The Bay Area Yarn Crawl starts this Friday. If we can’t have Stitches West anymore, we can make our own, said whoever pulled this idea together and got it started last year. Can’t wait.

Meantime, I took this picture this afternoon, with the needles curling over and hiding the third jellyfish and the first half of a turtle.

Then I kept at it till I’d finished the rest of its eighteen rows (head, shell top, back legs, upper front leg) because I wanted to see it!

Oh. It looks like I missed a stitch yesterday connecting the lower front leg to the body; I didn’t, but it looks like I did. I think I’ll embroider maybe just half a stitch there, maybe a whole, let me think about it overnight, we’ll see.

But the next row is definitely going to start a new fish to the left of that orange trio.

I did not plan on placing them all in diagonal lines; they just swam to where they wanted to go and waited over a month for me to notice.

The San Jose City Hall peregrines had their first egg today. During this bird flu, that is more than the usual cause for celebration.

Two years ago, the male was a second-year floater filling in for the original male just before laying started. Whether he contributed any genes to that one egg or not, we don’t know. He certainly tried. But there was no second egg. (The next year he was fully an adult and there were four, a more normal number.)

Juvenile markings and all, he was so excited at the sight of that thing. He’d never done this before but he was all in and he immediately went and hunted small prey for it so the pieces would be small enough to swallow easily–and, here’s the video, then tried to feed the egg.

Now it’s enthusiasm plus experience. As soon as his mate got up he was right there to get a good look. By the end of the week we should have a full nest and the brooding should begin.

Every step of the way is a victory.

(Former cam crew volunteer here.)

I knit a little extra yesterday, figuring I might not be up to much today. Good thing.

So life took up some of the slack: to my surprise, an apricot kernel I’d given up on pushed out its cotyledon towards the light.

That one had grown a root so I’d tucked its plug into a much larger pot and then it had just sat there for days. I wondered if it was starting to rot?

The move into the sunlight cleared away any sign of that.

It wasn’t a whole spray of true leaves opening all at once along with the first two like the earlier seedlings; it’s just barely started. But they are big and thick and promising. It was in the upper 30s out there the last two nights so I can hardly blame them for moving a little slowly at first–hey, today, me, too.

But that new one is growing now and hopefully will be for decades to come while creating good food, oxygen, wildlife habitat, and maybe someday kids climbing it to pick its fruit when I’m just a story in their grandparents’ memories, and the very sight of it delights me no end.

Reading up on raised planter boxes, red cedar vs all kinds of other options. Metal painted to look like wood? Um… The idea of not having to bend over sounds really tempting, but the idea of making it so the bunny can’t jump in is the real reason I went looking. (The dog next door barked. The bunny popped up in my yard right on cue while I was browsing.)

Thirty inches? Bunnies can jump that high, says he.

Straight up? Not that high, says me, wishing it to be so.

Oh yes they can.

So I thought I’d throw it out there: has anyone bought/built/used garden planters, and do you recommend what you got? Did it keep any critters away? Or would an on-the-ground be a might-as-well.

Plant a tree, bake a pie. (Some time may need to elapse in between.) English Morello tart cherry.

Happy Birthday to my youngest!

They haven’t had one in a long time that I can think of but there was a craft night at church tonight: bring whatever and get together.

I asked the organizer to text me the night of because I wanted to go but I knew I would forget. Which I did. And she did. I thanked her. I wore a mask: I knew she’d just had her last cancer treatment.

A few card tables were pulled out for watercoloring on. Two people were crocheting large afghans. I had my fish. One woman was sewing some appliqué, the project mostly folded up so you couldn’t really see anything but the flower at hand.

I asked to see it.

The whole thing laid out was revelatory–it was a stunning work of art.

She’d had no idea I knit. I know, right?

One friend asked me to spread my afghan out so she could see the whole thing. She knew me enough to say, And you just knit it, right, no pattern? Art is like that: it tells you where it wants to go.

It’s the boss of us, I affirmed. She grinned.

The things we take for granted about ourselves that others have no way to know. Seeing each other’s creativity was what the evening was all about, and a good time was had by all.

Even if I forgot to bring my turtle chart and had to put that off for several more rows.

Although, she would have heard mine, come to think of it.

So.

Dental follow-up appointment. They called yesterday to reschedule me. Got there early because parking’s a bear. Brought just a hat project in a ziploc, since it looked like it would start raining again any second.

I sat there and sat there and sat there. I could hear the folks at work in the adjoining rooms but no one was manning the check-in and nobody had any clue I was there.

After half an hour, another patient came in.

She was elderly. She looked smashing. Her hair had been done, her dress perfect, her makeup demanded you notice her eyes.

Those warm and smiling eyes. And an accent I couldn’t quite place other than to think she’d been here a long time now.

She exclaimed over my very simple turquoise stockinette stitch beanie that had the bottom folded up and the decreasing happening at the top of my needles and told me how pretty it was.

(I thought, Honey, I can brag on a better one than that), and pulled out my phone and showed the latest.

Her mouth hung open in surprise at that afghan. She embiggened the details for a better look, chasing the screen around with her finger.

Then she started to tell me she could knit, even if not a lot and that she doesn’t anymore. “We all could; we were invaded,” as if that should tell me everything.

I was suddenly glad I was wearing a gerdan, but she didn’t mention it so who knows. Either way, Eastern Europe was my guess.

But just then someone appeared who worked there but whom I’d never seen before nor she me. Her own accent was thick and clearly of Slavic origin. She wanted to know who I was and why I was there? Caught herself and backtracked a bit and asked if I had an appointment? But I wasn’t on the books…

She took my name to doublecheck that. Nope–I was off by a week.

I wondered what her experiences had been, too.

I explained that I’m pretty deaf and that I’d handed the phone to my husband when they’d called to make the appointment and I was sorry we’d gotten it wrong. She said that was her on the phone,  now realizing who I was, and she apologized–to which I said No, no, I got to meet you (turning to the woman I’d been talking to) because of this–thank you!

I went home chuckling over the effort life had gone to to get me to finally start to finish that silly hat (typing that knowing it still needs nine more ever-smaller rows. If you’re going to be so close you might as well be so much closer.)

Richard told me a few minutes later, They said today!

Meant to be, then, I told him.

My only regret is that I never got to ask that woman about the country she’d come from and how she’d managed to make it here. All those stories she’d lived through and how she’d come out of it a warm, loving person: I wanted to hear them!

Me, walking almost in the door from Trader Joe’s: I found it!!

Him, meeting me at the door to open it for me (but that’s not where I was heading yet.) You found it!

Last Monday I did some grocery shopping. Wednesday something in the car seemed…off. I remembered a news story some years back of someone who bought a new car, had some raw chicken roll under a seat, didn’t use the car for two weeks and when they found it their insurance company paid for all kinds of remedies before giving up and totaling out the car. Brand new. Replaced. For a chicken.

Thursday I opened the hood and cleared out all kinds of stray leaves, trying to find just where this stupid dead mouse or whatever it was was. Friday I searched the inside of the car yet again. Saturday I gave my friend who’s blind in one eye–oh wait, I thought I wrote about that here, guess I didn’t–a ride home but first apologized that the car had this, uh, problem, and we’d been trying, and I was so sorry.

Well if you don’t find it come back to me and I’ll find it for you guys! he promised.

Sunday parking the car at church we hoped nobody could smell it from outside the car.

Monday we didn’t go anywhere probably because we really didn’t want to. We promised ourselves we would finally find it once the sun got low enough for me to help in the search again. We forgot. And then you don’t go looking for decaying squishy things in the dark, I mean…

He never was sure it smelled mousy, though. I wasn’t either but it was definitely dead.

The next thing I said to him this evening at that doorway was, Remember that bag of greens in cream and garlic sauce that fell out of the freezer in the garage and didn’t get found for two days?

Yeah?

I bought another to replace it so we could finally try that stuff once, at least. I only discovered where it landed because I had a bag break just now and the trajectories led me to this–where I know I looked again and again and again. But there it was. I found it!

Clearly we are not meant to touch that dish, he said as I held it at arm’s length heading towards the garbage bin past the gate, exit, stage right.

He didn’t have to add, So please don’t ever buy it again.

…I went to go title this “At least it didn’t explode” and suddenly…

I told Richard, “As far as I know”…

And put on a jacket, was glad to see it’s not raining yet, and opened the car just to be sure.

It is much, much, much, much better.

Well hello! Are you still a baby? Must be that time of year again.

Cute little thing. Finally managed to find the one yard that didn’t have a dog to bark at it–I’d been wondering what critter their voices had been chasing around the last week or so.

On a different note, bird flu has decimated the peregrine population: they’re talking about DDT-era levels in some parts. The Berkeley Campanile Tower birds are gone, seven Bay Area nests out of ten being monitored by one biologist no longer have a pair defending their territory, and not only that, the usual floaters, ie single ones looking for a mate and a place to claim who would normally happily settle right into such an opening–they’re not there either.

And yet there’s our pair on San Jose City Hall. They’re doing all they can to get the egg laying started soon.

This is about the point where the previous male succumbed last year (or was it 2023?) and a yearling floater took over. Hoping for their resistance to the virus and into the next generations.

I wrote about wearing the huge sunflower gerdan in protest and solidarity the Sunday after the election.

What I didn’t mention was ABT coming up to me, wanting to know if that meant what she thought it did.

Support for Ukraine and made in Ukraine, yes, and I’d promised the woman who’d made it that I would wear it in celebration the day her country wins the war.

That meant a lot to ABT.

Two weeks ago I motioned her over at church. I asked her, Do you remember? and she went Oh, yeah!

I told her, I ordered something and this artist gifted me with the extra of a small gerdan–one that I already have one quite like. Is blue a good color, and would you like it? I pulled it out of its bag, its beads sparkling. (Not all do, but that one does.)

I knew, but didn’t say, how insane rents are in this area and how they can leave a young couple without a dime to spare. One of the perks of being older is getting to share. She got a little emotional at the sight as she took it in her hands.

I didn’t run into her last week so she made a point of finding me today. It matched her blue dress perfectly. It matched her and what she so hoped for for the sake of good people fighting for their freedom, and in the face of what our terrible leaders did to Zelensky this past week, wearing her support out loud felt imperative. And now she could.

And there I was, doing the same: that large loud sunflower was back on me.

March comes in on clumsy feet, kicks the trashcans down the street… Two warm days got things going and tomorrow the rain and chill come back.

Apricot seeds seem to get a better start in direct sun rather than behind a window, so the ones that had started to show signs of life were now outside in pots.  Three had leaves, two, just the beginnings of a tap root.

Five still-dormant ones were inside in their Root Riot plugs to keep a closer eye on because those can dry out fast. I knew I would need more pots and more soil soon.

There was this one out there that had a tiny white stub showing that on the others had turned into a cluster of leaves within a few hours–but not that one. The very tiniest discernible change took two days.

I considered its reluctance to thrive and said a quiet prayer: could You help the ones that would make great fruit to grow and thrive and end up where they’ll do the most good for somebody and the ones that wouldn’t to not encumber the time and water it would take to find out?

Yesterday morning that slow-mo seed was on top of the soil near the edge of the pot. Uprooted. Stabbed. No claw digging around it, no sign of a squirrel.

But at least the seed was still there to let me get a good detective-eye look at it, which was a nice touch.

I wondered how birds clean the dirt off their dinner and considered the fact that some types of apricot seeds are supposed to be sweet.

Today it wasn’t there. Nor was the other one out there that had cracked open and sent out the beginnings of a root but didn’t have leaves yet, nope, picked right out of the Root Riot within the pot to parts unknown. Definitely birds.

A little later a scrub jay flew onto the patio. Crows in blue finery. It was the first time I’ve seen one there in a year, the mockingbirds having bested them last year. It landed on the outside of a window ledge where I’ve never seen one land before because it really didn’t fit, tail and rear end smushed up hard against the wall behind it where it could guard its new territory: looking at me, looking at those three other pots lined up, looking at me. Novel take on a bird feeder ya got there, lady, don’t mind if I do.

Those last three had leaves–but the seedlings were so young that they hadn’t absorbed all the nutrients from the kernels yet, so the split halves were rounded little brown wings flapping and clapping and cheering on the little stalks stretching for the sky and clearly they still looked nicely tasty.

No you don’t. Those are mine. I found a small bird netting tent to fit over two of them and a mesh for the third.

Well, huh. I did say that prayer… Thanks for Darwinning those two for me, Jay!

And now I have two already-prepared large pots waiting for the next ones to wake up. Does that mean I’m done letting myself be told which ones are of future goodness? Hey, there’s more than one way to kill a plant, trust me, I’m good at it. Bumped into one pot last year and knocked it off the table right on its head. Once you snap it below the leaf line it’s done.

And over in that corner, I got my first set of tomato leaves today. Yay! Happy March!

Go grow things, it’s fun!

Conflict creates drama. At the very end, Trump reveled out loud at what great television this was going to make.

He’s a star, and some voters let him do it.

And so in the Oval Office, JD Vance accused Zelenskyy of campaigning for “the other side” last year, incensing 47 and egging him on to even greater bullying. Even knowing what I was about to see, it was astonishing.

This was supposed to be the President and Vice President of the United States of America, representing the hopes and aspirations of the American people before the world from inside the most important room in one of the most important buildings in our country, a temple to democracy, a place of diplomacy and peacemaking for all of our history.

I had read about it and thought, was it really that bad? I didn’t want to judge by what anyone else said about them, I had to go watch it myself.

Zelenskyy, put in an impossible spot, handled the betrayal with a great grace that was completely unseen by his attackers.

Trump played angry Mad King George to the hilt. Vance was worse because he was fully aware what they were doing and who would suffer and what the potential fallout could be across not just Ukraine but all of Europe–and that was fine with him.

Do the people who voted for these guys even know that they’re blaming Ukraine for starting an invasion of Ukraine by Russia and how twisted that is?

Vote for a rapist….

What is Putin holding over these men that they’re trying so hard to hurt people seeking to keep their precious freedom?

I go in every six months to see if it’s time for that retina surgery yet and today was the day.

Look at the blue dot, the tech said. Not the red line moving up and down. Look at the blue dot.

It took concentration not to let the red distract me–the blue held still and had a touch of a halo to it that was charming but that line, if you can call it that, wiggled and wobbled and threw its edges around like a spider’s legs on a wall while looking like it had been cut lengthwise with pinking shears.

Then they did the other eye. Now there was just a plain line going slowly up and down. No drama, just round and blue, straight and red, each conveying their information.

Looks great! said the retina specialist a few minutes later, pleased. It’s stable. That’s very good. Come in every six months and we’ll keep tabs on it, but we don’t have to do surgery for now.

Then this doctor, a man of color, asked me about my experience of how I was seeing, though, and I told him frankly, That (nodding towards the computer) surprises me.But then, in a flash of truth as I realized how it had been affecting me more than I thought–

–and what followed was one of those moments where you know you said just the right thing and that the person wasn’t expecting it but was so relieved and gratified to hear it–

I said, But maybe that’s just because of all the political noise going on right now.

One blue dot connected with another and we saw each other clearly. He seemed a little lighter of step walking out of there.

One whole side of the pomegranate tree popped out in small reddish new leaves overnight, officially declaring winter over. It had looked utterly dormant yesterday. Yay!

Things are starting to wake up.

In case anyone hasn’t heard: there is a move afoot to show the power of the people to those bent on ascribing it all to themselves.

Note that Jeff Bezos today announced that there will be no dissenting editorializing at his Washington Post from here on out: only those that support his vision of what ‘freedom’ means as he supports the current administration.

He asked the Opinions editor if he could agree to what he was being told to do, and Shipley said no. He is out.

Politico marveled, for a man supposedly bright about business, having already lost a quarter million subscribers in reaction to his exerting control over the editorial section before last Fall’s election, Bezos didn’t even try to hide it.

We have recourse. Friday, there’s a call for all to stop being consumers for one day: no buying (in some quarters, an exception is made for paying in cash to local small businesses, ie helping the little guy and not sending off a percentage of their earnings to the big banks via credit cards). No Amazon, no opening ads in your inbox, no shopping, no big corporations. Show our power of the purse to those whom that’s all they care about, to those who are cutting funds to the poorest (Medicaid, starving people, my stars) to give more to the richest.

Go on financial strike. Show them who’s really boss.

Just for a day.

There may need to be more.

Let’s see if Bezos lets it be reported on.

Note that Jennifer Rubin, lawyer and as of about a month ago a now-former editorial writer at the Post (her column was named Right Turn for her Republican take on politics, until Trump 1.0), co-founded “The Contrarian: not owned by anybody” a few weeks ago with one of the lawyers from the first impeachment hearing and it is already up to half a million subscribers. Nice.

Did two rows on the coral reef afghan this morning and then spent a whole lot of time hemming and hawing over the turtle that was going to come next. Went looking for sea turtle pictures just to be sure, and the green sea turtle had the markings I liked best. Modified the shape I’d made on my graph a little bit. Went through my yarns. I swatched one I really liked but thought that yes, it did, it had a little too much that was too light–it wasn’t variegated a lot but it was a lot for it.

I said I might have to go to the LYS.

Richard said, basically, If you do, you do.

I appreciated the support greatly–but I didn’t go.

And there it sat for eight hours. No progress.

I finally decided this is ridiculous, just pick it up and get started.

I picked it up.

I stared at it some more.

And finally the truth that had been trying to find room to squeeze into my brain all day got through and got my attention: I couldn’t start the turtle because that’s not where it’s supposed to go, and just because I want to do that next doesn’t mean it does.

Finally! I got back to work, and the yellow tail on that fish I just started was just the thing.

The turtle needs to be headed towards the uppermost jellyfish (hello lunch!), which doesn’t exist yet. Well then.