Hi All: I'm a bit early starting this since it's right before midnight your time. Anyway, on the last page of the previous Weekly Chat, Tiger had some interesting info about what's involved in putting forward Big Ben. I had no idea. And Cirrus posted a shot of two very noisy creatures (thankfully we can't hear them!). And Soosin is looking for Karen. Had a nice day out with daughter; won't be around tomorrow evening your time as I'm taking the train down to Burbank Airport to meet a friend for dinner who's got a stopover there for a few hours en route to her home in Sacramento. Won't be home 'til around 10:30 p.m. - 6:30 a.m. UK time.
Pitter, patter, pitter, patter. That wet stuff has been falling ever so gently from the grey clouds all morning. Currently 20 C, 85% humidity. It has taken me ages to read the posts, what with weekly & daily updates, old and new! Plus interruptions for phone calls, lunch (I’ve left the dishes til later.) Thanks to all for news, links, pics. I saw EJ 'in person' late yesterday our time. I have to adjust my habits when I figure out what time it is over there.
Annette - Yesterday's tour was the best yet of the once-a-year outing. We visited 3 small cemeteries. The first, Wesleyan Methodist, now only has 2 broken stones and the remains of an old underground vault beneath tall gum trees. The chapel long gone. The second church & cemetery are still in use by the Uniting Church. The third is very sad. There was so much vandalism that the Baptist chapel was finally demolished in 1981 with some of the stone used to build a low front wall. The surviving headstones bear many signs of repairs. The cem is in an isolated spot but I toured UK visiting isolated churches and they were not vandalised. I remember places like St Hilda’s, Ellerburn, down a winding lane, no-one around but me. Here, even in the Adelaide suburbs, most churches are locked except for services. Anyway we ended the day at a school museum, formerly a single room school built 1854. The ‘headmaster’ lined us up, we sang ‘God Save the Queen’, marched inside and squeezed into the tiny desks for a writing lesson on slate, followed by a dip pen & ink. One ‘boy’ was caned. It was great fun. Then followed afternoon tea, sandwiches & biscuits.
AQ: Dip pens! And blotting paper. Oh god - all my school papers were one big splotchy mess. And my fingers were always stained with ink, which I then transfered to my sewing projects. What a calamity I was. I remember the advent of "fountain pens"; then ball-points (or Biros). And here we are in the age of the "delete" button (thank heaven!) :-) I love old graveyards; so much history. Sad about that vandalized one - all it takes is a few clueless twits with too much time on their hands. I mentioned before on this blog a cemetary in New Orleans full of French families who'd settled Louisiana and who died during one of several waves of yellow fever. The New Orleans tombs are all above ground because the city is below sea level and subject to flooding (even without hurricanes). One of the tombs belongs to Marie Laveau, a former voodoo queen - her tomb is always draped with "offerings" (beads, flowers, etc.) from superstitious visitors. In the California Gold Country you can see graveyards full of people from all over the world who came looking for gold. When I was 14, I went on a school trip to Venice, led by our teachers who were nuns, and they took us to Milan for a daytrip where we got to visit a cemetary (I guess that was their idea of fun!!). It was actually interesting in that I'd never seen photos and sculptures of the deceased on top of the graves. (But they did take us to La Scala too, which was wonderful, even without a performance!) I've always wanted to go to Pere Lachaise in Paris. Here, in Southern California, in the Catholic cemetaries. graves of Hispanics are always highly decorated with balloons, toys, etc., especially at Christmas, Easter, and on the birthday of the deceased. One section of Long Beach, where I used to live, is full of young people killed in gang shootings. Just awful. Anyway, isn't this a chirpy post!! Think I'll go check out the Update page! :-)))
Annette: You're taking the train!!! I want to go, too. I so love trains. How long will the ride be? Is it Amtrak? Is the passenger train fancy or practical? Are you going to see any game shows while you're in Burbank? :-) Are you having dinner at a nice place? Should I stop asking questions? LOL
An Amtrak train stops in Crawfordsville, the town where I get our groceries and supplies. This train travels back and forth between Chicago and Indianapolis. I think it's a nice ride, but people report that the schedule is very flexible, i.e. not on time. I've never ridden it, but I have always intended to. (I used to take buses from Indy to Crawfordsville.)
At one point, I planned a trip to Chicago via Amtrak to visit the old Waldheim Cemetery. I want to see the graves of Emma Goldman, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Lucy Parsons, and the Haymarket Martyrs. There's a very nice monument to the Haymarket dead. I'm still going to make that trip one of these days when circumstances allow. I'm working on a novel, and the modern-day characters are inspired by and motivated by the lives of the martyrs buried there.
Speaking of cemeteries, AQ, it sounds like you had a very interesting tour. Wonderful! Isn't it an abomination when people vandalise cemeteries. What's wrong with people? It happens often here, and churches are kept locked in the U.S., too. My ex-husband's grandmother was buried close to James Dean (the actor). His headstone has to be repaired/replaced often because people take chips from it.
Tiger: Thank you so very much for all of the LG history you have been posting on various threads. I find the story of Ollie fascinating; he was a wonderful bird. It seems to me that instinct alone would not explain the fact that he fed and nurtured his chicks as a "single father". I think birds/animals are much more complex than humans think they are.
Also, thanks for posting the pictures of Odin, so that we can attempt to determine whether any arriving males are, indeed, him. Confirmation will be more difficult because he is unringed. I appreciate your efforts.
Hey Diane: Yes. It's Amtrak's Surfliner, which runs from San Luis Obispo to San Diego via LA several times a day. It's a 2-1/2 hour ride (ridiculous actually when I could drive it in less than that) but it follows the coast, is comfortable, and very relaxing. And it's reliable in terms of its schedule. It'll drop me right across from the airport, so I can just walk to the terminal (there's only one) and meet my friend; then catch the 7:30 p.m. train back, which is when she'll be getting ready to board her flight. I'm hoping there'll be somewhere halfway decent to eat at the airport. Driving home this afternoon, I passed the Coast Starlight en route to Seattle - it goes once a day each way and has the dome cars for viewing. I always wave at it. Maybe we should talk AQ into meeting us and taking that ride to Waldheim cemetary since we're all such graveyard afficionados! :-) Where is James Dean buried? When I drive to my friend's farm near Fresno I always pass the place where he was killed - it's still a dangerous stretch of road.
Writing a book?? How far along are you and why did you choose that topic? Brilliant.
Annette/AQ: Marie Laveau was a fascinating -- and very smart -- woman. She was a hairdresser, and in that role she was able to collect a lot of personal, inside information on the elites. She reportedly used that information very effectively to increase her own power and influence. Her daughter was also quite famous. Reports say that 12,000 people showed up on the banks of Lake Pontchartrain to see her perform rites on St. John's Eve in 1874.
A hairdresser? No wonder she became so powerful. Reminds me of that lady who was quizzing you in the beauty shop!
Annette: That train ride sounds heavenly, not ridiculous at all. I grew up along the railroad tracks (the wrong side :-), and I've always been in love with trains. I can remember seeing hoboes (probably the last of them) jump off the trains near our house, right before they reached the stop in town. We had wild raspberry bushes in our backyard along the tracks, and one time I gave one of the men a basket of raspberries. Not safe today -- or then -- but I was fascinated by the hoboes.
I would dearly love it if you, AQ, and I could take that trip to the Waldheim cemetery. We could probably even meet up with Caerann up there in Chicago. We would have a grand time!!!
James Dean is buried in Park Cemetery in Fairmount, Indiana.
My book is about 1/3 complete. Tomorrow, when I am more lucid, I'll give you a short summary of the plot and my motivations for writing it. Thanks for your encouragement. I see that the nest remains empty. I'm off to bed, and I expect that you will be, too. Have a GREAT trip!!!!!!!!! I want a full account.
Sleep tight!
What a lot of conversation about graveyards. It reminds me of a holiday with my uncle, we toured Scotland, and made several unplanned stops to walk around various graveyards - not because they had family or anyone famous buried there, but because he was fascinated by different headstones, monuments and inscriptions.
Since our clocks altered last night I have an extra hour of daylight tonight - it has the effect of making the mornings dark for longer, but at least the days are getting longer.
Hope everyone has a good day of nest watching & I will catch up on the days events probably early tomorrow.