what's going on?

we should be supporting our national parks with additional funds, not rescinding 267 million earmarked for park improvements. we should be supporting the workers with good pay and confidence in what they do, not disrespecting them and the history they share with the public.

sour dough bread

last friday evening i put together a sour dough bread, and then baked it saturday morning. korrina gave me the starter from her work, and it was so fresh!

it made such a delicious bread. i was surprised and pleased at how well it came out. it's been years since i baked bread.

cricket and zuzu were very interested . . 

zuzu ran away when i began documenting their attempts to steal a bite. of course, cricket was undeterred. (thankfully, we have a bread bin i could hide it away in.)

korrina's starter . . i'll have to take a pic of it bubbling in a bowl next time i feed it and bake with it.

meeting lizette

i took a walk to 54th street and second avenue to meet lizette at the clean market cafe/spa where she sometimes goes for an infrared red sauna. they offer reduced rates during the day.

we shared a bite to eat (chicken fajitas) at rosa mexicana just up the street from the cafe.

fresh lemon tea . . it was a beautiful day in the mid '80's with a cool breeze.

julietta's - the midtown location of greg's favorite ice cream shop. (i stopped to get a cup of pistachio and coffee ice cream for the walk home.)

i also stopped for a few cans of cat food at petsmart (24th street and 5th ave). sometimes i think i only go into this store to gaze at the giant photo of this handsome french bulldog - i would love to have a bulldog again).

peacemaker cricket

 

zuzu doesn't always get along with pluto and it can get tense when they both like to sit on the bins by the window. this morning zuzu was happily relaxing on the bins when pluto asked to go up (having cerebellar hypoplasia, he's unable to jump high enough on his own, though he's capable of jumping down). i don't always lift him up, as i want to avoid confrontation, but this morning i did . . and immediately cricket jumped in between them! he settled down and snuggled up to them both. 

that little nose bop at the end!!

out for a walk

 

a warm day for a walk, but breezy, which made it nice.

dreaming

these days morgan's photos from the u.k. feel so peaceful.

i just want to lounge on the lawn with these serene looking cats and maybe hook the hose up to a sprinkler and jump through the water or just lie on my back looking up at the sky and clouds.

photos from my coffee date with korrina

we both had the frappé (coffee and milk blended with whipped cream on top). so delicious!

the cafe has a beautiful fig tree growing in it's tiny front yard.

gorgeous black eyed susans on first avenue . . 

this is going to be a very large and beautiful sunflower one day . . korrina then went to work while i wandered around the health food store and bought a few things . . 

some of which i dropped off to her at work. these bowls with damp towels covering them are sour dough breads on the rise.

prepping for dinner. (i love our coffee dates and it's always fun seeing her at work.)

some scientific news after running errands

 

when i got home today from grocery shopping (which entailed wandering through the first avenue health food store after having coffee with korrina and then walking thirty minutes back home laden with three bags after two more stops along the way) chanda casually mentioned (and i'm not sure what inspired this revelation from her - i thought all i said was that it was a nice day for a walk as it wasn't as hot as prior days) that the earth would be spinning faster for a few days as the moon is closer to the poles. oh! i think i remember now . . i said something about the sun was still setting late in the evening, such as 7:45 pm and that prompted her to say that we would have a few shorter days due to the gravitational pull between sun and moon.

this made me lie down for a few minutes in distress because i felt like our atmosphere or universe was changing much to overwhelmingly much due to fossil fuels and other pollutants . . . 

however, maybe this knowledge of the day's hourly change is because of technological advances with our instruments of observation?

i'm not sure. 

here's a web page from live science about the shorter length of time in our next few days.

running around

 
greg and i hopped in the car for a cookie run to veniero's this evening at 6 pm. we thought it was going to pour, but the storm ended up passing south of us.

first we stopped for a bite to eat at hen house, the place around the corner from korrina (we were here for my birthday).

the chicken platter with humus, pickles, rice, eggplant, cabbage . . and chicken. so delicious. greg helped me finish it (he also had a falafel sandwich). (we brought a platter back for chanda.)

finally at veniero's for the cookies (we'll be celebrating my sister and brother-in-law's fifthieh wedding anniversary this weekend).

 they wrapped up a box of rainbow and jam filled cookies for me, and i had a few kept out for greg, chanda and i to have at home. (i spent the day doing last minute laundry, cleaning, preparing notes about the cats for the catsitter, running errands - as in visiting the new petco on park avenue which is amazing - and finally picking out some new summer shirts for myself at the athleta store. now it's time for tea and a cookie for myself.)

milly, morgan and korrina

 
a display at the library desk when i picked up a book on hold.

resting with milly . . it's been very hot again (yesterday's walk home was steamy and sticky) . .

i think this cute little boston terrier was feeling the heat.

morgan's peg children she is making from peg people the three year olds painted while in preschool today.

a little chef . . 

here is the back of his chef's hat . . his "toque."

speaking of toques, korrina was reminiscing today and posted a photo of her medallion from achieving the top toque award at her culinary graduation . . ten years ago today!

after the dentist

 

passing the latest sculpture on park avenue . . 

i stopped at scandinavia house to browse the gift shop and then picked up some groceries from whole foods at 28th street and madison (the nicest whole foods to shop in as it's huge and not as many people stop in).

it had begun to rain while i was in the store . . 

i did not have an umbrella for the walk home with my two bags of groceries . . 

it wasn't pouring but i did get very wet. fortunately, for the last leg of the walk, i ran into the crosstown 14A bus at 14th street and fifth avenue and so was able to sit down and rest for the final long blocks.

i met greg downstairs after he had moved the car and we went to misoya for dinner.

this salad was delicious! (we also each had a bowl of ramen).

hello again

 
i'm sitting at my desk by the window listening to the brian lehrer show. they're discussing the latest supreme court ruling that chastises lower court rulings and the majority has been called out for running rampant with making up rules.

i didn't post when morgana was here - we spent most of our mornings having coffee or tea together - and then when they left (morgan and harley), i spent a lot of morning time moping about . . definitely not unusual for me. now i'm trying to get back into the writing rhythm again.

we had so many cool days in may and early june! and they were followed by a heat wave which no one was used to, so of course it felt dreadful. i even put the air on (we have a heat pump, which uses a little less energy, i believe, than a regular ac unit). now it's seasonally hot and i've acclimated and the air has remained off. as long as it goes below 80 degrees fahrenheit at night, the apartment stays fairly comfortable and we don't need the ac.

we had a primary mayoral election and much name calling has been going on, but many, many new yorkers are pleased (over the moon is more like it) with the outcome and the atmosphere has been happy. of course there's lots of work to do for november.

morgan and i have been watching "the residence" on netflix and really enjoying it, and i began a new book yesterday that my sister gave me for christmas a year or so ago: call the nurse by mary j. macleod, "true stories of a country nurse on a scottish isle." it's very good and i highly recommend it. (i read it outside in the courtyard yesterday while waiting for the laundry to wash.)

(oh! and i was also sick for awhile and am still quite congested from it. it was a bad cold/flu type illness. i had a low fever, no appetite and no energy, but, thankfully, no nausea.)