Happy New Year

Right after Tom got back from the airport (that's his suitcase, lower right) Anne and Peter dropped by with a delivery. We had the best time! And you should smell our house. It smells like the Conservatory of Flowers in Golden Gate Park.

Lunch at Lucille's: teriyaki, couscous, French green beans, wine, COOKIES

 

5:11 p.m.

Next door neighbors. Fish tacos. Hair spray. Camera phones.

looking down   4:55 p.m.

looking west   5:04 p.m.

looking east   5:16 p.m.  (Peter had to point it out.)

Merry Christmas

Christmas at Emmy's

a glutinous feast

Aren't these the best teeth? (My contribution to White Elephants)

4:59 p.m. Christmas Eve

So Glad the World Didn't End Yesterday

4:34 p.m.

5:08 p.m.

In Bed

Prompt: The Round Robin

Most of us are in the kitchen mixing mimosas and loading plates

The Round Robin is swell. I love it. But it's hard sometimes. You're always having to look up big words that your partners use.

And some of those partners. Come on, now. Some of them write for hours instead of 10 minutes. And come on, now. Others write on their … oh never mind. I love my cel phone more than life itself.

I like the room we meet in at the end. It's cozy. The food people bring is scrumptious. One girl, Shannon, zoomed in on her motorcycle with a couple bottles of Champagne. Jane always has good coffee (today it was Peet's Major Dickason's) and she always has lots of half & half.

This group was hands down the worst ever, and I played a major role. I forgot to respond to my first partner's first piece if you can believe that.

But even so, today was one of the best final meetings I can remember. For one thing, we stood around the food table for a long time before we sat down. And Shannon actually found some champagne glasses up in the cabinets! In the past we've had to drink it out of coffee cups.

In the final analysis, the Round Robin is one of the best things that's ever happened to me.

Three Little Clouds

4:52 p.m.

On the Sea Wall

She spits. Her mouth is a drainage window.

12.12.12

photo by Peter Munks

From: Peter
Subject: "Somewhere..."
Date: 12.12.12
To: Linda and Tom

L&T, So this is what we see out our window this morning––DIRECTLY OVER YOUR HOUSE––12-12-12––Now that's how to start the day.

Date Night

Green Apple Books and Thai Time

Tom and Elaine, We Like You.

I walked right by. I didn't duck in even though I was starving.

It's a good thing, because look what was on our front porch! (van Holland)

Walking home down the Great Highway

Have Trouble Getting A Word In Edgewise?

Do you sometimes have trouble getting a word in edgewise when eating lunch with your loudmouth friends?

Download BIG WORDS now for your tablet or phone. It's simple and elegant. Just type in what you wish to say. Choose your font, font color, and background color. If the situation really gets desperate, you can shake your tablet (or phone) and your message will flash.

Biker Chick

Norma is Tom's stepmom. She'll turn 91 this Saturday.

She spent yesterday zooming around Fallbranch on the back of her pastor's bike.

Sincerely, Siri

5:01 p.m.

4:30 is about the latest we can leave to walk these days if we don't want to be walking in the dark. Around that time I dragged myself into the living room where Tom was watching a game. "Are we gonna walk?" I asked.

I saw some drops on the window: "Oh. It looks like it's raining."

"I'm not sure I want to walk in the rain."

"Me neither. Is it really raining? Let me ask Siri."

I summoned Siri.

"Hi Siri. Is it raining?"

"It does not appear to be raining Linda."

"Thank you, Siri."

"It is I who should be thanking you."

It's hard to argue with Siri. She's so nice! Tom and I sloshed down to the car. I could have sworn it was raining. Once we were in the car we had to turn on the windshield wipers.

We parked off the Great Highway and walked three miles. When we got back home we were not only freezing, but soaking wet.

I need to have a little talk with Siri.

Board Books Four

10 Valentine Friends was issued in board book format last week, so now all four of the 10 Kids counting books are available as board books. It's my favorite format because the books are fat and chunky––fun to hold and bite. (And the ink is specially formulated to be chewed and bitten--completely nontoxic.)

Fall Colors

A Long Day

The 4 Stooges Take a Hike

Goofing around with Gina and the doc.  Lunch at Louis'.

A little foggy on the Coastal Trail

Over My Shoulder

looking east   5:19 p.m.

Found On the Beach

Merry Christmas

Fifty-Two Spots, a special delivery from Anne

a splendid centerpiece––note furry mouse with tail feather

5:08 p.m.

I had a great jog/walk this evening. Tom was in a meeting and it was really tempting to stay home. The tide was high--I knew that--but I headed down the sidewalk to the beach anyway.

No one was there. It was dreary and the wind was fierce. But it was blowing from the south, so it wasn't as cold as it could've been. Still, I was wearing a baseball cap with my mom's cashmere cap on top of that, then my hoodie from my running top--and to top it off, the hood attached to my lightweight down jacket.

I got almost to the end of the dunes then turned around. It was easy street going back, because the wind pushed me from behind. I took off two of my hats. By the time I got to Lincoln it was dark, and I cut over to the concrete boardwalk.

I love walking--and walking alone, even though it's creepy sometimes. When I turned up Balboa, I noticed an elderly man running up the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street with only a towel wrapped around him.

A few blocks later, I heard an enraged shout: "NO, YOU MOTHERFUCKER, I WOULD NEVER DO THAT! IT'S AGAINST THE LAW!" I looked across the street and the guy was shaking the big blue mailbox on the corner with all his might. Then he turned and ran back down the street.

My neighborhood is so interesting. I thought, "If anything like this had ever happened in the 20 years Tom and I went for walks in our TN neighborhood, it would have been talked about for a decade."

Today's Prompt

Today's prompt isn't a word––it's the photo above, by Jane Underwood.

My head's been hurting for months.

This morning when Dr. Naraghi clipped my MRI* up on the light window, I caught his expression of shock before he could mask it.

"Doc, what's wrong?"

"This is … interesting. Our imaging equipment uses a gray scale, which means this image of your brain shouldn't be registering color at all. Especially being that the brain is made up of gray matter."

"But I'm an artist. I love color. I'm working on a job right now where the illustrations need to be in black and white. And I'm finding it impossible to do them in black and white. Even though the ink I'm using is black, color keeps flooding out of my pen. Is there a correlation, do you think?"

*see image above
-------------

p.s. I had a text from a good friend this morning asking me if I had really been having headaches for months, so I wanted to explain that the prompts are from a class I take called the Round Robin, given by the Writing Salon. Every day we get a prompt, and we write for 10-12 minutes. Then we exchange our writing with our partner-of-the-week, and spend 10 minutes commenting in a positive way on our partner's writing. It's a magnificent class! Sometimes we write things that are true, and other times we make things up, sometimes we write poems--whatever the prompt inspires.

Anne's Birthday

We were treated to a visit to her studio (followed by a big pizza pie).

Even her palette was beautiful.

Uncorking the bottle that washed up. The message: Love, Live, Laugh

It Happened Again.

5:14 p.m.

Dark Too Early

5:18 p.m.

Mimi's In Town!

We met at Kinokuniya Book Store in Japantown.

Then we had noodles and played with trains at Mifune.

Mari and Wolf said we could keep her, but then they changed their minds.