Visit the kelpforest....

Wow. From oppressive heat to pouring down rain; weather is bouncing like a rubber band...*

Well, I had been putting up mylife_onceaday photos that I'd posted to the community here, but then I got sidetracked by the scavenger hunts they started doing, and Sackboy Travels and other things. I still carry my camera around everywhere, but I guess I haven't been inspired to use it all that often, unless something really special or different happens. I feel like I seldom go anywhere new, and I'm constantly taking pictures of the same things, maybe just a different sky or another angle.

Anyway, the last non-themed thing I posted (here and in the community) was this, so I thought maybe I'd start catching up from there. And in a timely enough fashion, the next chronological photos are apropos for the month (and show I'm almost exactly a year behind - typical)...

http://www.ladayofthedead.com/



( LA Dia de Los Muertos.. warning - photo heavy )

Fantastic show. Great fun, the music was great and all the creations wonderful. I'm agnostic leaning toward atheistic, but if there is an afterlife, this is the way to celebrate it.

By the way, today is my mom's birthday. I think she might have liked this.


Link to all photos in this set. This year's Dia de Los Muertos at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery is on October 30. You might see another post like this after that date.

___________________________
*this damn post started on 10/5 when the weather was being really record-breakingly weird. Need to get 'puters fixed...

We actually went to the human cemetery today, but were surprised to find the gate locked; I would've thought it would been open at least until sunset. Then we checked out the pet cemetery, where in a corner we found what I took below. However, in the end I decided the above meant a little more to me. These rocks mark the spot in our side yard where my good buddy Bob is interred; the best cat who thought he was a dog who ever consented to live with me. He's kept company by Termite, not the smartest, but the sweetest. We miss them both immensely. The back rock is actually light green and sparkly, but I could not get the phone's white balance to record it properly. The front one is obsidian with red veins.

( To serve and protect... )

24. Gravestone ♥

This place is less than mile from my home, and I actually worked for about three years at the fast-food place visible in the background more than two decades ago. But in all the time I've lived in the neighborhood, I've never ventured inside, despite my father making use of the services there for my grandmother. Specifically, for my grandmother's beloved Boo-Boo.

Sea Breeze Pet Cemetery
Huntington Beach CA
Canon EOS 1000D
14 August 2009

( +4 )

Darn, just went to make a cup of coffee, and our lovely little boiling hot and refrigerated cold water taps by the sink in the breakroom are gone! Drat. Microwaved hot water just isn't the same. I may have to try it for some tea though; I need some caffeine.

At least the office seems slightly warmer this week, although I still wore my jacket most of the morning. Last week it was freezing in here all week. The building people said it was because of all of the office systems being off for the four day weekend, and it was taking awhile for the heat to get up to speed. Finally on Thursday, my boss held his hand up to the air vent and said he could feel some slight trickles of warm air coming out of it. I think what does come out the vents gets sucked straight out the floor to ceiling glass windows, because the inner rooms of the building always seem to be warmer. On a few days, it was definitely warmer outside. I know, here in southern California, that's not saying much, but damn it, it's been chilly lately. My feet weren't warm all last week.

I came in this morning to find a postcard on my desk, inviting me to donate my body for plastination. Apparently, PH had been to the Body Worlds exhibit at the California Science Center this weekend, and thought we might like to be added to the show. :p When DP asked if that's what he was planning to do when he croaked, he replied "Hell no!"

I hadn't heard this display was going on either. I saw an article in New Scientist saying the same scientist will be preserving a couple of giant squid in the same way, and forwarded it to VT. She told me some of her husband's students had been to his exhibition and taken pictures. I remember awhile ago when this exhibition was in London and hearing about protests; maybe they've been keeping this low key or something. In any case, it sounds vaguely creepy, as in several of the plasinated people are holding their brains in their hands, or balancing on top of them, but all for educational purposes. I was going to say I didn't feel any urge to go see this, but after looking at the two sites above, I'm beginning to feel curious. I have seen cadavers before, but this is a whole different thing. People report that actually seeing the real human body, how it's put together, and how it's affected by things like smoking, or where your duodenum is actually located, inspires them to take better care of their own.

According to the website, there are 300 plastinated bodies already extant, and another 6,000 willing to donate theirs after they die. However, while I do have my organ donor card filled out and nestled next to my driver's license, so I can do someone some immediate good if I'm suddenly squelched, I think I'd rather have the rest of my components just return to the natural cycle of things. Plant a tree on top of me, or scatter my ashes in the California Current and let the ocean take me where it will; maybe a foraminifer or a far off triton will use CaCO3 formed from my bones in its shell. Or you could scatter some of them here. There's a pretty little cemetery at the foot of that rock, overlooking the Tasman Sea, and I thought when I visited it in 1988 it would be a pleasant place to spend eternity.

edited: because apparently, I really like the word apparently.

Dad is still in the hospital. When they performed the surgery for his gall stone last week, it turned out it was infected and they were unable to do it laproscopically, so the procedure was much more invasive. He is on some pretty heavy duty antibiotics, still connected to an IV and a catheter, and he has a drain tube connected to his incision.

I called several times on Sunday before I went over to visit him, and it rang and rang and no one picked up. Whether he couldn't hear it or it wasn't working right I don't know.

They closed the surgery floor he was on (for the evening I guess, since there were only three patients) and moved him to the 4th floor. The social worker came in while I was there and said something about moving him to another hospital (a convalescent hospital I guess), because he's still on heavy duty IV antibiotics, although he's taking some orally now too. He still has a drain on the incision and a catheter. However, the case worker said that his insurance should cover home care too, so she wasn't sure why the doctor wanted him to go to another hospital. I have to call the doctor today to find out what's happening.

Dad said he does have long-term care insurance, so that shouldn't be a problem. This is getting more complicated than we expected. I hope it clears up soon. The hospital now is fairly close to our house, the one she gave me an address to is a couple of cities over.

My father could care less about covering up. He's only wearing one hospital gown with absolutely no coverage in the back, and when he got up to get in the wheelchair, one of the nurses made a comment about how he was flashing everyone, and went to get a sheet to put over his lap. He said something about "Well, it doesn't work anyway, so who cares?" and when we got to his new room, he just sat there on the bed, complaining that it was drafty. Well, yeah, it's drafty, because you're showing everyone what's exposed to the draft! I pulled up the blanket, and we sat and watched "Colonial House," until Gareth got too antsy to stay any longer (he started asking "when are we leaving?" about two minutes after we got there, despite begging to come in the first place).

Dad noted to the nurse that he now had a beautiful view of the cemetery next door, and she told him to stop being morbid. Gareth was very curious, and Dad told him that a friend of ours was buried there. After we left visiting Dad, I figured there wasn't any harm in satisfying Gareth's curiosity, so we went to visit Paul. It's hard to believe he's been there for 25 years, longer than he was actually alive. I last stopped there two years ago, so I had to cast around a bit to find his headstone. I should remember what tree it's near. It has a picture of his Eagle Scout badge on it - his parents were so proud he got that.

Was yesterday some kind of Vietnamese memorial holiday? Those sections of the cemetery were fairly busy. Lots of people visiting and many potted plants and flowers. There was even a group of people sitting in lawn chairs with an umbrella. Wind chimes, spinners and suncatchers had been hung where there were trees,. I was interested to see that there were a few headstones that had little hedges of iceplant or other plants around them that were obviously more than a few weeks old. I had always thought they didn't allow that because of the mowing. But there were a lot of places decorated with little figurines and such.

Paul's section was pretty quiet. Gareth had to check out all the older upright headstones - one is for Warner and another for Talbert, and I wonder if those are the same families a couple of major streets are named after. The dates seem about right. There are also quite a few military headstones scattered about among the families, and a few people by themselves, like Paul, whose family is no longer in the area.

In any case, Gareth found it fascinating and not a place to be creeped out or afraid of. Maybe I should take them to visit Grandma on Memorial Day - something she always used to do, she'd like it if we did it for her. John is not going to want to do much that weekend I'm sure, it's a painful anniversary for him too.

From the News From Lake Wobegon (a rerun from 1999):

"In the cemetery, there are graves belonging to several men who died some time ago, and to save a few bucks they added their wives names as well, who were still living. Their names were there and under the the year, 19--. The men died quite a long time ago, and I guess the 21st century seemed a long way away at the time.

So, now our cemetary is not Y2k compliant. "

-Garrison Keillor