The knock on my head apparently killed some brain cells, too, ’cause words, thoughts, ideas…I don’t have them tonight.  I’m stealing an idea from MommyByDay and just posting a picture.  Or two.

These were the greatest jeans ever.  Unfortunately, this picture is eight years old, so even if I could remember the brand and style, I’m sure they don’t make them anymore.  Too bad.

Here’s Mom playing Marine:

I wouldn’t say no to this view from my window.

Or this one.

Well, that’s enough.  Gotta give Roxy her medicine and go to bed.  Off to the busy life I lead…

And this:

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And lots more.  Those two pictures are of opposite corners of the first floor of our house.  There was blood EVERYwhere.  It was on the dishwasher, the blinds, the walls, all over the floor, the couch, and, of course, the dog.  Who was fine (and not really bleeding anymore).  John spent a couple of hours cleaning up, and then he brought Roxy upstairs to sleep and left Riley downstairs.  Roxy spent all of Tuesday at the vet, who didn’t have much to say.  She had a shallow gash along her shoulder, which apparently bleeds like a scalp wound would on a person.  As far as we can tell, Roxy had a seizure while John was a rehearsal and Riley did his crazy holding her down thing and in all the thrashing around, managed to scrape her shoulder.  Blood flew during the seizure, I’d imagine, and then Roxy did her recovery thing, which consists of her wandering aimlessly around the first floor, rubbing on everything and bumping into every hard surface.  This time, she tracked (and rubbed) blood all over everything within reach.

She really is fine.  John said she wasn’t bleeding anymore by the time he got her into the bathtub.  The vet didn’t even have to shave her.  We realized we can’t leave the two of them loose in the house when we’re not home after this, and so we can’t use the pet-sitting service anymore.  We can crate them while we’re at work or when we go out, but if we’re out of town, we can’t crate them all day and all night except for the three hours a day the pet-sitter is visiting.  Maybe if we had a house-sitter…  Luckily, the kennel had an opening (two – they have to be boarded in separate runs now, too) for the RI trip, so John left them there Wednesday morning and came to see me Wednesday night.

While I’m documenting seizures, she had that one Monday night two weeks ago (6/14), another short one the following Tuesday night (6/15), and she had one yesterday around noon (6/27).  Short, we were home, no big deal.  Every person who answers the phone at our vet’s office knows who we are.  I called this morning to update her file with yesterday’s seizure, and all I had to do was say just that: “This is Susannah, and I’m calling to update Roxy’s chart.”  They used to have to ask for my last name, my phone number, all that stuff, but not anymore.  On a positive note, two weeks ago she only had two seizures in a row, 24 hours apart instead of 12.  This time, she had one yesterday around noon and hadn’t had another one by the time I left for work this morning.  She seems to have broken the three-in-a-row-12-hours-apart pattern.  Yay!

John and I were out the door at 6:30 Saturday morning ’cause the night before (after we got mildly sunburned from walking around all day), I had a brilliant idea.  I wanted to do the whole cliff walk and then walk back along Bellevue (about 3.5 miles each way), but neither of us wanted to do it in the sun or the heat, so why not get up before the sunshine gets so intense?  Smart, right?  Sure.  It was early, but we managed.  The first part was great: gentle sunlight, not many people out, temperature in the 60s, paved path.

The start of the Cliff Walk

There was a bird doing a Batman impression right at the beginning.  Looked kind of freaky.  Was he warning us of something?  Maybe the trail was out.  Or a storm was coming!  Or maybe we should have been on the lookout for an angry mob of birds who think they’re Batman.  Hard to say.  Maybe he was just drying his wings after his dawn swim.

Maybe we stumbled on the super secret "Welcoming the Day" ritual of this particular type of bird.

We continued on to the Forty Steps and took a few pictures of the rocky coastline…

Forty Steps from a distance. Makes you wonder why they were put there. It's cool and everything, but did they ever serve a purpose? They used to be a gathering place for the servants and workers from the mansions, but that doesn't explain why there are steps there in the first place.

Close-up. Duh.

Shortly after that, the freaky bird came back with more warnings.

If the bird really wanted to warn us, it should have learned English. Would that have been so hard? We certainly didn't get the message.

Then the paved path went away.  Still not bad, packed dirt and the occasional line of large flat rocks.  Then there were the parts where there was no path.  Just rocks.  And not flat ones, either.

Inside the fence was private property. We had to become part mountain goat to finish the cliff walk, and I don't even think we were halfway at this point.

I didn’t take any more pictures after that; I needed both hands.  John took a whole series of the place we think is Hammersmith Farm (where Jackie O grew up), but we don’t have any more of the walk itself.

Probably (possibly, anyway) Hammersmith Farm

Not too long after that (and after a scramble across more rocks that turned out not be necessary – we missed the path), we found ourselves back on level ground, where Ocean Drive starts and Bellevue ends.  We were 3.5 miles from where we started with no alternative but to walk back.  At least it was shady.  And we could see the front side of some of the mansions.  I didn’t take any mansion pictures, but I can’t resist topiary.

Camels on a desert safari across a perfectly maintained, beautifully green lawn.

Our early morning adventure ended after more than three hours and over seven miles with quick showers and then breakfast at The Franklin Spa on Spring Street.  (By the time we cleaned up, we had missed breakfast at the inn.)  The Franklin Spa does breakfast really well.  I recommend it if you’re ever in Newport.  In fact, I recommend every restaurant we went to and every park, walk, or other activity we did.

On Friday, when we were in between appointments to see retail space, we joined the crowd on Ocean Drive to see the start of the Newport Bermuda Race.  John took some great pictures and I took some so-so ones.

Looking all professional. (Don't burst my bubble if that's not what professional photographers look like.)

One of mine. Hazy, not that interesting. But still - sailboats! Racing! And a helicopter!

I really like the color in this one of John's. And the dog is cute.

John plays with depth of field and proves that I was actually there (blurry, but there).

Don't know who these people are, but I love this picture. How does he do it?

More sailboats, courtesy of John.

And that’s enough.

I’m in the cafe (I’ve typed “face” instead of “cafe” three times now) of a Borders at Providence Place Mall.  (Really nice mall, by the wall.)  John’s flight left almost an hour ago, and mine (for Duluth) doesn’t leave for another three hours, so rather than return the rental car and sit around in the airport, I figured I’d find a place with free wi-fi (not free at the airport) and hang out for a while.  Doing this.

Now I’m hungry and I need to call Dad (Happy Father’s Day, Dad!), so I’m gonna pack up my laptop.  It’ll be midnight or later before I make it to my hotel in Duluth, so this’ll be it for today.  Actually, I’ll be in Chicago for a couple or three hours, so if they have free wi-fi, I may be online again.  I’m sure you’ll manage either way. 

Pictures?  Okay.

While I was lost (but before I knew I was lost), I went over that bridge, down some stone steps, and then nearly ran into a tree. But I got a nice picture out of it.

These steps. I didn't take a picture of the tree I almost ran into.

How awesome is that? There were benches everywhere, in all sorts of wonderful nooks and crannies, and if I lived anywhere near here, I'd spend lots of lazy afternoons reading in the shade.

I half-expected to see swans glide across this pond.

This little cottage (not accurate, but sounds nicer than shelter) overlooks the pond.

Seriously?  I want this place in my backyard.  Then there was the manicured part. With paths…

…and families.

Bridges…

…and a bride.

And flowers…

Lots of flowers.  And I didn’t even see a third of the place.

Not a real statue.

See?

You may not know this about me, but I have a sign on my forehead that says “Pick me!  I’ll play along!”  I love street performers.  I’ll always stop to watch.  And 9 times out of 10, I get picked out of the crowd to participate in some way.  (Or four times out of the five I can remember off the top of my head, if you want to get specific.  The fifth time I can think of it was Sandwich Stealer who was chosen)  I love it.  This past Sunday, as I was leaving the aquarium to go to Harvard (and before I couldn’t find the State Street T station), I wandered around Quincy Market/Fanueil Hall and stopped to watch a street performer.  Of course.  Did I get picked out of the crowd?  Yes.  Do I have proof?  Yes!  Because I asked some nice lady to take pictures.  Are they any good?  No.  But here’s one anyway.

I handed those flowers up to him and then did weird things with my hand before catching that pillow and throwing it back to him. Fascinating, right?

I shouldn’t go to bookstores when I’m away from home.  Unless I’m out of reading material, of course.  And if I’m driving, I think it’s okay.  So really, it’s just when I’m flying that I shouldn’t do it.  Boston has lots of bookstores, lots of used bookstores, and lots of good bookstores.  I’ve been in four of them.  And one of them was on a sidewalk near Harvard.  See?

I found four books there, $2 each.  Then I went to Harvard Book Store.  New books upstairs, used downstairs, and bought a few more.  THEN I went to one near where I’m working and bought three more Lawrence Block mysteries (I’m in the middle of one of them now).  And I have to fit them all into the two bags I’m already checking to get them home.  No more!  I’ll refrain from entering any more bookstores as long as I’m here.

1. I took the T from my hotel to the stop nearest the aquarium (which also happens to be the stop I’m using to get to work all week) so I could a) check it out for work so there wouldn’t be any surprises Monday morning, and b) get there faster.  The aquarium stop is the State Street stop, and at the stop right before it, this young guy, reeking of alcohol, got on and sat down next to me, ranting about how the cops should just leave him alone, you know?  Why are they hassling him?  I didn’t mention that it might have something to do with him being stinking drunk before 10am on a Sunday morning.  At least he wasn’t a mean drunk.  I could afford to be nice about it; I was getting off the train in about 30 seconds.
2. I got off the T at State Street, grabbed a bagel from Dunkin Donuts, and ate my breakfast in front of a fountain between Quincy Market/Faneuil Hall and the wharf area.  It was one of those fountains that kids like to play in (I know, that’s all of them, give me a minute), the ones with water shooting up from holes in the ground at unexpected times, with no curb or lip to keep people out.
   

   Every picture of this fountain turned out like this. They're all shots of water splashing around and they kinda miss the point. Sorry.

   

   These two had the same morning I had: breakfast while watching the fountain and then the aquarium. I wonder if they followed me to Harvard?

   
   

3. After the aquarium, I headed back to the State Street T stop so I could go to Harvard, but I couldn’t find it (the T stop, not Harvard).  I remembered leaving the station and being on State Street, but I didn’t look behind me that morning.  I circled the Old State House once, and headed back down the street about a block, scanning both sides for the orange and blue stripes indicating the station, and didn’t see anything.  I walked up to a street vendor outside the Old State House, finally ready to look (more) like a tourist and ask for help.  I was just about to open my mouth when I looked over his shoulder and saw the station.  IN the Old State House.  (Under it, technically.)  With entrances on both sides, even, so I walked right by it (TWICE) when I circled the building.  I’m an idiot.  Blind, too.
4. So I managed to get myself to Harvard (good thing the stop opens right across the street from it, ’cause I didn’t have a map) around 2 or 2:30, and from the looks of things, graduation was that morning.  As in, just ended an hour or two before.  Hahvahd Yahd was still blanketed with folding chairs, and there were crews starting to break down all the tents.  And hey, it really is covered in ivy!
   

   Ivy League. Who knew?

5. I hadn’t had lunch yet, so while I wandered around the outskirts of the university, I was keeping my eyes open for something local, maybe off the beaten path, ideally not crowded, and I found it in Arrow Street Crepes.  Check out that menu.  I had the BEST lunch.  I ordered the Earth Day crepe: roasted mushrooms, spinach, melted mozzarella, garlic butter, and parmesan, sauteed, melted together, and wrapped in a crepe.  It was the most perfect thing I have ever tasted.  (That didn’t include chocolate and strawberries.  And they do that in a crepe, too!)  SO so good, and we HAVE to do that at home.  The restaurant is a tiny little place on the first floor (up a couple of steps) of what used to be a house.  Basically just a kitchen and a sunroom with room for maybe 5 small tables.  Super cute and super good.
6. Some more fish pictures for you.
   

   A depressed-looking lionfish. I heard a kid trying to identify it for his friend: "That's a catfish. No, a tiger fish." Close, but not quite. Maybe that's why the lionfish is sad.

   

   What's the name of the other fish in the tank with Nemo? Gill? You know, the one with Willem Dafoe's voice (unless it's Denis Leary...). Anyway, I think this is the fish.

   

   It's looking at me....

   

   Look, it's Dory! Honestly, I must have been looking at the Finding Nemo tank.

   

   Scariest damn thing I've ever seen. No idea what it is (some kind of eel maybe?), but it poked its head out and kept opening and closing its mouth. Creepy.

   

   Up close and personal. Cliche? Yes. Evil with dead eyes? Yes. Too close for me? Yes.

   

   This one's for you, Dad. Herring!

   

   And this one reminded me of Roxy.

   More pictures (not as many fish, I promise) and a few more bits about Sunday tomorrow.

You know, today.    But doesn’t that sound cool?  Here is how I spent the rest of my day off in Boston.  With pictures!  ‘Cause I remembered my camera!  And then I used it!  (A crucial second step that I often forget.)  I just reviewed every picture I took today (215, thank you very much), deleted the blurry ones, and there is no way in hell I’m posting them all here, even assuming any of you wanted to see them.  I’ll show you a smattering.  (Good word.)

First, after my run, I went to the aquarium (for several hours) and saw ALL of the fishes, the penguins, the sharks, the jellyfish, and an IMAX movie that taught me way more than I wanted to know about the mating habits of cuttlefish, which, despite how they look, are not squids.

Cuttlefish, not squid. In Atlanta, I heard a woman tell her kid, "They're called cuttlefish 'cause they like to cuddle." The kid was grossed out by the idea.

My penguin pictures aren’t so great, but I did get a good one of a clownfish.  EVERYone recognizes Nemo now.  In every language.  I kept hearing, “Blah blah foreign language, maybe French, then some Swedish or Dutch or something NEMO!”  So here’s Nemo:

I’ve got lots more, and lots of stuff about today, but I need to get ready for tomorrow and come back to this.  I’ll leave you with my attempts at self-portraits from throughout the day.  Clearly, I need to practice this.

1st attempt. Lesson: My sunglasses are reflective. Take them off first. But at least I got the aquarium in the background and my whole head in the frame.

2nd attempt. Lesson: Put something interesting behind me. I was at the sea lion exhibit. Why are they not in the picture? I'm not even facing the right way to include them.

3rd attempt. Lesson: Timing. That's the end of a sting ray behind me. Could have been the whole thing. No idea why the picture is so grainy.

Attempt #4. Lesson: Don't hold the camera above my head and tilt down. That's quite the lovely picture of the ground you have there. Also, again with the reflective sunglasses.

5th attempt. (You'd think I'd have given up by now.) Got the harbor this time, but it kinda looks like I'm stalking that couple at the table. Lesson: Don't take pictures of other people surreptitiously if I meant to take one of myself. (Only do that when I'm going to make fun of them.) Also, please please please get my whole head in the frame.

6th try. Not massively improved. At least my head is in the picture. I'm at Harvard, not that you can tell by any landmarks.

Last try, back in the hotel room. I can barely manage, after four tries, to look at the camera when I'm in front of a mirror. How does Dooce manage this? I tried putting the camera to one side or lower down so it wouldn't be visible, but I couldn't manage that AND get my eyes pointing in the right direction at the same time. HARD!

Who needs self portraits, anyway?

I think these pots can be found here, but they don’t look exactly right.  The two-tiered thing is very elegant, classic, and possibly the direction I should go in.  On the other hand, these crack me up:

Found here.

The problem (only temporary) with starting an herb garden now (as in this weekend) is that I will hardly be home to take care of the plants over the next two months.  And I don’t know how much cooking John will be doing while I’m gone, with or without fresh herbs.  I suppose I could ask him.    In fact, I definitely should ’cause I will need his help.  I’m not very good at keeping plants alive.  People?  Sure.  Pets?  No problem!  Plants?  Enter at your own risk.

I’ve got a couple of random pictures of the UPitt campus from Saturday’s graduation ceremony.  Saturday was a beautiful day, all warm and sunny.  We woke up to pouring rain this morning, and after dropping Emily, Tom, and Molly at the building for the big university commencement, John and I hit the road for home.  It’s an easy four-hour drive (easier on a Sunday afternoon, in daylight, when we’ve only been up for four hours, not fourteen), and we stopped at Wegman’s on the way home so I wouldn’t have to go back out for groceries.  We ate lunch around 2:30, so we’re having tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella for dinner.  Light, fresh, easy.

Emily in her cute wrap dress and new pearls. Oh yeah, there's a sign behind her. We'd hate to forget where we were...

Emily in her gown and hood, while we tried to figure out how she was supposed to wear the damn thing.

The diplodocus (Elmer) outside the Carnegie Music Hall, our meetup spot after graduation.

The Cathedral of Learning (real name of the building)

Some church through the trees. Pretty.

I liked Pittsburgh.  We saw some really nice neighborhoods, some cute shopping districts, and I’m sure there are other places around the city we would enjoy hanging out in.  I’m not sure when the next opportunity will arise, though, since Emily will be moving away this summer to start her new job in New Hampshire?  Philadelphia?  Probably not North Carolina, but she’s got interested parties in all three places.  Good for her.

One week ago today, John and I got up ridiculously early (for a Sunday morning) (no, 5:20 is always ridiculously early) in order to get to DC (via metro) so he could run in the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run.  His training had completely derailed, since we had three feet of snow clogging all the paths and streets, and then when it finally melted, he got sick, he was working late, he had schoolwork – everything came together to make it hard for him to be ready.  He ran the Army Ten-Miler about three and a half years ago, but he hadn’t hit that distance since then.  And since he didn’t feel prepared, he was half-convinced the sweeper bus was going to pick up and take him out the race.  He had to keep up a 14-minute mile pace to avoid being picked up.  He knew (and I definitely knew) he’d do better than that, but that didn’t stop him from being nervous.

We go to the metro at Dunn Loring and got on the train.  Everyone who got on that train, at every stop, was a runner.  (They’re the only ones crazy enough to be going to DC that early.)  By the time we got into the district, the train was packed, and we all got off at the Smithsonian stop.  I wish I’d had my camera out because I looked back over my shoulder as we rode the escalator up and saw that the platform next to the train was one solid mass of people.  It looked really cool, but since I was part of that mass, I couldn’t get into my bag.  (I was playing sherpa, so I had the backpack to hold all sweatshirts, towels, water, etc.)

We followed the crowd from the metro to the grounds around the Washington Monument.  The race started in waves, so they didn’t expect all 15,000 people to be at the starting line at once.  The first wave was scheduled to go at 7:40, with the last wave at 8:00.  John was in the red wave, which I think was the second one.  All John had to do was pin on his number and go.  Of course, we’d just commuted in for more than an hour, so John (and every other runner) needed to find a port-a-potty.  Fortunately, there were tons of them.  Unfortunately, probably 7500 other runners had the same urge.  We joined one of the REALLY long lines and started to worry.  It didn’t look like it’d be possible for him to make it to the front of the line before the last wave started.  (It didn’t matter which wave he joined, so missing his wave wasn’t part of the worry.)

We waited in line for a while, and then he sent me off to find any alternatives.  I ran across 14th Street (near the starting line) and found another row of port-a-potties with NO LINES.  I raced back to John, waved him out of his line, and sent him running in that direction.  Feeling much better, he found me again as the next to last wave was starting, and we got him in the crowd.  And it was a crowd.  SO many people.  They were sent off, but they were packed in so tightly that they all walked for another few minutes.  So I walked along with them, outside the railing.

John in that crowd. The race has started, but nobody's running yet.

There they go.

I found a great spot along the rail right by the finish line (I was already there when  I look that last picture), so, along with some other very enthusiastic spectators, I shouted myself hoarse cheering on the finishers.  Long before John came in, Erik and Margaret joined me at the finish line, bringing much-needed caffeine.  We cheered John across the line, and then headed for our meetup point.  Here’s Erik, convinced he can spot John in the sea of people:

And here’s John, triumphant and sweaty.  He finished almost four minutes faster than his last 10-miler time.

From there, we hopped the metro out to Ballston to have a yummy brunch with Erik and Margaret at Whitlow’s, and then we went home, where both of us collapsed of exhaustion, even though only one of us deserved the rest.    Go John!