the parade of tall ships

 

on the way to see the tall ships . . 

security!

here they come . . 

pilot #1 led the parade . . (i love the call of the ship's horn)

greg said, imagine a hundred of them (british ships) anchored off of sandy hook, ready to attack (in 1776 when the battle of new york took place). 

many of the ships were playing music . . 

not all of the ships were warships . . here's the south street seaport museum ship, and the hudson clearwater sloop also sailed, but was turned away from the parade by the coast guard for hoisting their banner promoting the clean water act, climate solutions, indigenous rights and racial justice. a little beacon blog shares the story of what happened. in the past, the clearwater sloop has sailed in the bicentennial 1976 tall ship parade and the 1986 rededication of the statue of liberty parade.

i love the firefighter boats . . 

ships calling to each other while passing in the daylight . . 

tree damage from yesterday's storm . . 

so many trees were lost . .

heading home . .

selling flags at the corner . .

debris from the storm. we lost a tree in front, but fortunately not in the back.

korrina's sweet wash the cat, not enjoying the firework explosions coming from outside.

good night!

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.

knitting and dinner and rain

almost done with this baby sweater . . today i set the second sleeve in. tomorrow i'll sew it up along with the left side seam. the right side is already completed; then i'll block it and sew on the buttons. it was such a hot and steamy day! i went shopping for taco fixings (it just happens to be taco tuesday) when it began to rain and did not stop. greg came and helped me carry things home as they weren't delivering and i had a lot of jars and cans.

chanda is helping greg beautify his taco for the photo . . 

chanda's friend was here for dinner (they both helped get dinner on which was nice) . . it felt good to have a guest. she was interested in borrowing a fun and light book to read. i recommended jacobin's daughter since she said she liked history and felt like reading a romance. it's a book my parents gave me for christmas when i was about twelve or thirteen years old. it's fun reading these old books again . . i just finished re-reading a beautiful, early edition of black beauty that my sister gave me for my birthday. 

it's still raining and i can hear thunder in the distance . . there is a very cool breeze wafting through the window . . tomorrow it's only supposed to reach 72 degrees . . today it was 91! it'll feel chilly if it isn't too humid.

monday in new smyrna

the airbnb supplied bikes for riding on the beach, which was about six blocks away. for our first morning we rode past the shuffleboard courts, where i found out you need a membership in order to use them. greg has never been interested in playing shuffleboard; i think his family has always considered them a silly game for the elderly "snowbirds" that come from the north for the summer. however, i love playing shuffleboard. i have wonderful memories of playing at jones beach with my family when i was very little and all through my teen years. it was always a fun time and the fact that there are these lovely shuffleboard courts in his home town that i've never shared with my children while they grew up makes me feel a little wistful . . anyway, biking on the beach is one of the most fun things a person can do, in my opinion! we began each morning like this and it just felt so good.

this morning's ride was followed by a brunch at heath's health food store which was only three blocks away (this airbnb was in the best spot). greg had a sandwich and i ate from three different salads: broccoli, bean, and kale. afterwards, we drove to pick up his mom. she had made an appointment for us to see the new assisted living place she hopes to move to by august or september. it's in the older section of town by the main street and shops and the river park. she would be able to walk around the area on her own or with friends and visit the town's history museum, ice cream shop or the many gift shops or stroll by the river. the place she's in now is a little more isolated and one needs a car to get anywhere, and her eyes are no longer good enough for driving. it was a very nice facility and her room even has a little balcony (what i would give for a balcony). after that we drove to the tractor store (which his sister manages) to say hello and set up a time for getting together, followed by a walmart visit . . and then back to the assisted living.

greg and i ate at a restaurant called river deck, which was nice as it was right on the river and we could eat outdoors.

as you can see, it was very cloudy!

we shared a salad . . 

and i had salmon and greg had fish and chips.

driving back to the airbnb we would usually pass the flip flop shop . . (if we took the north bridge) . .

we weren't sure if we would make it back before the rainstorm, but we did . . 

we brought our dessert home . . key lime pie . . (which i had with a cup of numi green tea).

just a rainy florida evening . .

dinner and a downpour

 i had two eggplants in the fridge, from saturday's green market, so tonight shouted out to me: eggplant parmegiana.

 chanda made the salad.

and then it rained . .

caught in the downpour . .

wednesday evening . . thunderstorm and a birthday celebration

 kendall and i made plans to celebrate my birthday and little aurélien's homecoming with janine on wednesday evening . . i made it to her apartment just before the rain turned into a deluge, along with baguette, cheese, cherries and apricots. janine showed up during the downpour a half hour later.

greg sent me this movie from home at the same time . . he said he jumped at the end during that last loud thunder bolt . .

 minerva was a bit wide eyed too . . 

 we ended with tea and songs for the little one . . 

----

the rainstorm had chased away all the outdoor diners . . since no restaurants can have indoor patrons, everything was closed; even the 24 hour deli (which chanda says has been closing at night around 9:30 pm since march). it was very strange walking home. it might be nice on the high line . . but i like the normal busyness of a new york city night. no one was coming home from the opera, or the ballet, concerts, jazz clubs, theatre, parties . . nothing.

 back at home . . chanda was working on her test knit for a knitting designer . . 

the yarn is malabrigo . .