a bit of space

This last Saturday was the opening/dedication of a brand new little park nearby, called Seaside Heroes Park. I'd heard (mostly read, in the local paper) they were going to build it, in a smallish space that had been a vacant lot through all my memory: an unused right-of-way/drainage ditch that follows the line of Lomita Boulevard west a block-plus after Lomita ends at Anza Avenue. The park occupies the space there between Anza and the next street over. Since the only place we needed to go this morning was Trader Joe's, Una and I had a little time to drop by and check it out.



I was specially curious because of who the park is named for: three locals killed in Afghanistan and Iraq in 2006-2007. I knew one of them, Matthew Ferrara, not as well as my father and brother did, whose Boy Scout troop he was in, but I knew him (and wrote about him and his family and his funeral here). An older lady walking her little dog arrived the same time we did, and we both paused to read the tiled wall. She noted that her son had gone to school with Joe Anzack Sr, the father of one of the other honorees. I noted my connection to Matt Ferrara.




It is a remarkably wonderful little park. I was pleased by the design of a curving pavingstone path between the two entrances, flanked by curving swaths of lawn and one small rubber-padded play area with a few things to climb on, up, and under, suitable for kids as young as Una (with a bit of handholding).




She seemed to approve too; she liked climbing and running around, and didn't want to leave.


I am glad they built it. I am sorry the reasons for the dedication exist. But it is a place with a good cozy feeling to it. We will be back again.

a wrinkle in time

This resolution business is a bit more difficult when the bambina does not nap for two days in a row. Should have done it on the weekend, yeah yeah.

I was interested in the news item that a Cornell psych prof emeritus might have found some slight evidence of ESP. Sadly, another article in the NY Times seems to explain that what is often considered statistically significant may actually not be. Which deflates the situation somewhat.

I consider myself a person of science. But I like to be open-minded about things when it seems possible. I don't think any of the really fancy ESP things that make for fun stories are very likely, or we would have seen more evidence of it by now. But I can't help wondering about little hard-to-quantify things, feelings that I have once in a while, a few stories I've heard from other people.

Okay. I can't help wondering if sometimes I'm feeling emotional echoes in my timestream of future incidents. It's never been much use, because it's not like an actual message or anything, just a feeling that "this is going to have been important later" or something like that. Once or twice I've tried to kind of feel ahead this way, trying to figure out "is this going to be bad/good" and see if I can get any sort of hint about it. I've also had a few instances where I get deja vu and was pretty sure I'd dreamed the moment previously. Never anything important; the example I was surest about was simply a moment rummaging in a co-op pantry with a friend in college, when I had not ever been to that co-op before.

Nothing I can really distinguish from normal pondering and worrying, if I really am strict with myself. And one would only notice situations that did turn out to be interesting later, after all. Mere pattern recognition going too far. Probably. Of course.

It's just kind of hard to prove a negative, innit? And more fun to think of unusual possibilities. Just in case...

This is not turning out to be a very good post. I apologize. The end of Monday approacheth and I need sleep. I'll get more of a running start for next week. ... I think?

in which a resolution is made

I've been blogging, off and on, and off, since October 23, 2000, which I am pretty sure is before the term "blogging" was commonplace, if it even existed. But consistency has always been a problem. It's acted more or less as my online diary, available to be read by anyone coming across it but most likely simply by family/friends. Which is fine. And that doesn't HAVE to change. But even just for me, I want to try to be more consistent about writing actual pieces. So I am 2011-resolving to do it.

The Goal: every Monday, to post a reasonably long (ie, not just a few lines) entry on some actual topic.

Aiming to post it Mondays will in theory give me time for my procrastinating self to write it the preceding weekends. We shall see how this works. This is going to have to count for today's/this week's, because I just now thought of it (provoked partly by my cousin's related resolution) and baby's naptime will be over soon. But by next week, yeah! Multiple paragraphs! Possibly thoughtfulness! Woo!

brought to you by the number 2

C is for cookie, that's good enough for me
C is for cookie, that's good enough for me
C is for cookie, that's good enough for me, OH!
cookie, cookie, cookie starts with C

this is the toy i'm looking for

I am writing this entry on my new Droid. This makes me happy, now that it's not giving me all caps like a moment ago. I want to figure out what I accidentally hit to make it do that.

In other news, the weather here, two days after July 4th, is cold and even, this morning, damp. This is unacceptable. We have obviously been assigned someone else's weather by mistake, again. I hope this mistake is rectified soon.

Otherwise, we're all fine, here. How are you?

Baby Una, 18 months old

This is actually from about five days before she turned 18 months old, but close enough.

I'm going to call her "Una" here, although that is not her real name, because I like Tomato Nation's method of using pseudonyms for people. And she is our first, so: Una. At some point we hope to have a second, so I guess he or she will be Secund(us/a), or maybe Deuce. Then I guess, if applicable, Terti(us/a) and Quattr(o/a). Or perhaps more obvious pseudonyms will present themselves. I could also call Una "Pumpkin," since we do all the time and she was born in October, but I like "Una" better.

...and then I joined Facebook

I did take pictures for that previous post, but before getting around to adding them to said post, I joined Facebook, which promptly sucked up all the miniposts I might have got round to posting here, along with additional scarce computer-puttering time. Will now start attempting to rectify that a bit, providing my blog is still here -- it's giving me an error when I try to look at it right now.

notes to the neighborhood

(Los C--- edition) <-- i feel all nineteenth-century doing that.

Dear coffee-brown two-story house,



I admire your decor, with the stonework on the front matching the stone wall around the front yard, and the flowers just outside the wall are wonderful. Most of all, I covet your left-side bougainvillea, the one whose flowers are cream-white with pink tips. I've never seen one like that; it is gorgeous.




Dear pair of adobe-style houses,



I admire what you've done on lots that are half the size of most of the other lots. Did the others used to be your size and everyone else combined them, or did someone split a regular-size lot and build two houses on it? In any case, you left-side house in particular have done a really nice job with the front courtyard with the little fountain, and the bougainvillea (regular bright color flowers) that adds just the right amount of color to the setting. Anyway, good going on your architecture (what I can see of it, anyway).

[edit 2010 Apr 16: they both have neat fountains. the other one is in a slightly different spot, and I hadn't noticed it before writing this/taking the pictures.]


Dear brick-front house with the gable second-floor windows in the dark-shingled roof,



You remind me of a common look for houses in the Philadelphia suburbs where my husband's family lives. It's a good thing; it means you remind me of vacationing every time I walk past. Though, in general, I feel that the effect of a facing on the front of the house, such as brick or stone, is dissipated somewhat when it doesn't continue around the sides. But I still like you.


Dear little house with the covered porch running the width of the front,



I admire the neatness of your front yard. Your porch looks nice and cozy and is the sort of thing I wish we had on the front of our house, with a few design differences (ours would be above ground-level and wooden railings instead of brick floor/pillars). Thus you inspire me to thoughts of home design every time I walk past, which I enjoy.

-----

Hm. I should perhaps have pictures with this. Maybe I'll manage that soon.

[Edited, finally, on 2010 Apr 16 to add the pictures. I took them only a day or two after writing this entry, but.]

of a feather

The Players: Two kindergarten-age girls, four slightly older boys.
The Setting: upstairs on the play equipment at Walteria Park.

Girl #1 possesses a large black feather that is way too big and fluffy to be from any local bird. It probably fell off someone's hat.

The following is transcribed to the best of my recollection.

Girl #1: Look at my feather! (Goes over and waves feather at group of boys, who are clambering about the connecting chain-net-ladder-thing like a group of little Spidermen.) Isn't it awesome?

Boy #1: The feather is boring.

Boy #2: How old are you?

Girl #2: I'm in kindergarten.

Boy #3: Well, we're in the grades, so there.

Girl #1: The feather is awesome!

Boy #x (possibly more than one): The feather is stupid.

Girl #1 (to Girl #2): Come on. (They go to the other covered portion of the equipment.)

Girl #1: They are stupid and they LIE.

first tooth

Right lower front. Emerged last weekend, seen here on Tuesday in a lucky photo. It's becoming more and more visible above the gum now. Bother, I think this means I have to start brushing it soon.

iconic

the travails of mr. penguin

o, the fickleness of young girl's heart:

four months

of CUTENESS. Not that I'm biased or anything.

since the eagles weren't in it

We all wore Steeler yellow on Sunday, although hers took the form of teeny yellow flowers, which I suspect is slightly atypical as Steeler fan-wear goes.



It is now a trend that when a new generation is born into my husband's family, the Steelers will win the following Super Bowl. It happened with him, and now with our daughter. Steeler Nation: you're welcome.

libra rat with sheep ascendant

This is our daughter(!!!)'s seventh week.



Although these pictures were not taken this week, she still looks pretty much like this.

down the flume

228 to 205 to vote down the bailout. That's 433 out of 435. Not bad considering that my understanding of the daily usual in the House is a few people speaking to an empty hall, aside from the C-SPAN camera and the other few members on the list to talk that day who are still waiting their turn. A bit curious who the missing two are, although not quite curious enough to go search them out.

(Assumption that the information is available somewhere, and probably on the web. Whatever did we do before the Web? Yet it's only existed in its current expanded state for about a decade.)

Heh. The Yahoo link to the AP article is labeled "financial_meltdown". Dudes, y'all ain't seen nothin'. Even a 550+ drop in the Dow, where we are at the moment of writing, is only about 5 percent. The really big slides have been in the double digits. Although, maybe the computers kick in to prevent those happening all in one day now. Guess we'll see where we are in a week.

Interesting times, as they say. I know that's supposed to be a bad thing. I can't help finding it a bit exciting. I should really hold my excitement until I at least have a functioning vegetable garden again. Which, given imminent baby, is unlikely before, oh, ... I have no idea.

one week late

Another nonstress test yesterday. Another round of happy (?) wiggling. I am getting contractions more often the last few days, but nothing has ended up coming of them yet. We set her a deadline, though, for later next week. If she's not out by then, we're a-gonna get her out.

I hope she decides to appear before then though; I'd rather she picked her own date. I know I don't like being interrupted when I'm in the middle of something.

Too bad she didn't pick yesterday; it would have been M's grandfather's birthday, who died just before we discovered I was pregnant. Of all the potential "target" dates in these couple weeks (and there are surprisingly many), that would have been particularly poetic. Ah well.

zero plus four

This would be a fun date for her to pick also: our engagement anniversary. But still no particular signs. I don't think Braxton-Hicks contractions count.

She was perfectly happy (nice and wiggly, anyway) during the nonstress test yesterday. Which is good. At least one of us is comfortable. :p

zero plus two

I confess to harboring a secret hope that she might be born on Bilbo and Frodo's birthday. I know I would have enjoyed that for myself, although I'm happy with my actual birthday which is also my dad's (and a great-grandfather's!). But still no signs so far that she's going to make it out today.

Turns out that those who care as much or more than me about such things have figured out that, due to differences between the hobbits' Shire Reckoning calendar and ours, September 22 in our calendar isn't actually their birthday anyway -- it was September 13, this year (due to this being a leap year). Oh well.

Shire Reckoning, by the way, has always seemed eminently more logical than our cobbled-together Gregorian, but the hobbits' old-school season-based holidays (Midsummer, Yule) that don't belong to any months would, I suppose, confuse too many people used to our modern three-day-shopping-weekend system.

zero hour

So today is/was the due date. So far, it doesn't feel like anything's up today. Considering I myself was nearly two weeks late, this does not greatly surprise me.

I am really rawther ready for her to be out though. She's getting ... big. I am ready for my ankles not to puff up anymore, for it not to be such a chore to roll (literally) out of bed or get up from a chair, for visits to the bathroom to become less frequent, for my regular clothes to fit again (I know I've got a few months yet on that one). I don't know if I'm ready for one or two hour blocks of sleep, or diapering, but ready or not...

At least the house is more ready for her now. Bedrooms were painted several weeks ago. Nursery is ready. Crib, dresser with changing top, glider chair (I'm actually looking forward to trying the nursing, providing we both can get the hang of it OK), a few toys already in the closet along with diapers and various other gear. Clothes, blankets, check. Stroller, car seat, check.

But most of all, it's just the curiosity. I am so very interested to finally meet her.