda vague — it seemed like they were romantic but the actual words made it like they were friends.

In the comedian book, Charlie said that he and Lindsay were into each other but she was so famous at the time and her handlers discouraged them from having an interracial relationship. Yikes.

It was still fun to watch. I love how Jamie had such amazing hair that she flipped around while doing her bionic things. There is also a moment when she turned around: Ditto jeans! They had a very distinct seam on the butt. I had Ditto jeans! I think I had light blue corduroy Dittos. What a great memory.

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It’s the Day

If all goes as planned I am having a quiet dinner with Bob and Dad.

This is a selection of my cookie cutters. I offered to loan them to colleague in case he makes cookies this week while his family is in town.

I haven’t had good luck making sugar cookies the last couple of times. The dough was hard to work and the cookies came out lumpy and not pretty.

Who knows, maybe I will try again this year. I found a receipt somewhere that is supposed to be foolproof. HAHA. I know from experience there is no foolproof recipe that I can’t beat.

If you like such things I wrote a Bridgerton fan fic with Colin and Penelope (#polin).

It is very short and sweet and set in high school in 1986. Regency High Senior Spy. The goal was to enjoy writing again and it worked.

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