Every Now and Then I Fall Apart…

21 May

Guys, I have so much to share I think I’m having information overload and therefore am not sharing a darn thing. I’ve done so much over the past month or so. My camera is full to bursting with pictures of mini-vacations and projects, yet the blog has just been sitting here quietly twiddling its thumbs and watching reruns of Dr. Who (the blog’s a total nerd).

In the name of not completely abandoning the blog, I give you a quick post.

Yesterday, there was an annular eclipse of the sun in Asia and along the west coast of the U.S. While I wasn’t in the path of the full eclipse, we did get an 88% view of it. My boyfriend, his family and yours truly headed down to the Huntington Beach pier to get dinner at Ruby’s and watch the spectacle.

I was willing to burn out my corneas, but luckily just enough cloud cover came by to give us amazing views of the event without special equipment. I didn’t bring a camera because I figured I wouldn’t get a good shot, but with the clouds even my camera phone worked.

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Now, to make sure I’m in the true total eclipse’s path in 2017.

~ April

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Sea Findings

24 Apr

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I got to spend last weekend at a conference in Malibu. Before actually going to Malibu my only experience of Malibu came from the movie Intolerable Cruelty during a conversation between two very wealthily divorced women:

“Why don’t you come out to Malibu and see my new beach house?”
“I didn’t know Dimitri had a beach house.”
“Neither did I, until my lawyer found it. It was quite the paper trail, he had it in the dog’s name.”
 

This most certainly prepared me for the multi-million dollar houses that cropped up on the shore, but it did not adequately prepare me for my first encounter with these guys:

I could have spent an entire day watching this scene. My Peterson’s field guide describes these guys “chasing waves like a wind-up toy.” Poetic and remarkably accurate.

In other news, I got to go tide pooling!

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Oh, the crazy things you can do when you have podia.

I went a little crazy enjoying the underwater capabilities of my camera:

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I finally saw my first real life, not living in an aquarium at Sea World, dolphin. The twelve-year-old in me was positively leaping for joy.  It makes me want to start drawing dolphins on the cover of every single notebook I own all over again!

~Robin

it’s always ourselves that we find in the sea ~E.E. Cummings

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FTW Wednesday: Book Spine Poetry

11 Apr

FTW(ednesday)

Contrary to popular opinion, librarians don’t just sit behind their desks and read all day.  No, much of their time is spent on perfectly valid work activities, such as creating poetry out of book titles and then stacking the books up to display the poetry along the spines.  See, not wasting time at all.

These gems come from the children’s literature blog, 100 Scope Notes, where you’ll find more examples of librarians’ creativity.  Inspired by them, I decided to make my own version.  Working in a Catholic library left me with fewer options than a children’s section might, but I managed.

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~ April

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Happy Spring!

8 Apr

Winter passed us by this year and barely gave Yosemite so much as a glance. I’ve been wonderfully distracted for the past few weeks, in part because this spring has been blissfully unlike our last spring. It was a little startling, having grown up in Ohio and experiencing spring in places like New Hampshire and Illinois, to have actual spring weather on the first day of spring.

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I’m going to spend this weekend hanging out with the poppies and the redbud trees. Have a happy Easter if you celebrate it, and a happy spring if you don’t!

~Robin

P.S. Congrats to Amber and Kevin for winning the Hobbit Birthday Giveaway! Amber, I know where you live. Kevin, I will contact you to mail your prize!

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The Road Not Taken

26 Mar

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I–
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

~Robert Frost

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Happy Birthday Robert Frost!

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Joshua Tree’s Master of Camouflage

25 Mar

Lets get this part over with:

 

The challenge I left you with was finding the wildlife hiding in this photo:

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This was a bit of an unfair challenge considering that this critter can camouflage better than Peeta in the 74th Hunger Games. Not to mention he was camped out nearly a mile away from us. Let’s zoom in a bit:

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Look just to the right of the creosote bush at the center of the horizon in the last photo and you will see it, the shy king of Joshua Tree: the Desert Bighorn Sheep.

At this point you are probably wondering how on earth we spotted this. The truth is….we didn’t. I think it’s safe to say that we wouldn’t have seen it if a Canadian couple hadn’t pointed it out for us. (Thanks guys!)

My camera couldn’t zoom in anymore for a better picture. Fortunately, April was able to save the day:

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I was positively thrilled because I’d been hoping to see a desert bighorn after April and I went to a ranger program about them the last time I came to visit Joshua Tree. In fact, I’m still enchanted by a story the ranger told during the program: The Paiute Legend of Why the North Star Stands Still.

Desert Bighorns. Another reason to love J-Tree.

~Robin

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FTW Wednesday: Hunger Games Soundtrack

21 Mar

FTW(ednesday)

In the Entertainment Weekly Hunger Games issue, Taylor Swift described the songs on the Hunger Games soundtrack as “Appalachian music 300 years from now.”   Most of the artists, with the exception of Arcade Fire, Kid Cudi and Glen Hansard, seemed not even to attempt the futuristic angle, but the themes are definitely bleak and the sound is folky.  Most of the songs sound like they’d describe any poverty-stricken mining village, not necessarily District 12 facing a reaping.  Overall, I’m thrilled with the results.  If you have Spotify, you can listen to the entire soundtrack for free (but supporting the artists by buying it through your method of choice is encouraged).  For FTW Wednesday, I’m sharing some of my favorite tracks with you.


“One Engine” by The Decemberists (…and who’s surprised I love this?)


“Come Away to the Water” by Maroon 5 (this is one I didn’t expect to like)

“Lover is Childlike” by The Low Anthem.

Unfortunately, “Daughter’s Lament” by Carolina Chocolate Drops isn’t available for me to share, but definitely check it out on your own.

May the odds be ever in your favor.

~April

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Hobbit Birthday!

17 Mar

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The Cliffs of Moher, County Clare, Ireland

“Hobbits give presents to other people on their own birthdays. Not very expensive ones, as a rule, and not so lavishly as on this occasion; but it was not a bad system.  Actually in Hobbiton and Bywater every day in the year was somebody’s birthday, so that every hobbit in those parts had a fair chance of at least one present at least once a week.  But they never got tired of them.”

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

I think Hobbit birthday customs are perfectly sensible, so I intend to celebrate my birthday in true hobbit fashion. I also had the good luck to be born on Saint Patrick’s Day so I want to celebrate with one of my favorite Irish Bands:

I wandered into the tent where Girsa was performing at the Cleveland Irish Cultural Festival last summer while looking for another band and loved them instantly.  

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In celebration of my hobbit birthday I am giving away two Girsa CDs. All you have to do is leave a comment wishing me a “happy birthday!”  Include your email address so I can contact the winners, and I will enter you in the drawing. You have until Friday March 23, to enter.

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!

~Robin

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Rock of Cashel, South Tipperary, Ireland

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FTW Wednesday: Produce Geek!

14 Mar

FTW(ednesday)

Yes, I am in fact alive.  Yes, I also suck at regularly posting.  For that, I must apologize.  Hopefully, you’ll find this little tidbit as awesome as I do.

I work with Produce on a daily basis, and in the last year it’s really opened my eyes to the Seasons in a whole new way.  I watch as prices fluctuate and quality tapers off at the end of a season, or picks back up when it gets into full swing.  I watch in amazement as people play $10 for Organic Strawberries in the middle of winter.  I get to try everything year round, and experience the changes.  It’s really an awesome experience.  It has opened my eyes.

Like I often do, I hunt around online for stuff I like.  I came across a great website, Produce Geek. They post once a week to tell you what is at Peak Season, Value Priced, or just otherwise tasty. They also have an Organic Produce Geek. Check them out, and let me know what you think!

Produce humor...a.k.a - We got bored XD

~Manda

A Desert I-Spy

12 Mar

First of all, this post is about Joshua Tree, which means you need to listen to this while you read it:

Now that we’ve properly set the mood, you may continue.

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I still have not seen The Lorax, because I spent the opening weekend with April in Joshua Tree National Park. I did however, get to hang out with real plants that look whimsical enough to have sprouted from the imagination of Dr. Seuss.

The desert was as enchanting as ever. It awed with its alien landscapes that look like they belong on another planet. It surprised me with its extremes and the ability of life to adapt to a climate where heat and wind quickly strip away what little moisture there is. Even at its most beautiful, it reminded me of its fragility with stunning sunsets made more spectacular by airborne particulates from smog and starry nights blurred by lights from nearby cities.

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Highlights from the trip include hiking the Lost Horse Mine Loop trail, hiking with April to Lost Palms Oasis and Mastodon peak in the same day, and seeing desert flowers in bloom. The cliché of listening to U2′s Joshua Tree album while in Joshua Tree still hasn’t lost its charm for me. I also had a cool sighting of what I think was a Prairie Falcon dive-bombing a pair of ravens. I thought ravens were acrobatic in the air, but this thing was flying circles around them while -literally- flipping the bird.

However, the best wildlife sighting of the trip can be seen here:

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Can you find it?

~Robin

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