This is A Structure. To wit, a city apartment building, seen from about a block away. Seems pretty ordinary.
But move closer, and its fine structure becomes more visible. And more pleasing.
The bow windows lend a bit of class, and make the room inside bigger, and bring more natural light into the room. Then, move closer.
Now, you can see even finer structural details, like the individual panes of glass in the French doors. Doesn’t it make you want to see what’s inside?
Back in March, Hubby and I attended the After Midnight Gala auction for the Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra, a wonderful jazz Big Band. At that auction, we bought a weekend package that included two nights of lodging, and tickets to Friday and Saturday concerts, the weekend of July 31. Port Townsend is across Puget Sound from our home in Everett, so the weekend started with a beautiful ferry ride from Edmonds to Kingston. We just love this ferry, and sometimes we just go for a day trip. It was sunny and warm. Here are some pictures of what we saw from the ferry on the way over.
This one was taken from the ferry before we even left port! The State is doing some upgrades to the dock, and I am always impressed with the big machinery.
Next, I turned my camera in toward the car deck, and I just laughed to see this vehicle parked next to us. Check out the license plate frame.
We really do live in one of the most gorgeous places in the world.
That’s Mount Baker, which is north of us, nearly on the Canadian border.
We drove on west through Kingston and Port Gamble, and reached Port Townsend in the late afternoon. Here are a couple of pictures of the place we stayed. This is a private home, which was donated by the owner for the auction (one of the SRJO board members had stayed there and loved it). We had our own little suite with a private entrance at the back. Beware that monster!
Friday night’s concert (and all the rest) was held in a former blimp hangar at Fort Worden. Here are some shots of the outside and the inside. No photography was allowed during the concerts, of course.
Friday night’s performers were two groups. The first group was called “Keep on Keepin’ On”, with Justin Kauflin (an amazing blind pianist), Doug Weiss, Bass, and Kendrick Scott on drums. The second group “The Haris House”, consisted of Niki Haris, a wonderful singer, backed up by Wycliffe Gordon on trombone, Sullivan Fortner on piano, John Clayton on bass, and Joe LaBarbera on drums. They were all fantastic, and had the audience captivated. Jazz musicians tend to have a great sense of humor, too, and we all got lots of laughs.
Saturday had two performances, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Outside the hall in the afternoon, there were groups of student musicians who had been at the week-long jazz workshop, showing their stuff. These kids are awesome!
Saturday afternoon’s concert was incredible, featuring a lady who really screamed on her saxophone. You don’t often think of sax players as ladies, but this one, Tia Fuller, really knows her stuff! She was backed up by Sullivan Fortner on piano, Doug Weiss on bass, and Kendrick Scott on drums. Beautiful woman, great music, and lots of laughs-what more could you ask for?
Next on the program “Lifting Voices”, consisting of Cedric Dent and Niki Haris vocals, Sullivan Fortner again on piano, Jon Hamar, bass, and Joe LaBarbera on drums.
Last came the “All Star Big Band” of the workshop faculty, directed by John Clayton. They did get a little snippy with the conductor, but then they’re all stars in their own right! Soloists were Jeff Clayton on alto sax, Adrian Cunningham on tenor sax, Wycliffe Gordon on trombone, Sean Jones and Terell Stafford on trumpet, Hubert Laws on flute, and vocals by Dee Daniels and Niki Haris. The rest of the band consisted of Mark Taylor and Tia Fuller on alto sax; Adrian Cunningham and Alex Dugdale on tenor sax; Gary Smulyan on baritone sax; Brad Allison, Terell Stafford, Sean Jones, Jay Thomas, Andy Omdahl on trumpet; Wycliffe Gordon, David Marriott, Dan Marcus on trombone; Greg Schroder on bass trombone, Dan Balmer on guitar, Bill Cunliffe on piano, Chuck Deardorf on bass, and Matt Wilson on drums. I swear, Matt Wilson looked like something straight out of Mad Men! Needless to say, they were awesome.
After the Saturday afternoon concert we had some free time, so we went looking for dinner. We first drove down to the Port Townsend Marina. Beautiful!
Saturday night’s concert was just wonderful. The first act featured someone who I had never heard of before, Hubert Laws, whose instrument is the flute! You don’t often think of the flute as a jazz instrument, but Mr. Laws is a past master. Aside from the fact that the flute can get overpowered by louder instruments, the program was very fun, and Hubert Laws is a great musician. The last act featured a tribute to Louis Armstrong, led by Wycliffe Gordon on his trombone. All the musicians were really playing out, and we all felt that we had been really “jazzed-up” by the end of the evening.
As usual, we arose late on Sunday for the drive and ferry ride home. Here are some of the things we saw on the way out of town to the ferry in Kingston.
The Fort Worden Military Cemetery in just outside the gates. That is a cannon way over on the edge of the enclosure.
Closer to town, we drove by this old building, being devoured by the vegetation, and I just had to get its picture.
Most of my readers and followers know my political orientation. This sign, which we saw all over town, shows the orientation of most of the town. Opposite from mine.
Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it.
Here are a couple of photos taken from the bluff just outside the east gate of the old fort.
That’s the old officers’ quarters, which are now vacation rentals.
We got to Kingston around 4:00PM, and got in the ferry line. I went hunting with my camera, and this is what I found.
The newly-legal industry is doing their “good citizen” activity. Sigh…
Yes, even expensive Italian sports cars take the ferry.
The Norwegian Pearl, starting its journey to Alaska from Seattle. Three cruise lines ply that route, and it’s prime tourist season.
Once on the ferry, I got this one. Beautiful sailboat, in a brisk wind. She’s the Mata Hari.
All in all, a wonderful weekend.
This structure is in a pretty desolate corner of the world, on the bluff overlooking the Columbia River in north central Washington State. It also has a multitude of corners, angles, and intersections. You wouldn’t want to get caught by the sharp tip of one of those blades! Stationary, it almost looks like a piece of art. It was stopped the day we drove past it.
I love bird-watching, and when I’m outdoors I try to find them. But sometimes, when I’m doing something else, one will catch my eye.
This guy was on the roof of an accessory dwelling in the back yard of a friend in Colorado. What a place for a feeder!
We were surprised when a family of quail skittered across our path, down at the Desert Botanical Garden in Phoenix. I wasn’t looking for birds, just cactus. And they have such great camouflage, you have to be attentive to movement!
We were just walking the trail along the Sammamish Slough in Bellevue, Washington near where we live, when the sound of this little marsh wren attracted us.
…SQUIRREL!!
People are probably quite familiar now with the big story of how a Google software engineer was summarily fired for circulating a memo around his company, positing the viewpoint (taking into account verifiable scientific studies that confirm this) that a reason why more women don’t work as software engineers could be that most women don’t want to be software engineers; not that the evil male empire is preventing them from becoming software engineers. Google circulated memos in opposition, and their reason for dismissing their engineer was that his memo “violated company policies”. Here is a link to a post on the Ricochet Main Feed. Maybe you’ll want to join.
Just recently, the Daily Caller newsletter published an article discussing the participation of Google and Facebook in a gathering called “Netroots Nation”, a meeting of a variety of far-left techies. It seems that this “net roots” group will be ganging up on a pro-life organization. A Ricochet member did this, which is absolutely perfect:
[Editorial Comment. If your organization protests a group that is “pro-life”, what does that make you? Why, it makes you and your organizations and your sponsors “anti-life”, or “pro-death” (here’s looking at you, Planned Parenthood)]
The Daily Caller story also referenced a video, with the Google name changed to Gulag. You may never think of Google in quite the same way again. I have stopped using Google for my internet search. I use DuckDuckGo instead, and it works just fine. You already know that I do not use Facebook. Here’s just one more reason why.
Here in the Pacific Northwest, we live nearly surrounded by water. In Western Washington, anyway, you are rarely more than a mile from some body of water or other. Lake Washington, Puget Sound, the Green River, the Snoqualmie River, and Silver Lake are minutes away. No two bodies of water or rivers are exactly the same from minute to minute, or season to season. All those bodies of water moderate our weather here, and we rarely get extremes of heat or cold (recently we have been in a very unusual pattern of high temperatures and no rain at all for nearly two months). Water gives the Earth and all its creatures life, and sustains us all. Herewith, some examples of the beautiful water that surrounds me.
This is the Yakima River, just east of the Cascades in Kittitas County. It is wide and shallow, and a great place for fly-fishing.
The wake of a Washington State Ferry, leaving from Edmonds across Puget Sound to the Kitsap Peninsula town of Kingston.
Note how the color of the water is a reflection of the gray clouds overhead.
The Deschutes River at Tumwater Falls.
This is video I took of one of my favorite places, the Wenatchee River near Leavenworth.
Hard to believe that this flat, reflective surface becomes a raging torrent not too far away from this spot.
Glacial-fed Diablo Lake on the Skagit River. I am always amazed by the blue-green color of the water.
Calm waters of North Puget Sound, off the Port Townsend peninsula. We saw many kayakers that day, sticking close to shore.
Last, but not least, a rarity. Frozen water in the bird-bath in our back yard. Both ice and snow are present, and beautiful.
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/photo-challenges/elemental/
For years, we residents of the State of Washington have been hearing about the woes of our largest state psychiatric institution, Western State Hospital in Lakewood (south of Tacoma). This institution has had numerous escapes of dangerous inmates, reports of employees attacked by inmates (and sometimes attacking, themselves), and staff shortages and resignations. Once, a court commissioner nearly put Cheryl Strange, the Head of Western State Hospital in jail for not admitting an obviously insane patient who had been picked up by local authorities. The Federal Government, which contributes funds to the running of the hospital, has threatened to withdraw support if the hospital can’t improve its operations. This institution has been a hot mess for years!
So, today, the Governor has appointed a new head of the state Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS), which has had its own problems for many years (mistreated foster kids, elder abuse, high staff turnover, very high caseloads for social workers). And that new head of DSHS would be…wait for it…Cheryl Strange! So the state now has a head of the most-stressed cabinet institution, who has already demonstrated failure to handle the huge institution she has been responsible for for years! It is my considered opinion that Governor Jay Inslee needs to be committed to Ms. Strange’s former institution, so he can see how really competent his new head of DSHS really is.
It seems counter-intuitive for a plant to be both soft and prickly at the same time. This Arizona cactus, at progressively-closer views shows two entirely different textures. Seen from relatively far-away, it looks soft, with rounded curves.
Seen closer-up, the big spines look pretty dangerous, and the plant looks like you wouldn’t want to get too close.
But when you get really close, you want to jump back. Those spines can hurt!
If you feel the plant carefully, between the spines, it is actually very soft.
