INVITING THEMSELVES TO DINNER

THE UNWANTED GUESTS

      They are not shy about bringing the whole family to dinner, on your lawn, garden, flowers, or even deck.

       Dare to step into their dinner party and you get a 

"Who invited you?" look.

     They are hedonists, practicing the time honored tradition

of "Eat, lay and play."

      "Hey, you talkin' to me?  You talkin' to me?"

      "OK.  He's got the camera again.  Time to move on.  Thanks buddy.  We'll be back, when the roses are blooming."
       See you down the trail.

HOME BAKED & HALF BAKED

WHAT'S WRONG WITH PEOPLE?

             A couple of things are clamoring around in my

        mind, looking for a vent.

             Kathleen Parker of the Orlando Sentinel wrote

         a piece that, sadly, most of us can relate to.  A 

         loud, foul mouthed, obscenity spewing person, in

         this case a woman, got on a crowded elevator and

         continued to abuse her son for several floors liberally

         using  mother F......   I've always been conflicted

         about how to respond to such boorish behavior. 

         My strongest response was to a group of young men

         in a restaurant when I said "please, watch your 

         language or hold it down.  There are children here."

         That drew a derisive sneer, which I was happy didn't

         escalate to more.

               The other item was about the shooting and beating

          of football fans at the 49er-Raiders game in San

          Francisco.  San Francisco?!!!  No "flowers in your 

          hair...love in there" vibe.  San Francisco?!!!

          Cosmopolitan, sophisticated, center of West Coast

          urbanity?

               I've spoken to groups about the divide between

          the educated and the entertained.  Now I wonder

          about the growing gulf between the civilized and

          the modern American barbarian.

ENOUGH! 

NOW TO SOMETHING BETTER

  IT CAN'T GET MUCH BETTER

      Lana has been baking bread for longer than she'd care for me to say.  Friends and family appreciate this special, but only one of many, skill.

      When we came back from lunch the other day she noticed the dough had risen more than it usually does.

       Ever ready for an adventure, I thought I'd follow it through the process.

       Shaped, braided and put in pans to rise a bit more.

       Risen enough, it now almost ready for the oven.

        In it goes.  The final step on the road to delicious.

 Perfection.

 And now, it is time for me to get in on the act! The appreciative consumer!

See you down the trail.

PACIFIC VIEWS

REEL THOUGHTS

SARAH'S KEY

     Sarah's Key is one of those films that hits you hard.  

       The story line is tense and intricate. The acting, especially by Kristin Scott Thomas is superb. It is directed masterfully as the story moves between past events and a current unfolding of a mystery.  But it is the historical reality that plays as background and setting for the plot weave that is most moving.  

        The French, under Petain cooperating with the Nazis, rounded up and shipped thousands of their fellow countrymen, French Jews, to death camps.  Based on a novel by Tatiana de Rosnay, a French journalist, the story begins as thousands were rounded up in the Vel d'Hive incarceration in 1942 when a family is separated.

         In a way the story is framed by a sentence spoken during the film  

                                                   "The Truth has a price." 

     The truth of the context that gave birth to this fiction is painful and costly as is the fictional story played across 6 decades. The French can not escape what some of them did, nor can the world forget the Holocaust.  

      This is one story set against millions of real tragedies, but it is a story that packs an emotional wallop while once again reminding us of what should never be forgotten. Less important, but still significant, the story also demonstrates what value exhaustive journalistic reporting provides.  

THE SUMMER SHORE

       We are coming into what could be the best time of year

along the California Central Coast.  

       The sun warmed Pacific is reaching more mild temperatures.  Surfers always wear wet suits, but on the hotter days you see a few people wading or splashing in the surf.  The pier seen above is at San Simeon, near the original Hearst pier.  It is also near where the "Friday Lunch Flash Mob" is known to assemble.

        As late summer deepens into early autumn, temperatures warm, winds subside and there is less of the marine bank fog  that you see lurking off the point in the frame below.

       Though fall maybe the best, every season is magnificent

here in the unspoiled California.

        See you down the trail.

THE WEEKENDER :) KITTENS & SCRATCHIN'

WAITING

 We've adopted two kittens from the local

rescue service and are anxious to get them home.

The male, needed an extra week to 

be well enough for the "fix."

Now the female is ailing so the 

move here has been delayed.

But here's a first snap shot.

Our "momma cat" Nesta really misses

her Ziggy.  We figure these two will

fill her day and night.

DO YOU WANTA DANCE?

My friend Cris, aka Dr. Moto Groove

found another golden oldie in his unique vein.

Here it is for your weekend grins.

Aside from the great tune-see if you

emulate a couple of these dance steps?

Oh, and if you can, let me know what you think

the guys in the alley were up to?

See you down the trail.

FRIDAY IS FOR FLOWERS

AND APPRECIATION

Tamar, our driver/guide for part of 

our journey in Israel was very emphatic

"No man would think of coming home on a Friday

for Shabbat, without flowers."

The idea stuck.  

A bouquet in a moment, but first

REEL THOUGHTS
THE HELP

THE HELP is a great film.
But first a personal note.
I won a national Emmy for an investigative documentary
on the Ku Klux Klan.  My professional interest in racism began many years before, when as a young reporter I covered a "sit in" as black citizens were trying to get service at an establishment that banned them.  That was in 1965. A year later I got tossed down a flight of stairs by goons from 
a Klan chapter as I offended them with questions I had asked.
I have covered, race, segregation, integration programs,
prejudice and discrimination for most of my years in journalism.  Before that I attended an integrated
primary school and had friends of another race.
My junior high school had a larger population of black and Hispanic students than white. 
I've seen the ugly face of race hatred and prejudice up close.
THE HELP is not only a great film, it is one I wish everyone would see.  It is superb on all counts.  Acting, directing,
the technical skills and most importantly in the emotional
timbre. A great book has been made into a great film
that is sure to move you.
Though I lived through the era, what surprised me the most
was how recently we (American culture) lived liked that.
What moved me most was the dignity and courage that
black citizens evinced in the face of an outrageous
stupidity and hatred.
See it.  Everyone should.

DAY BOOK

FLORAL FRIDAY

I'm fond of the willowy Mexican Sage, 

though some consider it a pest.

We continue to love this Mediterranean climate

which means something is blooming almost all of 

the time.

See you down the trail.

JUST GRAZIN'

SOME DAYS THAT'S WHAT

YOU FEEL LIKE DOING

It was still foggy as I drove back up the ridge after

a couple of hours of morning tennis.

A couple of chores to do and then time

doing what this guy was doing,

until I disturbed him from his grazing.

Grazing now, at the computer, can absorb hours. With an increasing number of social networks, news services,

YouTube videos and more blogs than you can

possibly read, I wonder when is too much?

But as a kid who remembers  when we got our first television set I remain thrilled at the inexhaustible reach of

articles, opinions, videos and brain food

right here at the finger tips.

Pardon me while I munch some more.

See you down the trail.

THE IMPOSSIBLE

GOOD AND BAD
from root to branch

Do you find it difficult to hold opposites in your mind

at the same time?

Before you answer, here's a little ditty from

Lewis Carroll.

Alice is speaking with the queen

"There's no use trying," she said "one can't believe impossible things."

"I daresay you haven't had much practice." said the Queen. "When I was your

age I always did it for half-an-hour a day.  Why, sometimes I've believed as many

as six impossible things before breakfast."

 Frame this in your own sense of possible.

Stanford University has offered a free online course that has

has attracted 58,000 students. That's four times the size

of the school's enrollment.

I find this exciting and perhaps even a dawning.

 Consider this from the New York Times

The class on artificial intelligence is one of three being offered by Stanford’s computer science department and will be taught by two leading AI experts, Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig.

Thrun led an effort at Stanford to build a robotic car that drove 132 miles over unpaved roads in a California desert. Lately, he has spearheaded a Google project to develop self-driving cars, many of which have already been tested successfully on American roads.

Norvig is Google's director of research and a former NASA scientist. He has also written a widely read textbook on artificial intelligence.

The online students will not get grades or credit for participation, but they will be ranked in comparison to their online classmates.

Thurn explained that the course was part of an effort to increase the accessibility of once cost-prohibitive higher-education. “The vision is: change the world by bringing education to places that can’t be reached today,” he told the Times.

What amazing advances might emerge. What creative solutions could occur.

AND THEN

There is the Pentagon Budget process, another place that can't be reached or the embodiment of thinking the impossible not only before breakfast, but constantly.

McClatchy Newspapers reports it is practically impossible to get an accurate and thorough account of the cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. 

 Impossible to know how much we are spending.  

One estimate puts it at $3.7 Trillion or as McClatchy reports "$12,000 per American."

As we suffer a budget and economic crisis we don't even possess the tools to understand how and where to cut where we should.

These wars are THE economic crisis.

I guess our President and Congressional leaders can't hold two opposing ideas in mind.

Nor do they seem to recall the words of the highest ranking US Military leader ever. 

He was also our Commander in Chief.

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."

— Dwight D. Eisenhower 1961 Presidential Farewell Address

See you down the trail.