the bay area

on tuesday i explored a new city. the skies were cloudless, blue and perfect.
i've always wanted a place with a bay window. these looked like some nice options...from the outside anyway.

this one happens to be the former home of jerry garcia. not that you know who that is/was.

california sky

the california skies on monday, welcoming me.

The Other Side

Believe it or not, this is Prospect Park.


I took it last weekend while there for a photo shoot for an incredible jewelry designer. I know it looks all sylvan and serene, but all around were bald patches of trash, rusty bins stuffed with fly-infested dirty diapers, stripped-to-the-bone chicken wings...yum, New York in the summer.


There were a few other beautiful things tucked in there too, though. If only they'd hold still.

Many Happy Returns

Since I can't be there today, here's the closest I can come.


Happy, happy birthday to my dear BoB coauthor. I made these rosewater madeleines in your honor- they're light, sweet and subtly floral, and most of all, seemed like something we could enjoy together over a cup of tea. Or Champagne, now that I think about it.

You'll have presents awaiting your return. And don't worry, it won't be a box of moldy madeleines. I will take good, good care of these for you.

trippin'

the mountain was out to bid me farewell. the day was filled with clouds, sun and some rain. but visibility was good and it was all too tempting to risk my well-being as well as those of the others on i-5 today and take some pictures while driving.

there are lots of little bridges between washington and oregon. this one goes over the columbia river and welcomed me into oregon.

and then the very straight expanses of open road followed by the windier curvy hills further welcomed me.



i'm not sure low mileage on a car is something of beauty, but it's definitely not ugly.

another brick ad on the wall

i walk by this old ad(s) all the time, and only noticed it the other day. not sure how it escaped me, but now that i know it's there, i'll be paying better attention. and i'll also probably be on the lookout a little more.

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summer sky in seattle
succinctly shot
second and spring
sky scraping

Delicious Mornings

They've been absolutely beautiful the past two days, especially seeing the sun sparkling off the water of the East River.

the right idea.

it's been raining the past couple of days. these past couple of days were preceded with a hot run of days. this picture is from last friday afternoon. it was taken near the part of lake union that passes under the ship canal bridge. i spotted that massive weeping willow and wanted to take a snapshot, sans humans. but upon further reflection, i left the relaxing reader in the frame. it was a warm afternoon turning into evening and there was a comfortable yet strong breeze and this guy just seemed to have the right idea...just plop down with a book and enjoy it.

oh, and there's a bit of sky here, too. more sky to come.

More Sky

corny.

a good friend and i treated ourselves to a vegetarian repast after having our toes pedicured last week. both of us hadn't been to this nearby well-known madison valley veg restau in a few years. the last time we dined there was also together.
i am no food stylist, unlike my talented coauthor. however, i present my image of the dish i ate: yakima valley polenta -- dykstra farm bing cherries soaked in a port sauce with a saute of local snap peas, and walla walla onions served over sage polenta and cambazola blue cheese. it was as tasty as it was pretty. the dish was a perfect accompaniment to my company, also pretty, and very kind.

Morning Shadows

This was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes yesterday. The pattern struck me as more beautiful than any fabric, made more so by its ephemeral nature.

i see a full moon rising.

the neighbors decided to have a "full moon party." one of the signs announcing the event, taped to the bank of metal mailboxes, had images from the film, chocolat. i don't remember, but apparently there was a similarly themed happening in the movie.
it was known exactly where and when the moon would rise, and when it appeared in its place in the sky, it was no surprise. but with the white balloons tied to the dock, light blue stringed lights, floating candles, flowers, wine and a delicious array of eats, the mood and the temperature provided the perfect climate.
it makes it really easy to attend a party when it's just steps outside your door. there's really no excuse not to.

Summer Skies

In Brooklyn:



And Manhattan.

hook and houseboat

i think living on a houseboat would be fun. seattle has quite a community of them and they are as varied as the people who live in them, i assume.
something about the ps1 basement pics seemed similar in style to the quirky, tinny, pipe-y, rusty look of this water home.

Inner Workings

I went to a lovely outdoors Environ records party this weekend at P.S. 1, a museum housed in an old school in Long Island City, Queens. The music was fantastic and the weather was perfect, but if you needed a break, the whole museum was open as well.


All the exhibits are in converted classrooms and spread out over four floors, so it takes some exploring to uncover everything. It's much more enticing than the standard, hangarlike museum rooms.


These were from the basement, where a welcome, dark coolness made me want to stay for a long time. But I couldn't miss out on that music, so I headed back outside after a little while.

Wooden

I'm still all about shapes this week.


I took this awhile ago- the light is not nearly this rich today.

This chair was supposed to be just an extra seat, but a small army of succulent plants seems to have taken up permanent residence. They seem very happy, so I let them stay.

Form and Function

Shapes can seem so out of place, but still so lovely in their incongruity.


This downtown apartment building looks so un-New York; it's like some quaint vision a 1960s architect had of urban modernity. But that's what I liked about it.

Kitteh Out of the Bag

I chased this girl down yesterday, after spotting the little cargo in her bag from above on some subway stairs.


If this doesn't qualify as a bit of beauty, I don't know what does.

layers

i've started to take a real liking to old forms of advertising...perhaps in response to what i'm typically exposed to on a daily basis. i really like it when these old outdoor signs have a lot of layers. but the one thing that bothers me about them is that they are so vulnerable. there was a sprite ad (with clever zingy copy and neat fonts) that i used to admire on another brickface and last year when the building it was a part of was slated for demolition, i thought of taking photographs, but then never had the chance. the condos in its place are still under construction, and my memory of the old sign is fading.

painterly

a high school art teacher once described the sky (among other things) to me as painterly. i was reminded of that adjective a few days ago, when i was invited on an evening boat ride out on lake washington. there weren't too many other boats out on the lake that night. it felt so vast, and the sky had so much going on. what a treat.

Still Life

I took this last weekend, after discovering someone had hitched a ride in the raspberries that I had bought a few days earlier for my raspberry-red currant pie.


I felt terrible that I had shoved him in the cold clink for four days without realizing it. I set it aside in my fruit basket to show my houseguests, when they awoke, and they later noticed that he had started twitching. He had come back to life.

I guess it was more of a moving life, then.

oh, deer.

this juvenile greeted me upon arrival in connecticut about a week ago. it looked at us as we stared at him (her?) for quite a few moments. there is this strange sense of excitement paired with sadness when i see a deer, especially in the suburbs. upon first thought, deer seem out of place and foreign, so exciting. but then, of course, it seems so natural that they be there, so it becomes sad. that, and that so many are victims to speeding cars. that's why i am glad this guy was in plain sight and we had plenty of time for us to admire him, and he had plenty of time to get his bearings, figure things out, and make his way out of the street and off into the woods....

It's Knot Over

This is from a wedding I went to a few weeks ago; it was hung under a huge, old sprawling tree on a gorgeous little island in Boston Harbor, and part of the ceremony was conducted right by it.


The post about knots made me think about it. The couple incorporated a Celtic wedding tradition of tying different colored pieces of ribbon around their clasped hands, each color representing a unifying theme for the marriage (passion, faith, knowledge). It sounds corny but it was actually touching in its simplicity.

red-eye reward

the red-eye may not be the most comfortable time to fly, but it has its rewards. this sunrise was mine. it was the first of a few rewards that it took coming home to realize i was given. it can be easy to focus on not being able to recline your seat or desperately needing water or not being able to sleep because of a large snoring man seated directly behind you, but as corny as this sounds, i figure that usually the places, and people, you get to see are worth the sometimes bumpy ride.

...or knot to be.

knitting is essentially just a bunch of knots, i suppose. but i'll let the words scripted onto the wall speak for themselves and perhaps tell us that knots are perhaps much more.
taken at a design store in pioneer square on the first thursdays art walk.

Aged Windowsill

It's filthy, it's falling apart- it's my slowly rotting bedroom windowsill. I put these rocks there to cover up some of the peeling paint.


But in the blue twilight yesterday, there was something striking about the soot and chipping paint. Everything that was supposed to be white has aged into muted gray, and it was a reminder of how beautiful imperfection is.

Poolside

Usually I don't take photos of people, but this moment just captured summer for me. I couldn't resist.