Signs of the County.8
Yes, California’s primary election will be held a week from today (on Tuesday, 3rd March), and I have now obtained the absentee ballot with which I’ll be able to vote in advance, even though on that election day itself, I shall have been back in BD for two days already. Fingers crossed for a year of greater hope :-).
Signs of the County.1 – Pliny the Younger :-)
So smw, slt has landed for a bit of a vacation back home in Sonoma County, where conditions are different in many ways than what one experiences in Dhaka: here, I bike with pleasure and see quite different sites. And, well, unlike Dhaka, alcohol and its consumption are legal though regulated. Since I was having such fun with my daily “signs of the city” photos from Dhaka, I figured maybe I’d do the contrast with signs of the county, here in Sonoma County and Santa Rosa. Today’s offering: from my bike back from UUCSR on Sunday morning, the annual ritual of hundreds of beer lovers lining up to be the first to taste this year’s release of Russian River Brewing Company’s annual limited-output “Pliny the Younger.” It was only through my beer-buff brother than I learned quite how big a deal this is in brewing circles — apparently RRBC is quite the name amongst the brewing community nationwide, and this line gets *long* on the … guess it’s usually the Sunday of President’s Day weekend? The very first February after I set up a home here, I was doing the same ride from UUCSR back to my place early one Sunday and saw this massive long line, and being a former New Yorker I thought “are they buying concert tickets? Or is it a new JK Rowling book release??” Then I remembered it was early on a Sunday, and noticed the crowd skewed much older (all drinking age) and more male than the JK Rowling crowd…plus it was 2015 that year, and hey, she hadn’t had a major line-up type release for quite a few years…so then I biked to see where they were lined up and voila, I learned about Pliny the Younger 😊
By the Golden Gate
OK this is it, the last post with photos taken in my wanderings on three continents in 2019. If there are to be posts going forward, I’ll actually have to boldly try to get my camera out in this big crowded city I’ve now called home for two months. These are miscellaneous shots taken of or by me during visits down to SF during those lovely summer months I spent at home in Sonoma county: outside a BARS concert in June, of a flowering century plant on Bernal Hill (above & below), or during my last visit to SF when I had to pick up a few supplies at Target in SOMA, prior to flying out here. I shall now focus on sharing views of the streets of Dhaka or the beaches of Cox’s again, until or unless I’m elsewhere on holiday :-).
Have a golden 2020, one and all.
Beachfront Birthday
I know of no better way to celebrate completing a cycle around the sun (aka one’s birthday) than to spend the day(s) surrounded by friends, in places one likes, doing things one likes. Some of my very best friends in the world let me do just exactly that along with their extended family for a full three-generational weekend of awesomeness that included seeing Sea Otters & hearing loud sea lions at Santa Cruz Pier; attending fantastic concerts at the Cabrillo Music Festival; sunrise, sunset, and daytime walks along a beautiful beach on Monterey Bay; exploring a wetland called Elkhorn Slough…oh, and some really good birthday cake and strawberries. True, this all happened in August, but it’s nice to remember it now that I’m about 8,000 miles away and reaching the end of an eventful calendar year. 😊 Here’s to holidays and special times with friends and family. (Just below, one of those sea otters. Further down…is it possible to enjoy – and photograph – a sunset too much?)
Rockets’ Red Glare
Ever since childhood I’ve been a complete sucker for a nice fireworks display. These days I’m not a fan of loud noises, especially explosive loud noises that are unexpected…but if I know fireworks are in the plan, then I’ll settle in and enjoy them for sure. I’d already had my home-base in Santa Rosa several years before I learned how well situated my apartment is to see most of the town’s annual July-4th fireworks display. Being the county seat of Sonoma County, I think Santa Rosa feels an important civic duty to have a great event at the annual celebration of US-nationhood. But the first few years I “lived” there, I didn’t happen to be in town at the right time in July. This year I was; I was free and enjoying some wine and the views on my balcony as the fireworks lit up the sky – along with a nearly full moon which was also lovely that evening. I’m fondly remembering summer in Sonoma County as Bangladesh – where I find myself now – prepares to celebrate its own national holiday on the 16th of December – Victory Day. Enjoy 😊.
From The Air (Yet) Again
Clearly, I fly a great deal. And clearly, I like to look out the window, dream, and see the world from a new vantage point. At left: the salt-evaporating ponds full of bacteria along the shores of San Francisco Bay, shortly before landing in April. Below: Hamburg and its major harbor along the Elbe, shortly after takeoff in September. In the three galleries lower down: more of the lovely colorful salty ponds plus a few shots from a late-May flight into SFO when sky was clear enough to see over the peninsular mountains to the Pacific Ocean; more of Hamburg as well as clouds above London and easternmost England, later on that flight; and then a trio taken while flying into SFO again from Dallas, in September. And at the very bottom, a large photo showing both some salt ponds near San Jose, as well as the mountains on the peninsula and the sky over the Pacific Ocean at sunset. There are reasons I’m always happy when I fly home to the Bay Area :-).
Hikes in SoCo – Wet & Dry, Pre- and Post-Fire
Followers and friends will know that I spent nine months at home this year, at first mostly near my mother’s (now former) home in New Jersey with some trips to my own home-base in Sonoma County, and then from June mostly in SoCo. The day I left my home to begin the travels which brought me to the desk in Dhaka from which I’m writing this now, I left earlier than planned because the friend whom I’d planned to be my ride to the airport was in an area that had fallen under mandatory evacuation, due to yet another devastating forest fire. That fire ultimately burned parts of Shiloh Ranch Regional Park, which had already been badly burned in the major fires just two years ago. I hiked up there less than two weeks before I flew out, and took the photo just below – where you see the charred part of a trail marker, left over from two years earlier.
You also see how very dry things are by the late dry season, making whatever vegetation there is ready fuel for any fires that do start. The photos I’m showing you here were taken on several hikes with friends (Howard, Nancy, Steve) and bike rides on my own, in many parks, trails and roads spanning a lot of Sonoma County between the end of the wet season / start of dry (the first photo in this post, on a bike ride in mid-April when rain might still fall a bit) to the one below, late October, late in the dry when we haven’t seen rain in more than six months.
I’m thinking of home on what’s still the end of Thanksgiving day, there in California – even if here it’s already Friday morning, that silly consumerist “black Friday” thing that American merchants get all excited about. Enjoy time with your friends and family, my beloved readers. They’re what’s truly priceless.
(so much world, so little time....) 