The World Examining Works

Cake

 

 

One of the best things about birthdays obviously. Here a stupendously wonderful Carvel ice cream cake.

 

Here is a young man who forced down his sandwich extra quickly to get to the cake.

Here is a young lady who has never eaten cake before --let alone ice cream cake. (The perks of turning one!)

Investigation

and ingestion.

No fork required really.

Sfumato

 

Earlier this week the weather was misty and English --quite unlike the clear piercing light we usually get.

On Monday morning the tall buildings were shrouded in fog. (Shrouded always sounds a bit melancholy and romantic.)

Even the tree by the Midtown Tunnel managed to look picturesque.

Billowing something or other between the buildings of Penn South.

Dusk looking towards 23rd Street.

All these bare trees remind me of photos I took several Decembers ago on the beach in Morocco

where magic forests were created by the tide pulling dark sand over light sand or viceversa. I have always kept these pictures when much else has been lost.

Such trees, or coral, or roots of teeth 

Here trees reflected in water on 24th Street.

But back to the old misty business --Cold Spring Harbor on LI on misty Monday with the Hipstamatic filter

and the plain version.

Lastly Miss Gretchen -- like Diddle Diddle Dumpling my son John/One shoe off and one shoe on.

 

And the winner of the Novica gift code was commenter #6 DCW. I will send the code via email so you can buy someone a present from their  new gift finder.

 

 

Water

 

Run as fast as possible

to the edge of the water

to see the swan

and draw in the mud

run round the pond

to see the ducks

and look for turtles and fish underwater.

All photos taken in Huntington NY

Note: Robert has a painting in the show Urban Interections at the Quidley Gallery on Newberry Street in Boston. Opens Thursday Oct 25th. Do go if you're in Boston.

 

Beach's Last Hurrah

 

Ah! summer's end.....poor butterfly

but the crabs, scuttling through shallow water

seem to have thoughts of the future.

Almost no one on Sagg Main Beach. Granny dog and puppy Archer. We never discovered the third dog's name.

In the morning the sunlight cuts through the waves

in the early evening it's quite different.

Pondering change and the passage of time, it's cheering to discover that the Reverand Ebeneezer White lived to be 84. He died in 1756.

Gardiner B. Topping topped him -- living to be  91.

Nice, peaceful, nameless and lichen covered.

Sic gloria mundi.

 

 

A Week

 

Signs of the season: the first leaves fall into the paddling pool at the dog park.

A stormy sky reflected in the concrete down by Chelsea Piers

and a study of the gutter on 22nd Street.

Roses dry quite well so they can last and have their photos taken for weeks. 

 

Flowers from the planters on the roof --a very tiny arrangement.

Tis the season for the pee-wee (or is it pee-gee?) hydrangea?

A rather restful looking porch on Long Island.

Back home lemons getting their portraits done

as well as the bounty of yesterday's green market.

Waiting for the bus......

From my study window --making concrete for the scaffold which will surround the building for ages and ages while they do complicated things repointing brick.

Rockaway

 

Decided to discover the Rockaways --out beyond Brooklyn and Queens.

The subway pretty grubby

and we cross the Great South Bay on a little trestle

at first sight a little unpromising

I'm not sure I'd want a little house up on stilts

but we follow the families heading to the beach

past shops selling everything

a glory of plastic

I'm sure the town has seen better days

but even so

the creeper abounds

and the beach stretches for mile upon mile

 the water is warm and there are razor clams

and great piles of sand that look like the Sahara in the distance

the dress code traditional

after swimming we repair to the Last Stop Diner where the waitresses are sweet

the food and decor (Boomerang formica!) comfort indeed.

This last picture is simply because I like the colors.

More Beach

 

My husband holds that this is the best beach in the world.

I agree that it could be a contender. Personally, I like cliffs and rock pools and streams (that can be dammed). But it is a pretty good beach. We are here in the morning.

This seagull was the size of chicken and docile and just looked at us.

It reminded us a lot of our dog.

Seaweed....

A curious castle (not made by me) with twigs.

photo: Claudia Schmid

Afternoon on the North Shore of Long Island....

On the North Shore, the bi-furcated remains of a horseshoe crab.

At home in the city, the fruits of attempts at  urban gardening: lavender and basil, orange cosmos, two kinds of salvia and a pink whose name I don't know.

 

Horseshoe Crabs

 

Nicky collects horseshoe crab carcases as decor for Nicky Beach. These are two from last year. You have to put them a bit away from the picnic table until they stop stinking.

He also makes tablescapes which change pretty often.

We find this poor battered thing tumbling on the shoreline

washed over and over, barnacles attached.

I fip it over to reveal the articulated inside. Did Leonardo ever see horseshoe crabs? He would have loved them.

The shell looks like the helmet on a very tatty copy of Beowulf which used to kick round in the book room when I was a teacher.

 

Robert Moses Beach

 

Towel, hat

Lifeguard

Boogie board

Contrasts

Walk

Dig

Wet

looking west

 

 

Gadgets and Beach Reads

 

We are out on Long Island where we used to live and have a big garden, so it's bitter-sweet enjoying what used to be commonplace.

On the other hand, Countrymice might want a glimpse of the city. The answer, of course, would to be astoundingly rich and have both....and then there is the bother of two refrigerators and so on. But I digress.

My cell phone has this gizmo ( I think it was free) called Frametastic. Not sure whether it is a good thing or not. Anyway, it's fun to play around with. 

As well as looking at flowers, we went to the beach where I managed to study vegetation too.

 Probably better without Frametastic.

 Talking about beach reads, three of my books are now available in a Kindle edition and therefore super inexpensive.

A Fortunate Child a novel based on the true story of two women, one German, one English, during the Second World War. About mothers and daughters and adoption and joy and loss.

New Roof in October, a small book of poems

and also two books for the 9-12 year old set

Jane in Winter

and

Jane and The Essex Serpent 

These last two are adventures set in the 1950's. Happy Reading.