"Grief is a swallow. One day you wake up and you think it's gone, but it's only migrated to some other place, warming its feathers. Sooner or later, it will return and perch in your heart again."
--from pages 197 - 198 of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World
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| The clouds were really the stars of the afternoon. |
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| Shadows on the Fresh Flours wall |
On today's ride of just over twelve miles, we mailed a few packages and collected a fellow traveler so that we socialized, socially distanced and mostly masked, with another person over coffee on Fresh Flour's charming patio. And, okay, maybe I also laid in a supply of a few croissants and a Basque cake for future consumption. I was also taken with the way the window decorations and signage were reflected on the interior wall by today's so very lovely sunshine. It was a fine ride. I am making no progress on this year's calendar however.
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| Zoom in on the explanatory text if you can |
Another day in which the mileage was the old work commute so scarcely more than four miles. The photo above was taken back in early December, but it was on today's route as well so I say it counts. It's the sort of odd thing that pops up unexpectedly in out of the way spots in West Seattle. I'm not sure if it's official in some way or a bit of guerrilla public art.
I am ahead of last year's January mileage. That's something, right?
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| Still the dearest girl ever, even if this was a year ago |
Another short (4.2 mile) mileage day that results from having had an errand to do. There are no associated photos so this post features a year-old photo from Gradka's Laundry Period.
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| She says she hasn't felt so good in years. | |
I don't know that I've ever cared quite so much about an inauguration, though I miss the throngs of 2008. But this year was, I felt, a serious flag holiday. Today's ride was just a quick errand mid-morning, but maybe I tacked on a side trip to pick up cupcakes.
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| I sort of wish one of them was sporting pearls and sneakers. |
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| Downtown from the bike path |
Today's ride was just over eleven miles but ever so productive. We picked up the cheese and pasta I'd ordered from DeLaurenti plus a pepper from Frank's in Pike Place Market so there's lasagne in the oven even now. Then we headed south via the bike lanes on Second, which was particularly heart-elevating given the combination of dusk, headlights, and the way a mask makes one's glasses fog over. Happily, we succeeded in reaching Arundel's Books to pick up the copy of Man of the World that I'd preordered there.
From there it was all just riding in the dark, keeping an eye out for puddles and semis along Alaska Way. One doesn't get to note that on love to ride, however.
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| No idea what that green spot is |
After a slow start we set off on the Alki-Lincoln Park loop for a bit over twelve miles and some much needed fresh air and sunshine.
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| Farmers Market tulips from Alm Hill Gardens |
Yesterday we walked rather than biked and today's ride registers as a piddly 8.7 miles which I consider most unfair; there was a ton of uphill and I feel elevation gain miles should count double. Do I feel that long coasts shouldn't count at all? Of course not. I'm not crazy.
Anyway, most of today's miles, such as they were, came after we'd visited the farmers market where there's not a ton of produce these days--and Stephane was MIA again which means I should be making bread. Instead I've been taking down the Christmas tree and chopping it up, such being the mid-January tradition. The holy family is packed away as well. On yesterday's walk we saw the three magi joy-riding in the back of a pick-up truck. One wonders what else they get up to in the off-season.
Today, however, I suggested we tack on a few miles doing a reverse of our usual Alki-Lincoln Park loop but then switched to heading up to The Original Bakery which I always think of as being in my brother's old neighborhood. Of course it wasn't up the hill I thought it was, it was up another hill and then I felt we should continue east in our loop back home which meant, sadly, more hill. But at least we had baked goods. And apples and tulips. And now a living room that feels unusually spacious. It still smells like pine needles around here though.
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| Jeb the Pony never fails to delight. |
The weather has been challenging this week, and I've had a hard time breaking away from work so there were a couple of no-ride days. The power was out at home Wednesday so that day's ride was a return to the old work commute. At least it wasn't raining.
So--numbers aren't great given that it's already the middle of the month, but I record them anyway:
Today's ride was less than two miles, what with it being just to the market and back. So it goes.
Many years ago Scott and I spent a very hot fourth of July on Pig Safari, searching all over Seattle--on foot and via Metro--for the Pike Place Market Fundraiser pigs--at least, I think it was for Pike Place Market. Some months, or maybe a year and half later, they did the same sort of fundraiser with nutcrackers and we scoured the city for those, this time bundled up against the cold. Salty's in West Seattle seems to have collected nutcrackers and, in these sad Covid times, they have about a dozen lined up outside of the restaurant which we bike by fairly frequently en route to Alki.
Today's ride was in West Seattle since the Queen Anne snowy owl is on top of Queen Anne hill and that is one bit of elevation gain in Seattle that I just can't face. Damned hill. Pesky owl. But we got in 14.4 miles and had many fine views of Puget Sound and a mess of waterbirds today. But I choose to share the line-up of nutcrackers, perhaps for old times' sake.
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| The photo really fails to capture the extent of the horror. |
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| Some evenings call for a glass of rye and absinthe. |
The sort of day that, when it finally ended, really called for sazaracs and, a few hours later, starting cinnamon rolls for tomorrow morning.
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| It has been ages since I last made cinnamon rolls; fingers crossed. |
I'd really hoped I could just cut and paste my list from the side column but, of course, that didn't really work so goodness knows whether I managed to get all the proper links aligned here. If not, there's always google for the truly interested.
It turns out I read more than I thought I might in 2020; like many people, I found I lacked focus at various parts of the year. That resulted in my not blacking out my Seattle Public Library/Arts and Lectures bingo card--or maybe it's just that I found some of the categories particularly uninspiring. But looking through the list now, I find that I remember a great many of these titles quite fondly; I read some truly excellent books in 2020! It shouldn't be a surprise, but--by gosh--The Grapes of Wrath is phenomenally good. Like amazingly good. I'm so glad Paper Boat Booksellers had a nice-looking edition that caught my eye. Other stand-outs of the year were Circe, Three Things About Elsie, A Burning, and As Always, Julia. Particularly surprising to find fine was Pasta for Nightingales--a Christmas gift that looked like it would fall into the "pretty pictures but not such fascinating text" school. The text turned out to be quite fascinating and weird.
I read quite a number of Louise Penny's "Gamache" series and, in fact, a Gamache is my first book for 2021 as well. They aren't profound but they are somehow comforting. I cheat by quoting the last bit of the Acknowledgments for Glass Houses (which will be on next year's list, should we all survive that long): Three Pines is a state of mind. When we choose tolerance over hate. Kindness over cruelty. Goodness over bullying. When we choose to be hopeful, not cynical. Then we live in Three Pines. I don't always make those choices, but I do know when I'm in the wilderness, and when I'm in the bistro. I know where I want to be, and I know how to get there.
Some numbers: 54 books total including 11 re-reads, roughly 10 non-fiction (depending on how you want to categorize The Book of Mark, Maus II, and perhaps a few others), more or less 6 children's books. Some books this year were admittedly very short indeed (Cat Heaven had perhaps the fewest words on the fewest pages); others were quite long (The Levant Trilogy and The Balkan Trilogy are, as their names imply, actually each three not-short volumes).
As usual, the children's books were almost uniformly outstanding; Charlotte's Web never disappoints, though Jack and Jill was not exactly spellbinding. Anthony Trollope (Rachel Ray, The Claverings, and The Kellys and O'Kellys) is also always reliable and comforting. I admit Gingerbread left me a little baffled, How Long 'Til Black Future Month and My Purple Scented Novel were both a bit "meh," and The Thirteen Clocks was distinctly underwhelming, but there were very few outright stinkers this year. Utopia Avenue got some pretty lousy reviews, but it was a sweet, if predictable story (and oh! so much better than Slade House). I had some doubts about Piransi but it also turned out to be quite decent. Some of the books I've had to look at the links to remember--Homegoing, The Yield, Signs Preceding the End of the World--were truly excellent, but somehow just failed to stick with me; I blame my mental state, not the books themselves.
In reverse order of reading, the books of 2020 (indents, if they survive, indicate re-reads):
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
How Long 'Til Black Future Month?
How the South Won the Civil War
Signs Preceding the End of the World
Louise Penny and Magda Szabo are known quantities; I heard a snippet of Elif Shafek on NPR and it was intriguing. (Candle was an impulse buy at 40 percent off) |
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| It felt a lot more intense than this, I assure you. |
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| For the year--woohoo! |
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| Scott, Bernardo, and Bessie at the misty overlook |
I've no idea how long I'll keep this up, but today I'm posting today's mileage and a snap from the outing. The first day of 2021 was damp in Seattle. It was just starting to drizzle as we set out and developed into a serious downpour by the time we returned home. My coat is still drying. I need to find out how to re-waterproof it because my arms are just getting soaked when it rains these days.
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| New Year, New Start |
