I got a lovely package in the mail today from my friend from Davis - cow and pig socks! Can't beat those. I love snail mail. It's much more exciting and personal than email, or Facebook.
Winter break is drawing to a close. I became sad about that today, thinking mainly of how each time I come home, I seem to fall more in love with... home. You'd think I'd have had time to do that during high school, and the entirety of my childhood. But, I took it for granted. I don't anymore, now that I live somewhere else for most of the year.
We drove out into a more rural part of Marin today, and we climbed out of the fog in my neighborhood, up, up, up into the hills, until the fog tapered out and we popped out into the sunshine. I'll miss the oak trees, and the almost-green hills, and standing on top of them and being able to see all the places you know from way up high. Davis has no hills.
But, Davis has other things that I love. Flat, lush cropland stretching out as far as the eye can see. Green pastures dotted with horses and cows. Bikes - I can't wait to be back on my bike (Muriel). I'm definitely looking forward to being back in Davis, in spite of the fact that I'll miss home.
What else is new... I had a book club meeting last night where we discuss Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier. I really liked it. It followed the plot of a classic Gothic novel, and was filled with suspense, intrigue, and, of course, the always entertaining English aristocracy. I'm eager to read more of her books. The next book on our list is The Falconer by John Cheever. I know nothing about it, except that a guy goes to jail. It's not the usual sort of thing I read, which is why book club is so great.
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Monday, January 2, 2012
Book Club Day
This evening is books club, which I'm very much looking forward to. Anything to discuss literature set in Britain (Rebecca). I got up early this morning to take Sally out for her weekend walk. I didn't think there would be much color to the sunrise, due to all the fog in the sky. However, in the East there was enough clarity for red to fill the distance, lightening to orange, then butter yellow, and finally deepening to bright gold. It was glorious. Now she's fretting because Dad is outside talking with a neighbor, and she can hear them. The sky is clearing up today, so hopefully I'll get out for a nature walk of some sort, if my parents are amenable to the idea of going as well.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
I forgot I had updated this year....
I've been reading a classmate's blog, and have been inspired by that (and the fact that I began a Goodreads.com reading challenge today) to update this blog more often. I think I've resolved to update more often in every update... we'll see how this holds.
I have a week left of winter break - it's been a good one, as we got an extra week off, bringing the vacation time to a grand total of 4 weeks. Lots of fun has been had... some highlights:
1) Volunteering at Giant Steps Therapeutic Riding Center, and getting to ride Cici, and adorable little grey Arabian mare. It was fun to use the techniques I have learned in my horseback riding lessons at the UC Davis Equestrian Center.
2) Having no cavities at the dentist and getting to see the bison in Golden Gate Park and have lunch with my aunt at Green's in San Francisco. It's a vegetarian restaurant, so I can order whatever I like!
3) I finished reading Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier for my mother-daughter book club. It got extremely exciting halfway through (the first half was pretty good, but slower), and I'm so excited to discuss it tomorrow at book club.
4) Started reading Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy. I'm thinking it shall be a downer.... but we'll wait and see how it goes. I'm more than halfway done!
5) I also read The Mischief of the Mistletoe, a Christmas outtake of one of my favorite Regency romance series.
6) Christmas Day was fun - lots of lovely and practical gifts, and Christmas morning by the tree with my family is one of my favorite times of the year. We went to my aunt's, and they have cats, so we couldn't bring Sally. I felt bad until I found out that Bob next door took her over to his house for Christmas dinner, where she was the life of the party and ate lots of meat.
7) I have walked over to St. Vincent's school across the freeway a few times - it's gorgeous out there, and very bucolic. I had been missing the Davis countryside. And, I saw a Great Horned Owl with my friend. We startled it twice, unfortunately.
8) I went to Kehoe Beach. It started out completely socked in, and even that was beautiful. Someone had built a seesaw out of driftwood, which we played on. Then, the sky in the distance started lightening, and the fog began pulling back towards the shore. As golden light emerged in the distance, the mist receded around us until the sun shone on the cliffs, and we had to squint into the sky. We even saw a peregrine falcon (I think it was an anatum) flying along the clifftop. It landed at what I believe to be a nest, as it was fiddling around there, and then flew to another spot, where it groomed itself and perched for a long time. The drive back was absolutely gorgeous. The sun had come out, illuminating rich green rolling hills, dotted with dairy cattle and beef cattle (there were many beef calves, all of them adorable).
9) Mom and I hiked up Grasshopper Hill today. Funny that we've never been to a place 10 minutes from home before. The view was gorgeous from up there, and we saw a doe and her two sweet little fawns, plus a flash of another deer, a red-shouldered hawk, and about 5 turkey vultures.
10) Yesterday, my family went out to the holding ponds at the sewage treatment plant (the stench is minimal, and in most places nonexistent). We saw lots of water birds - the highlights for me were ruddy ducks, buffleheads, and northern shovelers, green-winged teals, American widgeons, and black-necked stilts. I even caught a glimpse of an interloper snow goose amongst a flock of Canada geese. My other favorite part were the raptors - we saw an American Kestrel, male and female Northern Harriers, a red-shouldered hawk, turkey vultures, white-tailed kites, and either a Cooper's or a sharp-shinned hawk. Lovely raptor watching! I wish the lake had an osprey, though....
You can see duck hunting blinds from the ponds... our neighbor goes duck hunting. I couldn't imagine hunting those gorgeous birds for sport. I understand if it's your only source of food - that's nature. I even understand if you do it instead of going to the market for meat. The wild ducks are happier birds than badly farmed chickens, I'm sure. It's when people do it for fun, and don't seem to be conscious of the individual life they are taking that it bothers me a lot.
Well, I finished this up after the dog park - Kona, a dog I met as a puppy, was up there - she's grown up into a beautiful dog now. Callie and Nellie annoyed Rocket as he tried to chase his frisbee, and Maxx snarled at baby Benny, as usual. Sally begged, and ran around when I tried to dissuade her from digging. That's the only time she runs with me, haha. So, this was a long post, so I'll finish it up. It might be boring, as it's about everyday events. Although, the blog I read was about everyday events, and that was interesting to me... so maybe this will be interesting too.
I have a week left of winter break - it's been a good one, as we got an extra week off, bringing the vacation time to a grand total of 4 weeks. Lots of fun has been had... some highlights:
1) Volunteering at Giant Steps Therapeutic Riding Center, and getting to ride Cici, and adorable little grey Arabian mare. It was fun to use the techniques I have learned in my horseback riding lessons at the UC Davis Equestrian Center.
2) Having no cavities at the dentist and getting to see the bison in Golden Gate Park and have lunch with my aunt at Green's in San Francisco. It's a vegetarian restaurant, so I can order whatever I like!
3) I finished reading Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier for my mother-daughter book club. It got extremely exciting halfway through (the first half was pretty good, but slower), and I'm so excited to discuss it tomorrow at book club.
4) Started reading Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy. I'm thinking it shall be a downer.... but we'll wait and see how it goes. I'm more than halfway done!
5) I also read The Mischief of the Mistletoe, a Christmas outtake of one of my favorite Regency romance series.
6) Christmas Day was fun - lots of lovely and practical gifts, and Christmas morning by the tree with my family is one of my favorite times of the year. We went to my aunt's, and they have cats, so we couldn't bring Sally. I felt bad until I found out that Bob next door took her over to his house for Christmas dinner, where she was the life of the party and ate lots of meat.
7) I have walked over to St. Vincent's school across the freeway a few times - it's gorgeous out there, and very bucolic. I had been missing the Davis countryside. And, I saw a Great Horned Owl with my friend. We startled it twice, unfortunately.
8) I went to Kehoe Beach. It started out completely socked in, and even that was beautiful. Someone had built a seesaw out of driftwood, which we played on. Then, the sky in the distance started lightening, and the fog began pulling back towards the shore. As golden light emerged in the distance, the mist receded around us until the sun shone on the cliffs, and we had to squint into the sky. We even saw a peregrine falcon (I think it was an anatum) flying along the clifftop. It landed at what I believe to be a nest, as it was fiddling around there, and then flew to another spot, where it groomed itself and perched for a long time. The drive back was absolutely gorgeous. The sun had come out, illuminating rich green rolling hills, dotted with dairy cattle and beef cattle (there were many beef calves, all of them adorable).
9) Mom and I hiked up Grasshopper Hill today. Funny that we've never been to a place 10 minutes from home before. The view was gorgeous from up there, and we saw a doe and her two sweet little fawns, plus a flash of another deer, a red-shouldered hawk, and about 5 turkey vultures.
10) Yesterday, my family went out to the holding ponds at the sewage treatment plant (the stench is minimal, and in most places nonexistent). We saw lots of water birds - the highlights for me were ruddy ducks, buffleheads, and northern shovelers, green-winged teals, American widgeons, and black-necked stilts. I even caught a glimpse of an interloper snow goose amongst a flock of Canada geese. My other favorite part were the raptors - we saw an American Kestrel, male and female Northern Harriers, a red-shouldered hawk, turkey vultures, white-tailed kites, and either a Cooper's or a sharp-shinned hawk. Lovely raptor watching! I wish the lake had an osprey, though....
You can see duck hunting blinds from the ponds... our neighbor goes duck hunting. I couldn't imagine hunting those gorgeous birds for sport. I understand if it's your only source of food - that's nature. I even understand if you do it instead of going to the market for meat. The wild ducks are happier birds than badly farmed chickens, I'm sure. It's when people do it for fun, and don't seem to be conscious of the individual life they are taking that it bothers me a lot.
Well, I finished this up after the dog park - Kona, a dog I met as a puppy, was up there - she's grown up into a beautiful dog now. Callie and Nellie annoyed Rocket as he tried to chase his frisbee, and Maxx snarled at baby Benny, as usual. Sally begged, and ran around when I tried to dissuade her from digging. That's the only time she runs with me, haha. So, this was a long post, so I'll finish it up. It might be boring, as it's about everyday events. Although, the blog I read was about everyday events, and that was interesting to me... so maybe this will be interesting too.
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