saturday green market and errands

i've been very sick all week with the flu. today was my first day out since last saturday. greg and i met up with kendall and aurélien and then walked to porto rico imports . . 

for coffee beans.

heading home past our lady of pompeii

finishing up the laundry . .

breakfast with some goodies bought at faicco's (italian bread and some smoked bacon).

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we just finished dinner with chanda who has now left to see a new studio ghibli film with a friend in brooklyn. before dinner we watched a little more of the david attenborough our green planet series which we had started two weeks ago. 

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morgan has been in madrid with harley all week and sent several photos:

(this was my favorite)

they really enjoyed exploring an antique shop . . 

there were a lot of fun graffiti drawings on the buildings . . 

 i liked this one . . 

such a beautiful and clean city. i've never visited but would like to one day.

friday sick day

greg sent me a photo of the sunrise on his way into work this morning.

i felt well enough to sit up and participate in the american friends service committee's power hour for gaza, with an update on the current situation there as reported by a member on the ground in southern gaza. it's all heartbreaking.

korrina sent a photo of her beautiful afghan made with stash yarn that wash the cat is very comfortable on.

wednesday sick day

greg stayed home to help take care of me today (he's been doing so, actually, all this week) and is working from the large bedroom, so i moved into the living room. as you can see, pluto is keeping me company on the bed while cricket and zuzu inhabit the window and the chair. i've been reading an immense world which deychen gave me for christmas last year. it's a book with so many amazing insights that i keep stopping and saying to chanda, "listen to how a mantis shrimp sees their world," or, "a dog's world is defined by all the myriad of things they can smell!"

here ed yong, the author, is explaining how birds see an entire new dimension of colors through their tetrachromacy (humans are trichromats).

about the bacterium wolbachia . . !

(i took this photo several weeks ago meaning to post about it) so, yes, an immense world! by ed yong. so fascinating and i highly recommend it!

i've also been watching finding ola on netflix . . an arabic show that takes place in cairo and tells the story of ola whose husband finds that he is no longer in love with her and so moves out of their home. of course they have two children with whom they have to navigate through the ensuing trials. it's very good, funny and poignant.

morgana is in madrid with harley and sent beautiful photos:

the subway . . 

morgana liked their subway signs . . 

photos of the hotel room (it was a business trip for harley) . . 

the view out the window . .

and the view from the roof . . 

a delicious dinner at a local restaurant just a block from the hotel . . 

(and i'm writing all this several weeks later as i was too weak at the time. i had no appetite for days.)

sunday sick day

totally wiped out with the flu . .

pictures i sent to morgan and korrina . . the cats kept me company.

i listened to braiding sweetgrass . . 

(posted several weeks later . .)

saturday night

i managed to make dinner this evening, but i didn't feel well and didn't eat much . . and it was an expensive meal as i had bought bay scallops from the fish vendor at the green market! oh well, greg and chanda enjoyed it . . and i just went to lie in bed for the whole week.

candlemas

well, it was a very grey day. will we have spring now?

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kendall finished knitting aurélien's sweater and it looks so good on him. i love the two different blues.

dog walking, bookstores, dinner out and a documentary

walked sweet milly today . . 

waiting for her treat . . 

and then i went to peruse the books at mcnally jackson . . 

i was interested in looking at this book as i heard the author speak in an interview with brian lehrer on the radio. she quotes a line from a walt whitman poem as an opening to the essays, but doesn't include the full poem. maybe they couldn't get the rights to it? i'm not sure why this bothers me!

anyway, greg met me and we decided to try the georgian restaurant i walk by all the time on bedford street. 

i chose a salad that was described as having walnuts, but i didn't see any. the server said they were ground into the dressing . . which is a part of the cuisine of this area . . but this bothered me too. i don't think i was in the best of moods today! (i complained about these walnuts all the way home too.)

walking home . . 

chanda and i watched the last episode of the green planet . .