Espola's newest neighborhood
- Thread starter espola
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I posted this already elsewhere, but I repost it here for the benefit of a narrower audience.
This shows a fig tree growing up within one of the landscape bushes outside our apartment. Every few months the gardeners come by and trim the bush (and thus the tree) back into the desired shape. The fig is destined to show its true fig nature, and it survives by accepting for a time the pretty shape ordained by forces it does not understand.
I feel a poem bursting to get out. If I just rearrange the punctuation, is that close enough to free verse already?
This shows a fig tree growing up within one of the landscape bushes outside our apartment. Every few months the gardeners come by and trim the bush (and thus the tree) back into the desired shape. The fig is destined to show its true fig nature, and it survives by accepting for a time the pretty shape ordained by forces it does not understand.
I feel a poem bursting to get out. If I just rearrange the punctuation, is that close enough to free verse already?
San Diego Public Library is not accepting holds on books for a few weeks while they update their computer systems. So Saturday I took a nice hike over Point Loma mapped out to include a stop at the Point Loma Branch where resided the SDPL's copy of the Toyota maintenance manual relevant to my pickup. (Third time for the same book, this time for studying the cooling system - so far things look bleak).
Route 28 bus along Rosecrans from Old Town, then walked up Nimitz, down Voltaire, with a lot of walking around in OB at the end before finding the 35 bus stop to get back to Old Town. I had hoped but did not know for sure that The Black is still open. The lady behind the counter (much younger than me, but too old to be a beach groupie) didn't seem to be impressed when I told her I first came into the store in 1972. At least she didn't say something like "Shh - keep it quiet. Look how you turned out".
I probably should have gone up Chatsworth from an earlier Route 28 bus stop instead of Nimitz. Nimitz is shorter but* it is like a street trying to grow up someday to be a freeway, and one of its freeway-like features is lack of sidewalks over many long stretches.
*I took a leadership seminar wherein the facilitator suggested that whenever we use the word "but" in communication to consider whether "and" might work as well, even though in some cases it might result in a slightly different meaning. This "but" is deserved.
Route 28 bus along Rosecrans from Old Town, then walked up Nimitz, down Voltaire, with a lot of walking around in OB at the end before finding the 35 bus stop to get back to Old Town. I had hoped but did not know for sure that The Black is still open. The lady behind the counter (much younger than me, but too old to be a beach groupie) didn't seem to be impressed when I told her I first came into the store in 1972. At least she didn't say something like "Shh - keep it quiet. Look how you turned out".
I probably should have gone up Chatsworth from an earlier Route 28 bus stop instead of Nimitz. Nimitz is shorter but* it is like a street trying to grow up someday to be a freeway, and one of its freeway-like features is lack of sidewalks over many long stretches.
*I took a leadership seminar wherein the facilitator suggested that whenever we use the word "but" in communication to consider whether "and" might work as well, even though in some cases it might result in a slightly different meaning. This "but" is deserved.
Hüsker Dü
DA
You are spying on me!
Were you the guy with the grey-blond, slightly-too-long hair and a suckinable beer belly in beach shorts and flipflops and tattoos covering one shoulder? Yeah, I saw you a hundred times.
Hüsker Dü
DA
None of the above, lol, but you were in the hood.
I thought I posted this already. Didn't I post this?
Dewy morning with cucumbers (impressionistic blurring effects thanks to essential tremor)
I haven't tried to raise cucumbers since we moved here. This year my wife brought home a packet of seeds, so I planted some and thinned back to 12 plants in half of one of my planter boxes (down to 11 now). They are showing pretty little yellow blossoms and the vines tried to take over the stack of patio chairs in the corner - I moved most of them but left them one to climb on.
Dewy morning with cucumbers (impressionistic blurring effects thanks to essential tremor)
I haven't tried to raise cucumbers since we moved here. This year my wife brought home a packet of seeds, so I planted some and thinned back to 12 plants in half of one of my planter boxes (down to 11 now). They are showing pretty little yellow blossoms and the vines tried to take over the stack of patio chairs in the corner - I moved most of them but left them one to climb on.
I'm not sure how this works --
I found it in an interior design webpage in the category "modern bathroom sinks".
I thought I posted this already. Didn't I post this?
Dewy morning with cucumbers (impressionistic blurring effects thanks to essential tremor)
I haven't tried to raise cucumbers since we moved here. This year my wife brought home a packet of seeds, so I planted some and thinned back to 12 plants in half of one of my planter boxes (down to 11 now). They are showing pretty little yellow blossoms and the vines tried to take over the stack of patio chairs in the corner - I moved most of them but left them one to climb on.
I got some inexpensive shade fabric today at Lowe's in Escondido. I noticed that the leaves were wilting when in the direct sun too long, and watering didn't help much - they didn't fill out again until the building shadow returned. I think I bought about twice what I need here.
On the bus today, another passenger noticed I was reading Siege and asked me what I thought of t. I said he was a criminal lunatic and should have had his ass dumped out in the street already if it weren't for the cowards in Congress.
After that we were good buddies, talking about adobo and sushi and different Navy ports of call until he got off the bus in Kearney Mesa.
After that we were good buddies, talking about adobo and sushi and different Navy ports of call until he got off the bus in Kearney Mesa.
In a couple of weeks it will be a year since I was brought back to life by the actions of my wife, the EMTs she called for, and the ER staff at Palomar Hospital. I think I should plan some sort of Second Birthday celebration - perhaps something with fatty spicy foods and margaritas, eventually leading to chocolate treats.
Hüsker Dü
DA
Such the rebel.
Driving home from the bus stop yesterday, I got a Low Fuel warning on my car information display. I knew that San Diego area gas prices are generally coming down (according to gasbuddy.com), so I stopped and got $5 worth at the Arco on the corner I had to pass anyway, even though the price there has gone up to $3.459/gallon.
Today's adventure - Escondido part.
As I was finishing filling up ma petite char at the US Gas at 5th Avenue and Center City Pkwy (3.219/gallon cash or debit, and no surcharge on debit cards - for the moment my favorite gas station) a man and a woman pulled up in a big (BIG!) white new Ford pickup, and he had longer and whiter hair and beard than me. I asked as he got out "Does your wife ever tell you to get a haircut?" "No - my wife's blind. Don't tell her I have long hair." The lady in the passenger seat laughed.
As I proceeded to the Sprinter station, I was passed slowly on the left by a 1950-ish Willys squarebody, lowered, with a bigger engine dropped in and all that mechanical muscle showing because it had no hood. I gave them a thumbs up. The lady in the passenger seat laughed.
As I was finishing filling up ma petite char at the US Gas at 5th Avenue and Center City Pkwy (3.219/gallon cash or debit, and no surcharge on debit cards - for the moment my favorite gas station) a man and a woman pulled up in a big (BIG!) white new Ford pickup, and he had longer and whiter hair and beard than me. I asked as he got out "Does your wife ever tell you to get a haircut?" "No - my wife's blind. Don't tell her I have long hair." The lady in the passenger seat laughed.
As I proceeded to the Sprinter station, I was passed slowly on the left by a 1950-ish Willys squarebody, lowered, with a bigger engine dropped in and all that mechanical muscle showing because it had no hood. I gave them a thumbs up. The lady in the passenger seat laughed.
Today's adventure - Oceanside part.
My objective today was the pre-moving inventory clearance sale at Hellhound Military Surplus, just west of the Mission/76 scissor crossing, and a short walk from a Breeze Route 303 bus stop. They had advertised $4 MREs, which is almost half off what I have paid for them at other locations before. My budget, I figured going in, was $40 just so I wouldn't try to buy up the store. I brought along one of the Asian shopping bags my wife had bought in one of her trips (woven plastic, zipper top, and two cloth handles, and they can hold as much as I want to lift with one hand, although the graphics tend toward the Hello Kitty style, she got them for less than a penny apiece so she bought a bundle as business giveaways) and I kept stuffing in MREs, trying to find ones that I might actually want to eat and avoiding duplicates. As it turns out, 9 MREs is just about a full load, and is all the weight I want to carry with one arm, and came out to $38.88 with tax included. I was tempted but avoided buying any of the $10 and $20 sleeping bags, or $7 foam sleeping pads, or $15 parachute bags. A lot of the surplus was not military in any way (a plastic-wrapped stack of bar coasters, for example).
Now for the fun part - I waited a few minutes for the 303 bus going the other way back to the Oceanside Sprinter stop. At the next stop a young couple got on, man and woman, 30ish, looking like people who are carrying everything they own in a couple of backpacks and zipped up in a sleeping bag. They had to dig around in their packs to find one more dollar so they could pay the full fare they owed, and the driver waited at the stop until they did. After paying, they settled down in the back over the rear-wheel hump seats. The woman looked as attractive as many of the blondes I have seen on the Oceanside Pier beach areas, even with the unlit Marlboro hanging from her lips, long hair, good teeth, trim legs and body. After a few minutes, the woman started screaming at her man and at a woman seated on the other side of the bus. I'm not sure what the trigger was, but the discussion involved a lot of "get off me you fucking asshole" type of remarks. The driver stopped the bus right away (not at a regular stop) and told them they had to get off. The lady complained that she didn't have enough money to buy another fare, so we all compromised with her sitting up front across from me and the boyfriend(?) staying in the back, and everybody being quiet. (Somewhere a dog was barking in the middle of all this, but I'm not sure how that fits into the story.) The couple got off, still together and talking loudly to each other, at the first stop after crossing I-5.
At the end of the line, I asked the driver if this was a typical day for him "Sometimes it's much worse." "You were kind to them." He laughed from the driver's seat.
Somewhere along the line, I'm not sure where exactly, but somewhere on Mission Ave in Oceanside, traffic was backed up in one of the stripmall lots because there was a low-rider car-jumping contest going on in Mission Ave. exit from the lot.
My objective today was the pre-moving inventory clearance sale at Hellhound Military Surplus, just west of the Mission/76 scissor crossing, and a short walk from a Breeze Route 303 bus stop. They had advertised $4 MREs, which is almost half off what I have paid for them at other locations before. My budget, I figured going in, was $40 just so I wouldn't try to buy up the store. I brought along one of the Asian shopping bags my wife had bought in one of her trips (woven plastic, zipper top, and two cloth handles, and they can hold as much as I want to lift with one hand, although the graphics tend toward the Hello Kitty style, she got them for less than a penny apiece so she bought a bundle as business giveaways) and I kept stuffing in MREs, trying to find ones that I might actually want to eat and avoiding duplicates. As it turns out, 9 MREs is just about a full load, and is all the weight I want to carry with one arm, and came out to $38.88 with tax included. I was tempted but avoided buying any of the $10 and $20 sleeping bags, or $7 foam sleeping pads, or $15 parachute bags. A lot of the surplus was not military in any way (a plastic-wrapped stack of bar coasters, for example).
Now for the fun part - I waited a few minutes for the 303 bus going the other way back to the Oceanside Sprinter stop. At the next stop a young couple got on, man and woman, 30ish, looking like people who are carrying everything they own in a couple of backpacks and zipped up in a sleeping bag. They had to dig around in their packs to find one more dollar so they could pay the full fare they owed, and the driver waited at the stop until they did. After paying, they settled down in the back over the rear-wheel hump seats. The woman looked as attractive as many of the blondes I have seen on the Oceanside Pier beach areas, even with the unlit Marlboro hanging from her lips, long hair, good teeth, trim legs and body. After a few minutes, the woman started screaming at her man and at a woman seated on the other side of the bus. I'm not sure what the trigger was, but the discussion involved a lot of "get off me you fucking asshole" type of remarks. The driver stopped the bus right away (not at a regular stop) and told them they had to get off. The lady complained that she didn't have enough money to buy another fare, so we all compromised with her sitting up front across from me and the boyfriend(?) staying in the back, and everybody being quiet. (Somewhere a dog was barking in the middle of all this, but I'm not sure how that fits into the story.) The couple got off, still together and talking loudly to each other, at the first stop after crossing I-5.
At the end of the line, I asked the driver if this was a typical day for him "Sometimes it's much worse." "You were kind to them." He laughed from the driver's seat.
Somewhere along the line, I'm not sure where exactly, but somewhere on Mission Ave in Oceanside, traffic was backed up in one of the stripmall lots because there was a low-rider car-jumping contest going on in Mission Ave. exit from the lot.
I posted this already elsewhere, but I repost it here for the benefit of a narrower audience.
This shows a fig tree growing up within one of the landscape bushes outside our apartment. Every few months the gardeners come by and trim the bush (and thus the tree) back into the desired shape. The fig is destined to show its true fig nature, and it survives by accepting for a time the pretty shape ordained by forces it does not understand.
I feel a poem bursting to get out. If I just rearrange the punctuation, is that close enough to free verse already?
Apartment.....?
Hüsker Dü
DA
How long did it take to accumulate that? All personal or are you dumpster diving?