hot weather, a card game, and a summer storm

 

greg went out to the museum of modern art today, chanda went to work and i sorted through outfits i'm considering wearing to morgan and harley's wedding. the pants i shopped for at the fancy store with greg ended up not fitting so i'm kind of back to square one. but i ordered a shirt that i'm hoping will go with a pair of pants i already have . . we shall see.

it's been incredibly hot . . so hot that when i stepped outside the other day, i was met with a wall of hot air that reminded me of southern california. it was sufficiently hot and sufficiently dry that i was transported back to my aunt's house on canoga avenue in woodlawn hills . . to when i would step out from the bedroom's sliding glass door onto the hot cement surrounding the inground pool. the sunlight was blinding, the water was sparkling blue and very inviting, and my feet burned from the hot pavement. i would always get blisters. they were lazy days of lying in the sun, floating on the water, and getting stung on the back of my knee by a giant wasp. they were summer days in between college days. i miss the people in the periphery of those days . . my aunt and uncle, my mom and dad . . mixed in with the smell of the pepper trees and the eucalyptus trees.

all of that swam in my head as i stepped into the courtyard from the back door on the ground floor with  two bags of laundry. one hundred degrees. thirty seven celsius. today was the same, except i didn't go out in it. i stayed in the cooler air from the heat pump we have. it's a welcome respite and i can get things done but it'll be nice to open up the windows again . . one of these days.

we played round six of may i this evening. chanda is leading with 20 points (much to her surprise), greg has 155 points and i'm last with 245 points. ah well!

as we were playing, we heard the wind begin to howl and something seemed to be rolling around up on the roof. the trees bent as we've never seen them bend before and the wind increased so that it felt like the whole apartment building would take off like the house in the wizard of oz. the rain pelted down and we could hear someone exclaim when the lightning flashed. and then it quieted down again. i've never been in a tornado, but that is what i imagine it might be like.

the sky glowed afterwards . . yellow, pink, purple and blue.

korrina put up a photo on her instagram story. she had been at work still. such striking colors in the sky!

i posted several days between june twelfth to the twenty fourth.

shiny happy people

 

milly . . after eating one of the treats i keep in my pocket .. . it's so wonderful walking around the city now. everyone is so happy (due to the knicks winning the championship - i shared when they won on june 14th's post: at the beach). i've read accounts where reporters feel that the city hasn't been this lighthearted since before 9/11. i won't dispute that. there really is a special joy in the air.

greg and i had dinner at las mariscos (greg's favorite place) . . 

i continued my reading of the scarlet pimpernel while waiting for our food . . 

now that the basketball championship is over, the focus is on the world cup. i think argentina and brazil were playing here?

walking home . . it was a beautiful evening. i love summer's long days.

chilly days

i met greg after work today and we picked up some groceries before making dinner.

the black eyed susans are beautiful at st. luke in the fields' garden.

it's been very cool! late at night and in the early morning i can feel fall in the air. it takes me back to when the girls and i would visit nana and nonno in the first week of september when everyone else was starting school and we would sit on the beach at south lake and watch the geese fly past, or greet nana and nonno in the evening when they would come down to gin beach to sit with us before heading home for dinner.

i'm sitting at my desk by the open window and i can hear the leaves rustling in the wind outside.

saturday afternoon

 

greg and i had brunch at phebe's on bowery and then walked to elizabeth street to sit in the garden. it was very busy but he found a chair and i happily sat on the grass. 

i worked at casting on for another pair of socks. i cannot remember where this yarn is from!

he had forgotten his reading glasses, but he sat and read on his kindle with the letters enlarged.

the weather has been beautiful with warm sun and a cool breeze.

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.)

am meet up

 
i met ellen this morning for coffee at her favorite breakfast spot on king street. sixth avenue is noisy but it was still nice to sit outside in the shade and talk about her summer and her students (i'll see her again this evening for krista's dance which chanda is also performing in at a venue on the lower east side).

taco tuesday

 

today was the first day to help ellen (sacha's charlotte was there also, to help demonstrate, but she broke her foot when hiking and still has a boot on for the next two weeks!) and i met greg for tacos at tacombi afterwards . . we had never been here before.

delicious guacamole, but i didn't like the tacos as much as las mariscos . . we brought some home for chanda (she had been in class).

the weather has been so beautiful . . in the low 80's and not at all humid. i love when the air conditioning isn't necessary and all the shops have their doors open.

walking home . . 

after work

i met greg after work near where the chinese restaurant used to be in hudson river park. the last time we ate here was in 2019 with amelie. we've also eaten here a few times with clyde. we were hoping a new nice restaurant had taken over the spot, but it's now a montessori school and the current restaurant on the corner doesn't have as good of a view.

you can see there's a big hedge all the way on the left behind the two ladies on the bench, which blocks the view of the water. oh well . . c'est la vie . . 

instead, we walked to brookfield place to where he used to work with time life . . 

meredith corporation now publishes many of the magazines time did . . a few have been discontinued.

we stopped in the food court for lebanese food . . 

and then walked home along the river . . 

the battery dance festival was happening . . many, many groups participate in several different locations each night for a week. the group above is mayurbhanj chhau from india (rajesh sai babu).

also, the geese were out and busily eating many bugs in the grass . . 

while the sun set.

outside the customs house

a trio of photos from our visit on saturday, july 27th, to the smithsonian american indian museum . . 

hint of fall

with it only being 66 degrees today, you can feel fall around the corner . . it's such a nice break from 91 degrees and the dew point in the 70's. the sun is hidden and there's a cool breeze. (photo by chanda.)

i met kendall and aurélien in the hardware store to return a set of keys to her and to get lemon oil for myself for dusting the piano. they were searching for a specific tool to fix their sink faucet . . funny because our sink faucet is a problem too . . we just haven't bothered to fix it and so keep a bucket underneath . . !

tuesday

another warm day . . 

deviled eggs and steamed zucchini with kasha for dinner.

hazy day

it was a very hazy day . . 

janet and i went for a short walk along the river in the morning after having croissants and hot chocolate at pastis on gansvoort street, which we used to do years ago . . (when the cafe/restaurant used to be on washington street).

 

chanda made delicious sesame peanut noodles for lunch.

it became so humid that we turned on the cool air and i cooked two fresh tuna fillets for dinner that i had bought on saturday from the fish vendor at the green market.