I babysat Rina last night, if you can call it that -- actually I just sat at Mike & Heather's and watched cable TV and ate ice cream. They went to a Hallowe'en party -- too complicated for me to explain, I guess. Heather was dressed up and was playing something by a group called Poison. Is she not lovely?

Zoe and I are dressed to the nines (for us) to go to the tea today. This is my best hair day in about a month, and it's not a good hair day by any objective measurement that I can imagine.
It was really nice today to finally have something else to do. In addition to having a cold, which has engendered incessant whining, I feel like I haven't done anything out of the ordinary forever. I walk, I go to the gym, I practice. Yawn. I know this is my own fault, but nonetheless... Anyway, Zoe invited me today to go to a tea that the Symphony League gave. It was at Viskaya and was really nice. They had a very nice spread at the tea, scones, (but no clotted cream) little muffins; egg salad, cucumber, smoked salmon, and pate finger sandwiches. They also had a greatI finally feel like a human being again, but Zoe was coming down with a cold now. She's going to Hawaii in two weeks and I hope she's over it by then.

Valentines Day

Not that we aren't a romantic pair, but we didn't bother with anything today, and neither one of us even managed to get the other a card. Well, I tried, but I couldn't find one that said: "I love to listen to the sweet dulcet tones of your coughing." I guess he was similarly unable to find one that had any romantic sentiments that rhyme with snot. So there you go. On the other hand, the weather was nice and sunny and relatively warm, so we walked up to the Mars building on 20th St. and had coffee at Peet's. And then we had some Cultive Yogurt on the way home. And by the time we got home, it was 3 p.m. Time sure flies when you're having fun. Later it was such a nice afternoon, that I went around looking for blooming flowers. I know I saw some daffodils somewhere last week, but can't remember where. So these are just the normal February stuff, camellias, iris, those iris-like little yellow flowers and the pink trees (flowering quince, maybe?)

A sick day

John's been sick since last Thursday, and I seem to have finally come down with it today. I wouldn't say I'm really sick, but I have become a world-class snot factory. I did get smart today and bought some of that really soft Kleenex with lotion in it to make it a little easier on my nose.

Earlier in the day, I felt a little better, so I went to the gym and worked out, then sat in the eucalyptus room for about 10 minutes. That was wonderful, and my nose and chest were clear for a good hour or so after that. So I managed to get in a 6-mile walk today. Not fast, but it just felt good to be outside. I also found another source of eucalyptus. There are three different varieties right near each other on the Capitol grounds. I collected leaves from all three. The smallest tree seemed to have the most aromatic leaves.

The other thing that's really a pain about not feeling well, is that you start stuff, and then you don't feel like finishing them.. So everything in the house is a mess, the result of times when you feel good and start a project, and then you're tired and don't do any more and leave all the parts lying around.

So if you look around these pictures, you see our box of soft Kleenex, pans sitting on the stove with eucalyptus leaves in them and leftover chicken soup, tea pot for the 10 cups of tea I've had today (with pretty predictable results for tonight, I'll bet) my new bunch of eucalyptus, brandy bottle for making hot toddies, grocery bags with oranges I bought today (can't find any really fresh ones on people's trees, so I had to actually buy them at the grocery store. I cannot stand it when the kitchen is a big mess like that, but now I'm back to one of the down times when I'm so tired I can hardly even type. Suffice it to say that the dining room table looks just as bad and I've managed to keep that one clean for the last month. Ha ha ha. That's all over.
I can't believe how whiney this sounds. I have a little cold. You'd think I was a man with this amount of whining.

The New Computer

Finally, tonight, I'm having a little fun with my new computer. I got one of those little mini laptops because I thought it would be easier to take on a trip, etc., or at least I wouldn't mind losing it as much as my more expensive laptop.

I've had it for two weeks, but couldn't bring myself to take it out of the box and try to set it up, because I was pretty sure I'd do something wrong. As it turned out, the challenge has been finding the password for the wireless router.

I was pretty sure it was on the router itself, and there are three long numbers on the back. One of them said SN before it, so I was pretty sure that wasn't it. So I tried the first number -- no luck. Tried it again, duh, still no luck. Then I tried the second number. Also no luck. Then I got out the other computer, hoping I could find the number on the computer. I've seen other people do this, but I couldn't find it.

Finally, I went upstairs and put a second pair of glasses on over my regular ones and discovered that I had read two 5's as being 6's. Sure enough, that was the magic answer, so now I'm here writing on my new laptop. It has a smaller screen than the other one, and is of course, all over smaller, but seems to weigh about the same, which is a little disappointing.

In other news today, I was supposed to go watch the lovely Rina while her dad got stuff together for a show he's doing in the Bay Area tonight. I had completely forgotten about it, which may have been just as well, except for today's inconvenience to him, because I am coming down with the cold that John started last Thursday or so, and suspect that if I'm going to be contagious, it's probably today. So other than the annoyance today, they'll probably be just as glad I didn't. Since I like pictures on the blog, of course, here's a picture of Rina. I went out to look for Eucalyptus leaves to boil and inhale tonight, and discovered to my chagrin that the trees I used to plunder over by the YMCA have been cut down. Damn. I ended up walking a mile and a half looking for another tree, finally went back to the one at the Bee, which is only four blocks from the house. That one's a little hard for anybody but a koala bear to get to, though, because the lowest branches are about 20 feet high, so you can only get whatever has fallen off.
I still don't have the closet finished, but now there's a reason to get it done. I have a ton of junk all over the floor in the sunporch, and John has suddenly decided that it's time to get another estimate for the windows. At this point, nobody could even get in to take any measurements -- it's difficult in the best of times, and that room hasn't seen the best of times since before Christmas.

The other thing I discovered in getting the new computer is that the card reader in the old one is kaput. I was hoping perhaps it was the camera card itself that was bad, but I just stuck it in this one and it's fine.

Sculpture in the Traffic Circle

It takes a lot of people to get this going. Several years ago, in fact before the founding of Newton Booth Neighborhoods Association, a group of people in the neighborhood petitioned the City to do some traffic calming. After a long and arduous process the neighborhood ended up with a traffic circle (a big cement circle in the middle of the intersection at 26th & S) and a smaller barrier on T Street, as well as getting some parking changed from parallel to diagonal on some streets. Anyway, in spring of 2008, they brought the dirt for the plantings. A number of people from the neighborhood got together and added amendments until we had some really nice soil. Another neighborhood association gave us some iris to start and then later in the fall we planted some other drought-tolerant plants.
At one point when we were planting, or digging, or measuring – it was two years ago, I don’t remember) a woman named Kirsten Hoard came over and introduced herself and said she did outdoor sculpture and would we like one as a donation to the traffic circle. To make a two-year long story short, today was the day the City installed the sculpture, and we are the only neighborhood in town with a nice piece of public art in a traffic circle.
I was sort of surprised when I went back later this afternoon to see that these big concrete pillars are so high, but I guess they have to keep the sculpture high enough that drivers in cars can see below it. We have a few plants that need to be planted back in, and I suppose we will then get some other plants to fill in the center. We've kind of been waiting to finish the plantings until the sculpture was finished.
It's a little difficult to see from the pictures but there are four of these figures in various colors. The colors reflect light in different ways depending on how the light hits them, and one sculpture faces in each direction. It's a little difficult to get a good picture, but I see this last version as a welcoming introduction to the neighborhood