Happy Halloween

Magic Circle

John Waterhouse, 1886

A magic circle is a sphere marked out by a witch or magician to form a sacred space, containing energy and protection against evil. It might be drawn in salt or chalk, or just visualized. 
 
Her Kind

I have gone out, a possessed witch,   

haunting the black air, braver at night;   

dreaming evil, I have done my hitch   

over the plain houses, light by light:   

lonely thing, twelve-fingered, out of mind.   

A woman like that is not a woman, quite.   

I have been her kind.

I have found the warm caves in the woods,   

filled them with skillets, carvings, shelves,   

closets, silks, innumerable goods;

fixed the suppers for the worms and the elves:   

whining, rearranging the disaligned.

A woman like that is misunderstood.

I have been her kind.

I have ridden in your cart, driver,

waved my nude arms at villages going by,   

learning the last bright routes, survivor   

where your flames still bite my thigh

and my ribs crack where your wheels wind.   

A woman like that is not ashamed to die.   

I have been her kind. 

 

Anne Sexton

1960

The month of sports

This is the time of year when if you're "lucky" enough to have a split screen TV, you can watch the World Series and a football game at the same time.  Or more like, watch dueling commercials. The networks aren't stupid.

Around here, John just channel surfs back and forth between games, which I find discombobulating, because baseball and football watching is so fundamentally different. My brain doesn't process it.  Baseball is more contemplative and pleasantly boring. Sure, there are bursts of excitement, but if the home team is losing it's deathly quiet in the stadium, compared to the non-stop roaring of football. 

Having said that, our HDTV turned me into somewhat of a sports fan, and John managed to set up excellent antenna TV service. Unbelievable as that sounds in this techy house, we still get our TV the old-fashioned way-- over the air.  Not only is it free, but the definition is as good or better than cable reception we see in motels and other places.  Anyway, this World Series is interesting for its beards and sloppiness, if nothing else.

Tomorrow is Halloween, and after weeks of dry, clear weather it's supposed to rain again in Seattle, just in time for trick-or-treating.  I always enjoy it, because once a year I get to see the kids and parents who live close by but are never seen outdoors anymore.  The only problem with Halloween is that little kids now seem to go to bed later than me.

Busy fall weekend

 Sleeping Lady Resort

We had a great weekend.  On Saturday night we went to a wedding at the Sleeping Lady Resort in Levenworth, and it was a beautiful occasion on so many different levels.  And what do you get when a commercial pilot marries an instructor at the UW Information School?  Well, a fascinating group of wedding guests!  It was fun to connect again with old friends from Microsoft, and mutual friends we didn't know we had.  It was one of those weddings where you heard the phrase "it's a small world" over and over. 

The fall colors were at their peak and Nancy and Kit had a nice afternoon for their outdoor ceremony. The next day, not so much-- it was windy and rainy.  Oh well, we hit the road early to Twisp, about a two hour drive from Levenworth.   It had been two long months since we saw our family.

And here's the promised pictures. Just look at these darling girls...

Over the mountains

Somewhere, over the mountains, skies are blue... 

We're headed East this weekend, and it's been two long months since we saw our little girls.  Maya had time to turn from a baby into a toddler, and who knows how smart Nova is now?  New pictures from the sunny side coming soon to a blog near you.

Cross-country

We're not around teenagers much anymore, although the way time flies I guess Nova and Maya are right around the corner.  So it was fun going to Lincoln Park yesterday with my good friend Julie to watch her daughter Mary run in a conference cross-country meet. 

It brought back memories of Amanda's cross-country days when she was at Seattle Lutheran High School.  That was a much smaller school, but still the same experience at Lincoln Park.  Parents, teachers and students cheering on the runners as they take off, and then emerge out of the woods once or twice before going over the finish line.  There isn't much to see in cross-country, except the kids and their antics when a few hundred of them get together, which is pretty delightful in itself.

All that energy, health, beauty and potential is a breath of fresh air, when we're constantly bombarded by bad news.  You can't help but wonder what these kids will accomplish with their long lives ahead.

Julie and Mary

Oh yes, along with running cross-country, Mary is a senior and honors student, plus a finalist for National Merit Scholarship. She plays the violin and viola and pretty much aced the SAT test.  And that's just for starters.  She's headed to university next year to study medicine.  The world needs you, Mary. Way to go!

National Bologna Day

 News of the day:

1. Still foggy.
2. October 24th is National Bologna Day.

Does anyone eat bologna sandwiches anymore? Now most of us are too good for plain bologna, so we eat that processed "turkey" and "ham" out of plastic tubs, and I wonder if it's any healthier.

Bologna has been around since about the 1400s. Typically, it’s made of ground beef, pork or both, with little chunks of fat like good Italian Mortadella. Why hide it? But U.S. government regulations require American bologna to be finely ground without visible pieces of lard.  There are many different kinds around the world, and no doubt some are much better than others, but the bologna most Americans are familiar with has a first name, it's O-S-C-A-R. 

The Pennsylvania Dutch and Germans love their sausage and curred meats.  We can't help ourselves, it's in our genes, like pasta to the Italians.  The Pennsylvania Dutch make delicious Lebanon Bologna, which is dark, smoky, tangy and slightly sweet. Some people compare it to salami, but the taste is completely different. 

There was also something we called "ring bologna" that you can't seem to find on the west coast. Hillshire Farm sausage is a sad imitation.  In the old days, ring bologna was naturally smoked, and eaten cold.

After a big Sunday dinner at our Grammy's farm in Quakertown, we kids played and the adults talked and relaxed until it was time to eat again.  Grammy started making supper right after lunch dishes were done. Supper was fried potatoes made in a cast iron pan, cold cuts, cheese, bread, many kinds of pickles and of course the leftover pies and cakes. I can still taste that slice of white bread folded around a piece of Lebanon balogna.

The food was plain and maybe a bit heavy, but everything was wholesome. I really can't remember eating between meals in those days, although someone must have handed us a pretzel now and then. This was before junky snacks had been invented.  Potato chips still came out of a can, and were just for special occasions. Gosh, I'm getting old.

If you're from eastern Pennsylvaina, you can't pretend that you've never eaten a fried bologna sandwich, or had fried bologna and eggs for breakfast.  Happy National Bologna Day!

Fog-tober

From weather expert Cliff Mass:

"We are now in the middle of a highly unusual situation for mid-October:  a several-week period of high pressure, drought, and dense low clouds and fog.  I have forecast here for many decades and I can not remember a situation that is even close.  The underlying cause?  An extraordinary persistent ridge of high pressure over the eastern Pacific and West Coast.

The latest pilot reports report the top of the clouds are around 1200 ft, allowing some of the higher eastside  hills to be uncovered. The inversion is really extraordinary, with temperatures in the forties near sea level, while sixties are a few thousand feet above...even at night!  During the day some low mountain locations jumped into the upper 70s to near 80F, while some Puget Sound folks were 30+ degrees cooler.   Amazing."

I don't know if creeping around under a cold, polluted blanket is "amazing," but hopefully it will look like this today in the foothills.      

Asian massage

This isn't the type of place where I'd impulsively jump in for a cheap massage, but my friend Dolly recommended it for foot reflexology.  This isn't up on Aurora Avenue, actually it's next to University Village, the fanciest shopping mall in Seattle.  The Eileen Fisher and Tiffany stores are just around the corner.  You gotta love Seattle's crazy neighborhoods.

Well, I'm usually up for trying new things. Sometimes it works out and sometimes-- not so much. Remember my boiling hot "water massage" in Desert Hot Springs?  After that, a little Asian foot massage should be like nothing!

So I splurged and got the $35 combo, lasting an hour and 15 minutes. Very inexpensive, considering a 50 minute "spa massage" around here sets you back $80+ tip.  I gave up on massages lately, since most are not that good, and too often you have to endure a talkative masseuse.

Price list

So you walk in this place expecting a creepy warren of massage cubbie holes, but the space is reassuringly open. Best of all, there aren't forms to fill out and there isn't any chit chat, because only one lady at the front desk speaks English. It is quiet with rows of low soft beds.  It smells good, but it's too dim to tell just how clean, so you hope for the best. You take your shoes off and keep your clothes on.  You lie down, get covered with a warm towel, and put your feet immediately into a tub of hot herbal water with a hygienic plastic liner (good) to draw out the toxins.

Then someone comes out of the dark and begins a wonderfully painful, pressure point head "massage."  On to the arms, hands, etc.  Deep work on the upper back and 30 minutes spent on the all-important feet. It was very businesslike, and nothing like those lazy Swedish massages. This masseuse had that uncanny ability to zero right in on the tight spots, on a total stranger. What a professional.

Years ago on a business trip to China, I had a similar restorative massage on a cold, rainy day. Fully clothed, there was a lot of strange whisking away of bad energy (Reiki, I think) combined with light acupressure all over my body.  I jumped up feeling like a new person, jet-lag and headache gone, and the dampness on my Qi vanished.

But of course I was 16 years younger then. This time I didn't leap up quite so fast, but I still felt good. I wandered around University Village in pleasant, relaxed daze looking at expensive things. It took me quite a while to even decide what I wanted for lunch.  After staring at their conveyor belt for 15 minutes, I ate a California roll at Blue-C sushi. Eventually my brain started up again, and I headed home across town.  Thanks, Dolly! This might be the biggest bargain in Seattle.

Back to the opera

We haven't bought season tickets to the opera for quite a while, so it was nice to go back on Sunday afternoon, sitting in the same area where we had seats for many years.  We're up at the top level, but there's great sound and a good sight line to the stage, with the sub-titles right at eye level.   

The first opera of the season was Donizetti's comedy, The Daughter of the Regiment. No one goes to this opera for the preposterous plot, but to hear the bel canto arias, with lots of thrilling "High C's" in the tenor role. The soprano has even more stratospheric notes.

There were special touches added to the libretto, just for us. The audience roared with laughter during the wedding-party scene, when the arriving guests were introduced as nobility hailing from Medina, Puyallup, Hoquiam and Humptulips.  Peter Kazaras, a tenor and director, appeared in drag as the snobby Duchesse de Krackenthorp. All entertaining and very Seattle.   But it makes a person wonder why an enduring work of art needs so much "help" to be appreciated?

Our traditional coffee and cookies (from home) before the show...

Full Hunter's Moon

There hasn't been much rain this month, unusual for Seattle in October.   But the downside of high pressure weather systems is fog-- so thick we can hardly see across the street in the morning. It turns driving around our dense "urban village" into a Halloween nightmare.

Late frantic parents are rushing kids to school, and people in dark coats run across the street to make their bus.  At stop signs, joggers in black suits dash off the curb without looking. Worst of all, invisible bicyclists suddenly materialize out of the fog on your right, and insist on their "road rights" just when you're about to make a turn into them.  This makes my two mile drive to the gym a good morning exercise in mindfulness.  

Sometimes the fog doesn't clear out (we're close to Puget Sound) until about sunset, then we get a short and spectacular west view of the Olympic mountains from across the street.

To the East, a majestic full moon rising above the old shed last night.

From the Farmer's Almanac:

This full Moon is often referred to as the Full Hunter’s Moon, Blood Moon, or Sanguine Moon. Many moons ago, Native Americans named this bright moon for obvious reasons. The leaves are falling from trees, the deer are fattened, and it’s time to begin storing up meat for the long winter ahead. Because the fields were traditionally reaped in late September or early October, hunters could easily see fox and other animals that come out to glean from the fallen grains. Probably because of the threat of winter looming close, the Hunter’s Moon is generally accorded with special honor, historically serving as an important feast day. 

Shave Your Beard Day

That's right, October 18th is National No Beard Day.   I thought men were supposed to grow their beards in the fall? Which reminds me, when did baseball players become so hirsute? 

This is that special time of year when you can make a nice TV sandwich of football and baseball.  John was surfing back and forth last night between the Thursday night Seahawk's game in Phoenix and the Detroit-Boston playoffs. I had to go upstairs and read my book.

No compost for you

I feel like one of those movie stars who blows through 6 or 7 marriages-- just another failed relationship with another garden service.  I waited around home yesterday morning for Mr. Le and his 4 yards of compost.  Finally I sent a text message "confirming" our appointment?  Maybe that jogged his memory, because shortly after he left two incoherent voicemails (unfortunately there's a language barrier) saying he could not come and wanting to reschedule at his convenience.

Gee-- thanks, but no thanks.

You may know that in Seattle, good citizens put their yard clippings, potato peels, chicken bones, used paper towels, greasy pizza boxes etc. in a "clean and green" bin (the clean part is debatable) that gets picked up once a week, along with the separate recycling bin (newspapers, cans, wine bottles, junk mail, etc.) and the tiny can of truly evil trash, containing stuff that can't be recycled or composted. 

All the organic goop is hauled to a mind-boggling composting facility called Cedar Grove, where they turn our garbage in useful garden products and sell it back to us.  After being stood up once again, I was gloomily perusing the Cedar Grove website drooling over the luscious pictures of rich, black compost for sale.  Hey!  Wait a minute! Mr. Le was going to make a tidy profit on 4 yards!

While I was browsing around, the nicest live chat compost girl popped up on the screen and asked if I had any questions.  Wow, that's what I call service.  I said I was looking for help with the back-breaking job of spreading 4 yards of compost on my flower beds.  She suggested ordering up the home delivery "compost blowing truck."  And guess what?  For several hundred dollars less than the expensive and high maintenance Mr. Le.
Stay tuned.
  

 

Strange connections

So the country teeters on the brink of what, exactly?  In the meantime ordinary Americans get up, go to work and pay their bills more or less on time.  As someone in this house likes to say, we get what we vote for in Washington. Well, the sneaky low politics of  gerrymandering tips the scales. People should be outraged! (OK, I'm jumping off the soapbox now.)

Here's an interesting connection and a story from MOHAI that makes you proud of American smarts and ingenuity.  What does soft ice cream and kidney dialysis have in common?  It turns out, plenty.

The self-educated inventor of the milk shake machine at Sweden Freezer Company went on to partner with the University of Washington to develop and manufacture the portable kidney dialysis machine. In the 1960's, they discovered the requirements for both machines are remarkably similar, namely sanitary metal components and the ability to freeze liquids precisely.  For the complete story, a click on this link should take you to our latest finding aid, just posted yesterday.

Pleasantly boring

Autumn, Pytor Nilus 1893

I guess the ukulele hootenanny took a lot out of me, because I'm late getting around to my computer this morning. Household chores piled up over the weekend, and I need to get things ready for the arrival of Mr. Le tomorrow-- he is supposedly coming with a truckload of compost to mulch the flower beds.

The TV weather lady described it this morning as "pleasantly boring."  A ridge of high pressure in the eastern Pacific will be with us for many days, blocking all the bad weather lurking out there. So we're in a nice dry weather pattern this week, with gorgeous blue skies in the afternoons-- but first you have to get through mornings of suffocating fog.  Which seems to have also entered my brain.

Over the weekend

The Jim D'Ville Method

I packed up my instrument, put on a smiling face and went to the Seattle Ukulele Player's Association (SUPA) meeting for the first time. I had plenty of company. Who would have thought?  Not everyone in Seattle watches the Seahawks on Sunday afternoon. 

About a hundred ukulele players of all ages, shapes, sizes and abilities meet once a month in the Phinney Ridge neighborhood for fellowship and a song circle.  Jim D'Ville gave a group lesson the first hour-- he's a funny and talented guy who travels the county in an Airstream trailer, teaching people how to play without music, paper notes or even calling out the names of chords.  I laughed more than I learned, but it was great entertainment.

All the SUPA regulars brought their folding music stands and carried large notebooks full of sheet music printed from the SUPA website. Everyone was friendly, and I shared with a nice lady about my age named Mary, claiming to be a beginner.  She said she went to "Camp Ukulele" this summer (I tried to picture that place) and said she learned quite a bit there. Something to consider next year?

When I took my uke out of its cheap case, there were some envious gasps nearby and I heard a comment "that's a really nice one for a beginner."  Well, what could I say?  I didn't know if I should be proud or embarrassed. You can certainly pay much more than I did for a ukulele!  Just go to Dusty Strings!   But other musicians seem to notice these things, and mine has eye-catching, mother-of-pearl trim. I was a bit nervous and accidentally banged it on the edge of a chair, which raised a few eyebrows.

Then the song circle got started.  One hundred vigorously strumming ukuleles, accompanied by uninhibited loud singing, makes a mighty noise.  The strong carry the weak, shall we say.  Those of us struggling with new chords simply blended with the din.  It had the odd effect of making you feel like you were playing well while pitifully stumbling along. I now see why strumming circles are so popular! 

When Amanda was about 12, I decided she should have an "opportunity" I missed. She should play an instrument. Every parent learns the hard way that this doesn't usually work.  She hated her flute of course, and refused to practice.  Finally, the time came for a big concert.  How proud I was seeing her on the stage in an orchestra.  Then afterwards, she told me she was "just pretending" to play,  and no one even noticed.  Including her clueless mother.

Well, yesterday in the middle of a tricky "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (how could such a simple song be so diabolical?) I knew exactly how she felt.

Northwest sunsets

Chambers Bay sunset

Color in sky, Prussian blue
Scarlet fleece changes hue
Crimson ball sinks from view
Wear your love like heaven.


Those are lines from an old Donovan song called "Wear Your Love like Heaven."  I loved that song in 1967, but I liked it even better later when I realized what Donovan was singing about. The song mentions wonderful color names like Prussian blue, scarlet, crimson, Havana lake, rose carmethene and Alizarin crimson.

Remember how hard it once was, trying to figure out pop song lyrics?  Listening to the same records over and over gave teenagers something to do. Now a few taps on the computer and "Wear Your Love Like Heaven" becomes your phone ring tone.

Anyway, speaking of beautiful sunsets, the sun goes down around 6:30 now.  I used to have a dandy little view of the Olympic Mountains from the kitchen sink while I cleaned up supper.  That is, until someone built a big, gray box of a house right across the street from us.  Not that I'm bitter!  But now we have to take out the recycling to get a peek of the mountains from the sidewalk. 

Here's some Northwest sunset photographs from Scott Sistek's KOMO TV weather blog. Most of these were sent in by viewers, some from YouNews contributors, so I'm sorry I can't give exact credit for the fine photography.  (If you see your photo here, let me know.) These and many others are posted on Scott's excellent weather blog.

View from the Space Needle

Kalaoch Lodge sunset

Mt. Ranier lenticular cloud, Jim George, Puyallup

Olympics and Elliot Bay

Olympic Mountains

Autumn bonsai

Delicate branches
Roots caress a simple pot
The essence of all forests
Lives here in one small tree.

- Mastuyama Mokurai

White notes and a singing nose

"It comes from two of Cosme’s holdings: one in Vinsobres (a bit cooler, on limestone and sand) and one in Gard (warmer, on large terraces of medium-to-large rolling stones). Done entirely in concrete, it’s a deep inky purple-black and presents a singing nose of boysenberry/blackberry fruit, lovely topnotes of white flowers and violets, and dustings of black pepper...there’s cooling mineral cut to balance the rich fruit and hoisin flavors."

Huh? Well, we're talking about wine here, specifically from the Rhone Valley region of southern France, poetically described in a Full Pull email offering. I've been thinking about this one since John asked if there really was a difference between the smell of white and colored flowers?

Of course our white garden flowers came to mind, and I dug around to find these pictures from previous summers.  White hollyhocks, camellias and dahlias have no fragrance at all, but white jasmine and Casa Blanca lilies scent the entire yard in August. And there are many other beautiful white stinkers that don't grow in Seattle, like gardenias, tuber roses and stephanotis, all popular with brides.  How does this white scent differ from say, a red rose scent?  And what are the words to describe such subtle differences?

There's a website called Fragrantica, where I found a post titled "What Do White Fragrances Smell Like"?

I'm old-fashioned and still love nice perfume.  A lady really wasn't really dressed to go out without a bit of perfume behind her ears, or at least daubed on a hankie.  I've used Oscar de la Renta perfume for decades, and Amanda and John say they would recognize the smell of it anywhere. We used to call that our "signature scent."

Women's perfume and cigarette smoke must have once mixed at social gatherings in a way we would find nauseating now.  Times change. The Seattle Symphony program advises concert goers not to wear perfume because some people are allergic and/or annoyed by it. My doctor's office is a "fragrance free zone."

And perfume and fine wine do not mix, not one bit. Napa Valley "tasting room etiquette" advises against wearing fragrances, because the sense of taste is heavily influenced by smell.  It makes perfect sense. A whiff of Oscar's sweet "white notes" does compliment the "white notes" in that wine the person next to you is contemplating.

Happy Birthday, dear Maya

Oh, the time files!  Just a year ago today you were a sweet, helpless newborn-- now you're already a toddler, picking out pumpkins and feeding goats with your big sister.

We're thinking of you today, and send love and kisses far over the mountains. 

"It takes a long time to become young."

Pablo Picasso

Back to the Symphony

Is it transcribed for ukulele?

It was nice to be back at the Symphony yesterday afternoon in our fourth row seats, sitting next to Betsy and Paul. Everything seemed the same, with changes.  Starting with the nice man who always took our $8 at the parking lot, and told us who won the Seahawk game afterwards. Now he's been replaced with a credit card machine. And where was that familiar old fellow in his big motorized wheelchair, who slept at the end of our row for years and years?

I wonder if anyone will notice when John and I finally stop showing up for the season opening?   Something like, I wonder what happened to that old couple who always ate granola bars at intermission that she brought in her purse?

The first half of the program was Beethoven's popular "Triple Concerto" for violin, cello and piano, starring some young, attractive soloists. Fun. But there was plenty of time to consider mortality (your own, and others) while sitting through the hour long Schubert Symphony # 9. It is called "The Great" because of its mighty length. 

These wonderful pictures were the other Sunday highlight.  Every Nana needs a smart-phone so she can show off to her friends right on the spot.

There's more cuties from their pumpkin patch trip I'll post later.  Thanks, Amanda!