Street Work and Halloween

I came across these autumnal trees walking home from work yesterday. It's amazing how fast the leaves change. It seems that all we need are a few cold nights and suddenly we have autumn.

Remember that sign indicating our street would be closed for a few days beginning on the 14th? Well, this is what the closure looks like. I have no idea what's going on here, exactly, except that it's a Thames Water project and it's linked to that house on the right, which has recently been entirely gutted and basically rebuilt except for the outer shell. It's been a long, long renovation process and I guess they're getting a new water hookup, maybe?

Meanwhile, at work, our Halloween book display went up yesterday, with the help of some enterprising parent volunteers. (All I did is pull the books.) I like the witches' hats hanging from the ceiling!

Not to mention the big, hairy spider hanging off my desk!

Garfield

Another picture from my canal walk on Thursday. I'm showing you this partly because I like it, but also because yesterday was a complete photography fail. I don't think I took any pictures at all.

Oh, actually, I did take a pic of one of our dahlias:

This plant is pumping out flowers by the dozen. It's outperforming all the other "Bishop's Children" plants. I don't know if it's happier because of its location by this warm, south-facing brick wall, or if it's just extra-robust. I have been deadheading the dahlias like crazy, and that supposedly keeps them going.

So, OK, one picture. Otherwise, I just didn't have the opportunity for much photography. I barely left the house, except to go to the laundromat and walk the dog (briefly) up the street. I did a lot of cleaning here and took care of the houseplants, and read a chunk of "Bleak House," and watched a movie in the afternoon. ("Mandragora," a 1997 Czech film about the fraught lives of male hustlers in Prague. I remember seeing it at the theater when it came out, but I'd forgotten how melodramatic it is -- a bit over-the-top considering the subject matter is already plenty dramatic. It's the last of a trilogy of films, the other two being documentaries I watched earlier in the week.)

Dave was away for part of the day, helping students prepare for honor band auditions. I know! On a SUNDAY! I hope those kids are grateful.

Here's another photo from Thursday, a bit of graffiti at Trellick Tower. I was a big fan of Garfield back in the day. I had about eight of his books, I think. As the graffiti artist noted, he was very '80s! I was going to say my level of laziness yesterday was on a par with Garfield's, but I did at least clean the house, and I did not eat any lasagna.

Oh, and we Skyped with Dave's parents last night. They say their mobile home in Cortez survived Milton just fine. A neighbor went and checked it inside and out and sent them a video. Some nearby residents had damage and even flooding, but their home is slightly elevated and apparently stayed high and dry -- except for the loss of the washer and dryer in an outdoor shed during Helene, which I think I mentioned earlier. (And possibly the air conditioner, because the compressor is on the ground -- they're not sure yet because the house still has no power.) Anyway, they're obviously relieved about that.

Dave and I got confirmation of our Christmas plans in Whitstable, and we're also making arrangements for a little trip at Thanksgiving. Stay tuned!

Autumn Cemetery Visit

Olga surprised me yesterday by ginning up the energy to go to the cemetery. We hadn't been there together since August, and frankly I wasn't sure we'd ever go again, so I was glad for the opportunity. Usually we set out for a walk and she turns around at or near the top of our street, ready to come home.

And not only did we get all the way to the cemetery, we walked the entire thing -- not just the back half like last time. The old girl was having a good day!

The area that was thick with green hogweed in July is now relatively bare (above), the hogweed having died back for the year.

It was a fairly unremarkable walk, but as I said, I was happy that it happened at all! The cemetery itself is pretty timeless so not much had changed there -- just the slow revolution of the seasons.

I didn't even bring a tennis ball this time, and though there was no squirrel-chasing, there was definitely squirrel-watching. She seemed to have fun. Look at that dog grin!

She is still sound asleep as I write this. I'm hearing lots of snoring.

Otherwise, not much happened yesterday. I read about 50 pages of "Bleak House," which is slow going at first, but now the plot's beginning to pick up.

I just opened my e-mail and found 28 spam messages, 13 of which were from the Democratic party or the Harris campaign. Can I just say that I am SO READY for this election to be over? It feels like it's been going on forever, doesn't it? I realize I may not be happy with the ultimate results -- and it's inexplicable that the race remains so tight -- but still, I am ready to move on.

A Failed Talisman

A relatively quiet day yesterday. We had an engineer from British Gas come to make a minor repair on our boiler -- the timer switch, which we use to control when the heat runs, wasn't working correctly so he replaced it. At this time of year we usually set the boiler to come on first thing in the morning, for about an hour, just to warm up the house. But we don't want the heat to run all day, and that's what was happening. I came home from work one day last week to find the house stifling. Argh!

I also went to the doctor for a routine follow-up visit after all my medical tests in the spring. I  really want to repeat that calprotectin test to see if the numbers are still elevated -- if I still have inflammation in my guts, in other words. The doctor seemed unconvinced that it was necessary but it's a cheap test so she went along with it. It's mostly for my own curiosity. It bothers me that I had an abnormal test that is completely unexplained and I'd like to either see that it has resolved or get to the bottom of it.

Olga, meanwhile, took advantage of the sunny day, lying in the yard on her bed. It wasn't particularly warm out there but she didn't seem to mind.

Our passionflower vine has produced several of these heavy-looking passionfruits. I suppose we should come up with a recipe to eat them, assuming they're the eating kind. I know nothing about passionfruit! A squirrel already got to one of the ripe ones, but I think we have five left.

Finally, Milton has proved to be the gift that keeps on giving. News emerged yesterday that the Rod & Reel Pier on Anna Maria Island, where I spent a lot of time hanging out with friends in my 20's and 30's, and which I photographed several times on more recent visits, was destroyed by the storm. It had already been damaged by Helene, but now it is completely gone. Shocking!

Coincidentally, I wore my Rod & Reel Pier t-shirt when Cherie came over on Wednesday night, as a sort of talisman against the storm. Strange to think I was wearing it at the very moment the pier was collapsing into the water.

A Canal Walk

Well, I'm happy to report that all my peeps in Tampa seem to have come through Milton OK. My stepsister said a large limb fell across their road, temporarily blocking access, but it was being removed as she told me about it.

You may have seen that a massive crane collapsed in downtown St. Petersburg and crashed into the building that houses the Tampa Bay Times. I've been in that building several times, including once almost a quarter of a century ago (!) to interview for a job I didn't get. (It was actually better that I didn't get it, because the opportunity arose to move to New York a few months later.) I still have friends who work there. The building looks pretty badly damaged.

Things in London are fortunately much calmer than Florida, weather-wise. I took a walk yesterday along the Grand Union Canal, from Lisson Grove through Little Venice and Ladbroke Grove to Willesden Junction -- about four and a half miles, according to Google Maps. It was a good day for photography, with light rain eventually making way for intermittent sunshine, so I got some decent photos.

I tried to pay attention to the changing seasons. We haven't hit "peak leaf" yet but there's some color out there.

The leaves combined with the quirkiness of the canal boats made for fun picture-taking.

I don't know what's happened in this area under the Westway. There are three or four derelict, burned-out boats in the water, including that one in the foreground that is little more than a pile of floating plywood, and there's loads of rubbish piled against the wall along the path. It looks like there was a fire, or series of fires, and people are perhaps rebuilding -- but I couldn't find anything about it in the news. It's a mystery.

I stopped at Trellick Tower to check out all the street art. I used to come here with Olga all the time when we lived in Notting Hill. It makes for good graffiti photos, but I only took a few this time around. I guess I'm not as into graffiti as I once was.

This area between two bridges was hard to photograph because it was just a little too wide for my camera lens -- and I couldn't back up anymore without the bridge intruding into the picture overhead. So I took a pano shot with my iPhone. It's nice to have a couple of camera options!

It was a little strange to make this walk without Olga, but she can't go that kind of distance anymore. Hopefully she was content to go to Hampstead Heath in her dog-walker's van!

It's Happening Now

All the drama is happening across the ocean this morning as Milton crawls across Florida. I've just been reading up on the news and it looks like Tampa has escaped the worst of it, but of course the storm is still happening so who knows. Areas to the south seem to have been harder hit, and then there are all those tornadoes toward the east coast of the state.

My friend Cherie is visiting London with her husband, and they came over last night for dinner. Their home is in South Tampa, and their daughters are staying with a nanny in Brandon, which is inland from Tampa. We watched storm news as they collected information from home, all in advance of the storm making landfall. In addition to newscasts we found a webcam channel where we could watch a series of live webcams from up and down the west coast of Florida, so we could see what was happening in real time.

I'm sure it's strange and stressful for them to be here now, rather than there, but at the same time we enjoyed dinner and it was great to catch up. Dave made shepherd's pie, a broccoli and cheese soup and a tarte tatin for dessert. Cherie texted me from her hotel at 3 a.m. saying her daughters are without power but safe.

We're waiting to hear what has become of Dave's parents' mobile home, which is on the water in Cortez, near Bradenton. My family in Lutz, north of Tampa, planned to ride out the storm in their houses. I had misgivings about that because...

...of my stepmother's house. This photo was taken not long after my dad built it in the mid-'70s, and as you can see, that entire wall is glass. I texted my stepsister and said my stepmother and nephew shouldn't stay there, and she said she agreed but they were determined. (She lives next door.) Hopefully they've sequestered themselves in an interior room. It's proved to be a very durable house during past storms so hopefully the same will be true this time around.

Meanwhile, yesterday was pretty quiet. I cleaned our flat in preparation for our visitors and took a walk through the neighborhoods north of us just to get some exercise. That's where I found the leaves in the top photo, and also this broken mirror:

I wasn't going to use that photo because it seems reminiscent of hurricane damage, but what the heck. I can emphatically say a hurricane did not damage that mirror.

Here's a mystery. This sign has appeared at the base of our street. (Hopefully this one won't be abandoned so that I have to haul it away myself.) We have no idea why the street's going to be closed or what's going on. Stay tuned!

Milton and John

Well, it's starting to look like Milton will strike to the south of Tampa, instead of head-on, which is perhaps slightly better news. It's still a big scary storm and no doubt Tampa will be affected, but it looks like Sarasota may take the brunt of it. Remember how I wrote about that condo where my family stayed on our beach vacations, and how it survived Helene? Milton is aiming straight for it.

I lived in Sarasota and Venice for six years, so my thoughts are with all my friends there. In 1999 I bought a condo there that was surrounded on three sides by water, in a relatively low-lying area, and although I loved it, let me just say I am very glad I sold it the following year when I moved up north.

I also wonder how Dave's parents' mobile home, in a park on Sarasota Bay, will fare. Fortunately they're up in Michigan at the moment so they are not personally in danger, but their laundry room flooded during Helene so they've already had storm damage.

Coincidentally, I'm supposed to have dinner tonight with friends who are visiting London from Tampa -- someone who also worked in Sarasota with me. I bet they're happy not to be home, but we'll no doubt have one eye on the news the whole night.

Thanks for all your concern about Dave's eye problem, which I mentioned in yesterday's post. The specialist he saw yesterday doesn't want to do anything immediately. He told Dave to wait four weeks and see if the problem resolves itself, which is apparently a possibility. I pointed out that there's still the underlying question of the abnormal blood vessels, but I guess even those may heal. It sounds to me like they're convinced this is some kind of injury, but I SWEAR I am not punching Dave in the face in the middle of the night. (You'd be surprised how many people have suggested that I am!)

Last night Dave and I went to a movie premiere where I actually got to sit in the VIP section AND I have my name in the film credits! I can't think of any other time I've been mentioned in the credits of a movie. (Can I have an IMDB page now?)

The movie is called "The Writing's on the Wall," a documentary about a public art project that arose in West Hampstead following the deaths of local community fixtures John and his dog Sugar. You may remember that some murals went up including portraits of John and Sugar, and those murals -- meant to raise awareness about homelessness -- wound up being quite controversial and were eventually painted over after a few months. The film tells the backstory of the project and the evolution of the controversy, and the producers used some of my photos of John in the film, which is why I got credit. It was very interesting and it was cool to have been involved, even tangentially. It made me feel part of the cultural fabric of my community and of London.

Dave went too, but he had to sit behind me, not being a VIP himself. Ha!

Anyway, I have no idea what the availability of this movie will be but if I ever hear that it's online for public viewing I'll let you know!

(Photos: Leaves found on my walk to work yesterday morning.)