Margate and Cathay

The weather was mercurial on my walk home yesterday, with moments of bright sun against a dark, rainy sky. In fact, a few minutes after I took this photo, a rainbow appeared as the sun shone through those gray clouds -- but it only stayed for a minute and I wasn't fast enough with the camera.

I have been in a funk the last couple of days. I guess that's not surprising with our recent dog news, which I suspect is at the root of a lot of it, even though Olga appears perfectly healthy and spry day-to-day. (We're still waiting for her biopsy results.)

But we've had other stuff going on as well. The Russians' construction project is (hopefully momentarily) paused because, allegedly, the contractor needs dry weather to do the roof work -- so we're having to live with the patio scaffold for longer than we'd hoped. In addition, Mrs. Russia told me yesterday that her husband is about to tear out and replace the floors in their bedroom and living room because, as she put it, "they squeak." (I wanted to respond, "Well, naturally! It's a 100-year-old house! WHO CARES if the floor squeaks?" But I did not.) She said, "It will be a long project. And it will be noisy."

I sometimes wonder if they are trying to drive us out. Is that paranoid? Do they want to expand their Russian borders into our downstairs flat?

Yesterday I had to stay home all morning waiting for British Gas to come and do their annual gas inspection. It went smoothly, once the guy showed up, and then as I walked to work I took care of some other long-standing errands. I've had a small amount of Singaporean money in my armoire for ages, the remnants of a long-ago trip, and I finally changed it back into pounds; and then I deposited it and some Scottish money my friends Pam and Bryan mailed to me (left over from their recent trip to the UK) at the bank. Good to have that taken care of.

At work, I finally got back the bound copies of our school newspaper that I began arranging for in late spring. So that's another project done.

I am making progress, despite the funk.

When I met up with my friend Sally in Greenwich back in late July, I bought this at Greenwich Market -- an old illustration of the pier and harbor at Margate. I think it probably was cut from a book, and yes, it's crooked on the page, which drives me crazy but never mind. It only cost a pound or so and when I got home I tucked it away and then forgot about it.

Here's a closer look.

I bought it intending to blog it. But last night, when I got to thinking about today's blog post and wondering where this illustration was, I COULD NOT REMEMBER! I thought I'd either slipped it into a book or filed it in our file box. I spent, not kidding, at least an hour combing through books and files searching for it, and went to bed wondering if I'd mistakenly thrown it out.

Then, this morning, I checked a book I had apparently failed to check last night, and boom -- there it was. The Reed filing system triumphs again.

I also found this sketch, which I drew 35 years ago, of the creamer from a groovy set of '60s china (the pattern was called "Cathay") that I used to own. It's not a very good drawing, but I was happy to find it because I've long thought that I threw it out. (I find it interesting that the decal is flipped on my drawing vs. the creamer shown in the picture linked above. Were there variations in the manufacturing? Did I draw it in a mirror? But the decal is flipped vertically as well as horizontally. Hmmmm...)

Anyway, this has been a long, rambling post, for which I apologize, but that just shows the disorganized state of my mind at the moment. At least I found my missing illustrations. I guess I should be more careful about storing things in books!