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| Ears back or up |
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| Panting |
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| Spontaneous hug |
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| Checking out ground squirrel hole |
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| Human Mom took him away from an almost-caught squirrel. So rude. |
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| Squeaky Snake |
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| Teeter in agility class |
T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??
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| I didn't update the map; it was his to do or not. I have that map now, though. Frozen in time. |
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| Happened to be wearing it in 2015 to check out the ballyhooed presence of the Hello Kitty bus selling Hello Kitty snacks. You can see the extreme long line out behind my head. I took photos and went home. |
And one of my sisters went twice, I believe. She is generous with gifts and astonishingly aware of what people like. When she returned from a summer visit there in 1998, she handed me this beautiful blue --of course--t-shirt. To wear for inspiration to get me up there. And it does remind me, every time I wear it.
It’s one of only three t-shirts that I believe I’ve ever had for places I haven’t been, out of the 250-plus that I remember having over the years. That means I have to get there eventually, right?
Some days the smoke is worse than others. Some days it's above a cloud layer, which makes everything an eerie or even scary yellow to deep orange. Other days it's right in your back yard, and you might smell it even if it's many miles from the source.
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| My back yard on the 9th. Everything inside and outside bathed in sickly yellow-orange. Relatively tame compared to many. |
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| At 5:00 PM on the 9th. Sunset not until 7:30. With a large window over the sink (visible) next to a sliding glass door and another sliding glass door to my right. Spooky dark. |
Two days ago, only moderately bad air quality first thing in the morning, but got worse. Next day, upper 90s to lower 100s. This morning...
Woke up dreaming I'd been walking the dog and was out of breath. Woke up and breathing harder than normal. Not gasping for breath or even panting--but AQ was around 240--so time for a hit off the old inhaler. And I had left my windows cracked a few inches just for the coolness, hoping that the screen and 2 layers of curtains would reduce particulate matter. Apparently not so much. Also closed the windows.
I had been averaging 50,000+ steps/week since chip's death, but between the heat and the air quality the last 3 1/2 weeks, it's dropping precipitously. Zorro is going nuts not going for walks. But even he is mostly staying inside lately, on his own.
So I recomposed some lyrics for all of us.
Oh give me air, fresh clean air, under starry skies above.
Don't smoke me in.
Let me walk through the wide open country that I love.
Don't smoke me in.
Let me be in a place where it’s easy to breathe,
Listen to the murmur of tall unburned trees,
Make me S.I.P. but I ask you please,
Don't smoke me in.
If you look at the airnow.gov map (https://gispub.epa.gov/airnow/) for the EPA's sensors for the entire mainland U.S. for this morning, it's kind of pretty . Like holiday lights. Or... erm.. alarms and warnings. So many fires up and down the western states, and depending on the winds and inversion layers or whatnot, you don't know which fire's smoke you're receiving. Personally, I like to be introduced before I inhale something.
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| Active fires as of Sept 11 from https://storymaps.esri.com/stories/usa-wildfires/ Many caused by a rare thunder/lightning storm mostly on Sunday Aug 16. Worse, it was dry. Reported August 19: "Over the last 72 hours, there have been some 10,849 lightning strikes throughout California, state officials said. As of Wednesday afternoon, 367 major fires were burning statewide, according to Gov. Gavin Newsom." |
T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??
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| 1975 Photo-by-human-tripod: Hey, we're all dressed up, please take our photo! Oh by all means make us as tiny as possible, surrounded by meaningless messy darkness, please. (Before I learned to be more specific...) |
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| 2008 at the Monterey Bay Aquarium: Get the camera set up, push the 10-second timer, and get back into position to lean casually against the railing... didn't quite make it. |
With my first small digital camera in December, 2003, it became easier to hold it in one hand at arm's length, aim it at myself, and click, hoping to get what I wanted, although I preferred setting it somewhere and using the timer. At least with digital I could immediately see whether I had achieved the ideal artwork (unlike small film cameras).
But if I wanted more than my head and shoulders, and some of the background, too, and decent quality, it would have to be the DSLR. Which also has a 3-second or 10-second built-in timer. And then a rush to get into position and look casual. Heh. Ha.
Finally after enough frustration, in 2010, before leaving on a long driving vacation, I bought a remote shutter release. Allows me to set up the camera, compose the shot, get into position, compose myself, and simply press the button in my hand. Love it. But I don't often carry my DSLR or a tripod around.
When an iPhone came into my life not quite 2 years ago, suddenly I could hold it at arm's length and see myself to compose the shot. Nifty indeed, although it's designed for a one-person head shot, really. Hard to get more than that. And, although it has a timer, it's hard to just set it down somewhere and move away from it like I could with the regular pocket digital cameras.
If I want more than just my face, there's always the Mirror Selfie strategy.
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| 2019 Mirror Selfie. How about if the camera is *here*? What about over *here*? Or maybe over *here*?!?! |
Fact is, I like having photos of myself doing things and going places. (As a kid, I often resented people taking my photo. But I liked seeing them as long as I didn't look too terribly ugly.) So I have taken photos of myself (sometimes with friends or dogs) for a long time.
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| 2012: Nice Canon digital pocket camera--could actually get more than just my own face when held at arm's length. By then I understood how to [usually] get my composition when staring at the camera lens. Can't get this wide a shot with the iPhone in selfie mode. |
My dad loved Yosemite. But the first time he saw it was Armistice Day, 1952, while waiting for the final leg of his trip to the Korean War. As he was a New York City born-and-raised young man, I'm doubtful that he ever went west of the Mississippi before that, and other than a year at college in Michigan, not certain [without going back through his personal history] whether he'd ever been much west of the state of New York. He was an explorer, though: Discovered the mountains and hiking and climbing and camping in late high school and more in college and never went back to city living. Never one to be shy about travel, or any suggestion of somewhere new and different to explore, would get him moving.
Not sure that he felt that way about Korea, but-- bypassing that--
The draft scooped him up in 1951, and in November of 1952 he began the long journey to Korea--stopovers in Chicago and Denver and Oakland to refuel the plane before landing finally in San Francisco for a two-week layover in a camp in Petaluma.
Mom kept all of his letters home, and decades later he assembled them with commentary into a book. Some excerpts from that first week in California:
We arrived in Frisco via Greyhound Bus from the airport. We bought our bus tickets up to camp, and then walked down Market Street at about 8 A.M. Finally gave up on walking, after being stopped by a number of people who said we really should take a tour to see the city [1], and bought some sight-seeing tour tickets. While waiting for the tour start time we went for a ride on a cable-car. The ride went from Powell and Market streets over the top of Nob Hill, by the Mark (Hopkins), through the edge of Chinatown and then back again. Had views of Alcatraz, the Oakland-Bay-Bridge, and some very nice houses.
Got back in time to take the tour, and had a pretty good time. Saw a lot of the Sights, and a lot of Real Estate. I wasn't impressed by San Francisco's zoning restrictions and rental policies as we were told of them by the tour bus driver [2]. And prices; wow!! Twelve to fifteen thousand (depending on location) for a five room attached bungalow.[3] And there isn't much room in either front or back. The plots are usually 50x70, or smaller.
The tour is over and we're having lunch on Fisherman's Wharf at DiMaggio's (Filet mignon).
...
[after settling in at the camp]
...
We were fortunate, Armistice Day was on Tuesday, so we were given passes from noon Saturday until 0800 Wednesday. We spent those days touring: saw Muir Woods, Yosemite, and Devil's Postpile among other places.
He likely has more photos of this trip, but immediately at hand I have only this--
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| "Road to Yosemite Armistice Day 1952" |
I'm not sure where exactly this photo was taken, but the road to Yosemite no longer is one lane without guard rails. I remember Dad saying that parts were still unpaved.
Dad told me in 2015 when we were discussing his photos:
On the Armistice Day Weekend in 1952, four of us GIs rented a car to go to Yosemite and Devils Postpile. The roads into Yosemite (Rte 120) and through Tioga Pass were single lane roads, with places to turn out to let other cars go by. Included with this is a photo showing a short stretch up in the high country.
I believe that the Sierra Nevadas made a lasting impression on the man who had already climbed a few of the highest peaks in New England. The eight highest there range from 5,000 to 6,300 feet (1520- 1920 m) above sea level. But the fifty highest in the Sierras range from 8800 to 14500 (2680-4420 m) --none more than about 200 miles from sea level at the coast).
I think he couldn't wait to get back to the Sierras and Yosemite when we moved to California less than 10 years later. And again about 8 years after that. We went many times as a family.
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Footnotes
[1] they must've been in uniform
[2] my dad's frustration and anger about ill treatment of black people was well established by then--and not too many years later that caused him (a white male) to resign from a job he loved otherwise.
[3] Today, the median price for a home in San Francisco is $1,310,500. I'm not sure what Dad meant back then by a "5-room" bungalow--was that bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, living room, and--? And I don't know what size home today's median price will get you, but likely not much more than a 2-or-3-bedroom attached house with little or no yard.
T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??
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| Bought in 1998. Still wear it. |
Even before I adopted Amber, my first dog, I knew that I wanted someday to train an Obedience Champion. But, in my naivité as a first-time dog owner back in the '70s, I didn't know until a member of the local AKC dog training club told me: "If you wanted to compete, you should've gotten a purebred." I felt insulted and angry. And that was that. I washed my hands of AKC.
That same year (1978), Mixed Breed Dog Clubs of America was founded to allow AKC-rejected dogs of any kind to compete in Obedience and Conformation.
MBDCA was an instant hit: All that pent-up desire from owners of non-AKC breeds and mixed breeds and otherwise unpedigreed pups. Affiliates grew up across the country.
I had no way of knowing about it and, in any case, the California affiliate (MBDC-CA) wouldn't exist for another 15 years--which happened to be the year Remington was born. How convenient!
Unaware, Remington and I started basic pet obedience classes, and then my instructor told me about MBDC-CA. So! Yay! We began training in earnest with a private instructor. A possible Obedience Champion dream come true at last! We were [almost] good enough to start earning legs [qualifying scores towards specific titles].
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| Most of ours scores were not nearly this good--I got a bit of a vibe of "how sweet that people are bringing out their mixed breeds" from this judge--but I wasn't going to turn down a close-to-perfect score! [We also started competing in agility in 1996] |
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| Demonstrating tricks at the MBDC-CA picnic: Jake Shake Tika "Bang!" |
The MBDC-CA cemented some of my nascent friendships, expanded my understanding of dog sports and organizations, and gave us a chance to just have fun with our dogs and friends in relaxed, dog-friendly camaraderie.
Meanwhile, something else that I initially had no idea about had begun only 10 years before MBDC-CA's founding. It would, directly or indirectly, lead to the collapse of most of the MBDCs a mere 10 years after I started training Remington. Yes: dog agility (mid-1980s).
Obedience was interesting but pretty low-key, and Remington wanted more more more! And so did I. We tried tracking, too. And "Circus Dog" classes. And then my original obedience instructor told me about another thing -- dog agility. Went to a class, loved the look of it, was accepted for training, and ... I had no idea what I was in for. Among other things--a rapidly growing collection of new friends with purebreds and mixes all with a common love of dogs and, now, agility. Even though clearly Obedience would be my main thing.
A year after I started agility with Rem, Jake came home with me, so then I had two mixes with whom to have fun at the annual MBDC-CA picnic. One year, Jake won the hot-dog diving contest (bits of hot dog in a bowl of water) almost before the timer could start the stopwatch. The club's monthly newsletter reported everyone's titles and achievements and new puppies and the passing of old dear friends and activities. An eager, active, close-knit, and successful organization, with dogs earning obedience and conformation titles left and right.
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| Of course I have no photos of me in the MBDC-CA t-shirt at one of their events, but at agility competitions, we'd gather for photos anyway. Here, four of us wore our MBDC-CA t-shirts. (Me with Tika and Jake.) Arlene (to the left of the sign) and I became good friends outside the world of dogs. |
But something was happening--I began to lose interest in competitive obedience, because: Agility. And other people began to lose interest in competitive obedience, because: Agility. People wanted demos of agility and articles about agility. evvvvvery body, it seemed, was doing agility.
And then, the finishing touch: AKC, under pressure from a huge agility community and other growing dog sports (or possibly to tap into all that money that wasn't going their way), made it possible for mixed breeds to earn AKC obedience and agility titles. The purpose for MBDC had nearly vanished; only conformation remained as a unique draw. Fewer and fewer people came out for MBDC events. Fewer and fewer people had interest in doing the work to keep the club running. In 2013, it folded completely, as did all but one affiliate across the country. Long after I had ceased interest in obedience.
I appreciate that it existed at all, at the time that I needed it.
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References for fun:
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| So long, and thanks for all the fish |
T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories. ---- Whaaaaat??
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| 2017: Rescued briefly from the rag bag for its final photo. Little holes and rips all over. Good old t-shirt. |
T-shirts as a kid? Don't recall ever having one. Certainly nothing enhanced with writing or pictures. Clothing was for wearing, right? I don't recall anyone else my age wearing that kind of T, either. They started to come into their own as mini-billboards only a few years before[1]. Mom disapproved. Clothing is for wearing!
My high school hosted a Sadie Hawkins Dance[2] every year, where girls asked boys instead of the normal order. My freshman year, friend Carol and I had our eyes on, gasp!, a couple of sophomores or juniors! The first one I asked said yes. I barely knew him--a friend of a friend--but he was cute and sweet.
In my mid teens, I got a small allowance at home of five dollars (equivalent to about $33 in 2020[3]), for which I had to do certain chores. Plus I started babysitting, giving me enough wherewithall to buy things other than candy, Bazooka gum[4], and DC comic books[5].
So then--for that dance, you were supposed to come in matching outfits. What ,what, what to do? We had no experience yet of what others did, so we thought that matching t-shirts would be plenty. She had one or two fun men's pocket t-shirts with horizontal pinstripes[6]. (Ha, little did I know about how much more fun one could get with Ts!) Bought at the neighborhood Mervyn's[7]. We went down together and, wow, a wide array of colors. I wanted them all. But, instead, I got a dark blue with light blue pinstripes to match Carol's, which we'd wear for the dance, and a bright blue one with red pinstripes because I love love LOVE that color.
That I recall, they were my first-ever TSHIRT t-shirts, not merely CLOTHING t-shirts. Bought with my own money.
Loved them. Wore them out eventually, which is possibly the best compliment that clothing can hope for. I'm lucky to have a few photos of the partnership between me and those shirts.
[Aside--I'm pretty sure that's why we got the matching shirts. Hope I'm not confusing the whole story with the SHD where we spent long, long hours sewing matching long-sleeved button-down shirts in a fun blue and purple pattern. I *think* that was the following year.]
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| The dark blue one. The friend on the right bought the matching t-shirt. I didn't play the bugle, Phil [8] didn't play drums--but Carol did play guitar. Fooling around at my house my high school freshman year.
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| 6 years later, my junior year of college. The bright blue shirt. Fooling around with friends in the lounge on our dorm floor. I have no idea what was on the board or who wrote it, but I strongly suspect that I might have had a part in it. |
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Footnotes:
(All are just for fun; you don't need them to read the post.)
[1] T-shirt history at Wikipedia "In the 1960s, printed T-shirts gained popularity for self-expression as well for advertisements, protests, and souvenirs."
[2] Sadie Hawkins Dance at Wikipedia
[5] DC Comics at Wikipedia - I'm a long-time Batman fan
[8] Phil got in touch with me five years back, after decades. We had dinner. We said we'd do it again. A couple of months later it was too late. A smart, funny guy with whom I spent a lot of time mostly in Junior High years.
T-shirt tales? Because every t-shirt tells a story, don't it.
And I have so very many of them. Shirts. And stories.
This project (because I need more projects) has percolated for a long, long time. Years and years. Because people sometimes ask, Why in the name of Marlon Brando* do you have 150** t-shirts? What could they possibly all be? (... In truth, nobody really ever says the 2nd part. Usually just variations on the first part, with the hairy eyeball and all...and then usually suggests that I should turn them into a quilt... but that aside... ) I respond:
--erm, hmm, well--they're comfy. They're fun. Almost anything goes. They can be colorful. They can provide a conversational opening for someone who wants to talk to me (why they would, I have no idea, but sometimes people apparently do). They can put forth values that I want to promote. They can remind me of places I've been and things I've done. They can simply share anything that I like (dragons come to mind).
Plus, one word: Tie dye.
--------------------------------------------------
Footnotes:
* This t-shirt. I mean, Marlon Brando.-------------------------------------------------------
Pick your favorite [author will attempt to keep this up to date]
My t-shirts in general or this project:
Specific t-shirts:
Yesterday, Dad died 5 years before. The day sits so clearly in my mind, lurking with the things about it that I would absolutely have done differently, but also with relief about a couple of crucial things that I had been afraid that I wouldn't have been able to do for him that I did. So--a wildly emotional day. Plus, he died. So, yes, laser burned into my mental memory book.
And that's all on that for now. But it brings up this:
My Archaelogy/Anthropology prof at Santa Clara University, Mark Lynch, was killed by a drunk driver after he graded my final but before I picked it up. Yes, relevant--
holding this space hoping for ok to post painting of Mark lynch
I learned about his death while listening to the car radio--and then I was driving on US-101 bawling my eyes out.
I cried over several days, couldn’t stop thinking about it at night when all those thoughts you don’t want come calling. Then, one night, I dreamed that i was sitting on the outside steps of the building where his class was, head down on my knees, crying again. Suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder, and I looked up, and there he was. He said, you’re crying? And I was stunned, just staring at him being there. And then he said, “About me? Oh, there’s no need for that” followed by words that I don’t remember exactly any more but something along the lines that he had had a happy life and he’d be honored if people would remember the fun that he had and the education that he gave and be happy about all of that for him. And I nodded and he smiled his familiar smile and trotted on down the steps and away.
It helped me so much when I woke, even though I know that it was my brain inventing things--I think it was inventing a story for myself that I could grasp to not wallow in grief and to, indeed, remember him cheerfully.
So, yay, brain.
(See end of post for links related to Mark Lynch.)
I haven't had dreams like that about either of my parents. I try to remember the same things for them, though. But these anniversaries are hard.
Disneyland is my happy place.
Not my only happy place, but pretty much guaranteed to be my happy place when I'm there. Which I try to be, roughly every couple of years. Except, haven't been since November of 2017, and then I did very little in the parks because we were there for races (5Ks, etc.) and friends.
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| Looking across the dustpile that would become Disney California Adventure towards the Anaheim Convention Center. |
We did Walt Disney World nearly a year ago, but it's not the same: Disneyland is home. The addition of California Adventure in 2001 at first was a disappointment but has gradually improved after the huge Disney Corp filled with some of the most creative people in the planet recognized their design flaw, which probably most of us saw while they were still building it:
Let's build an amusement park about doing fun and famous things in California, and put it in... California!
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| Clearly *something* will be built in here; hoping it will be cool. |
However, to add Disney California Adventure (and Downtown Disney, which is between the parks -- a long pedestrian-only street of shops and restaurants, all of which are pretty good and we have a couple of favorites), they built it atop where the dearly beloved parking lot used to be. The one that was right next to the entrance. Convenient. And shoved all the parking into distant huge and pricey parking garages. I've never parked in one, but friends who drive up to join us sometimes don't get to us for as much as half an hour.
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| Used to be parking lot. |
Today, someone posted in the Facebook Group MiceChat,
"Does anyone remember [the] old parking lot for Disneyland where Disney’s California Adventure is now!"
I said:
Ooooh yeah I remember--for an extra fee you could park in the spaces closest to the entry if there were any left. So we'd get there early. Miss that for sure.
When we were kids and parents took us to Dland, we had a camper, so the camper would be available if someone needed a nap or for meals--Miss that for sure, too.
Discovered that my Dland-going partner seester had already said:
loved preferred parking. We could leave a cooler and coats in the car, and walk out for lunch and stuff, without having to pay for a locker.
And THEN... I just couldn't resist. Pulled up my photos from 1998, when it was all about bulldozers, not much of a hint about what was to come (views from the monorail), and this came out:
DCA was the old parking lot
Now it's DCA, not the old parking lot
Been a long time gone, Oh the old parking lot!
Now it's walking afar nowhere near your car--So, Take me back to the old parking lot
No, you can't go back to the old parking lot
Been a long time gone, Oh that old parking lot
Why did the old parking lot get replaced?
That's for all those new attractions we've embraced!
(Here's the original gold-selling version of Istanbul by The Four Lads, 1954.)
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| The Turks aren't the only ones who rename things-- Looking across the DCA construction to the hotel originally owned by Tokyu that opened in 1984 as the Emerald of Anaheim. It was renamed Pan Pacific Hotel, Anaheim in 1989 when Tokyu merged its Emerald and Pan Pacific hotel divisions. Disney purchased the hotel from Tokyu in 1995 and renamed it Disneyland Pacific Hotel. The hotel was rebranded as Disney's Paradise Pier Hotel on December 15, 2000, named after the formerly Paradise Pier (now renamed Pixar Pier) area in Disney California Adventure Park that the hotel tower overlooks. |
