A slow morning. I’m feeling a bit ‘foggy’ and I think I need another cup of coffee STAT.
We had dinner with Rick and Doug last night and will spend some time with them on Christmas day. Our social life is stepping up as several mutual friends are coming to visit them in the next few weeks, so we’ll get to see them as well. I’m a girl who loves her solitude, but I also love seeing old friends, and Rick – being much more social than I – will force me in the best possible way to come out of my cave.
I didn’t run errands yesterday as I realized I would just go nuts with the weekend shoppers everywhere. I’ll do that tomorrow when they’re all back at work and at school.
The production company of Escape to Margaritaville found a great apartment for Don. It’s just a few blocks away from the theater and it has a separate bedroom and a good amount of space. It will be such fun to have a little NYC pied-à-terre for the run of the show – however long that might be.
I moved these two pieces of Roseville over to this bench because they were in the path of the Christmas decorations. I sort of like them there. They may stay.
A closeup of the gifts under the tree in Caroline’s house. I wonder what is in that Paris bag? Hmmm.
It will be a lazy day today; reading, doing some laundry, that kind of thing. Oh, we watched Singing in the Rain last night. I never tire of that perfect movie musical. Brilliant.
Happy Sunday.
Love Seeing pictures of your home, thank you for sharing
You’re most welcome, Donna.
I just finished watching a documentary about Christmas movies on Turner Classic Movies. Gordon Gebert, who you mentioned yesterday, was one of the actors offering comments. He noted that every year around Christmas time he gets fan mail from people who enjoyed A Holiday Affair.
I’m sure he does! He was such a gifted actor.
Thank you for the view into Caroline’s lovely abode. I just love it all!
I love her stairway. The carpets. Her tree and other decorations are just perfect. And the Paris bag. Hmmm
I could get some rest in her girly boudoir. I just love it all!
Thank you so much, Monica!
I bet you two are excited about your pied-á-terre…I just love the way that sounds! Enjoy your day! ;)
We are. I can spend a couple of days here and there in the city. I like that.
I live in a 550 sq feet apartment with one bedroom. what is very small to most people feels very cozy to me. I too am a lover of my solitude. and yet this Christmas we are having it here at little
‘safe harbor’… a name I gave to it because I moved here shortly after being critically ill.
I hope there will be comfortable room for all 6 of us! my brother and his son and daughter-in-love and two young teen nephews! I am anxious and excited at the same time! LOL!
the pictures in your posts are always so lovely. and i’m happy for don’s little apt in the city.
no doubt an amazing find!
I bet everyone will fit in nicely – especially on a holiday filled with love!
I thought about going shopping but like you I’ll wait until tomorrow when the crowds won’t be quite as bad. We had a lovely church service this morning. Sara and Family lighted the Advent Candle and the theme was JOY. Our minister talked about Joy and then played some songs that brought him Joy. One was ‘Good Morning’ from Singing in the Rain and we all had big smiles on our faces! Just a lovely time with family and church friends today. I’m resting and reading and maybe making some cookies today. Hugs!
Good for your minister! It’s a happy song!
You have a very charming and welcoming home. Christmas in Connecticut is playing on TCM as I write this. I have only seen it a few dozen times, but love it so much I am watching it again.
Love that movie!
Claudia, Your pied-a-terre sounds wonderful! When does the NYC run begin? No errands, but a busy weekend nevertheless socializing with friends. We saw the zoo lights with two of my oldest (years known, not necessarily age!) friends last night and then had pizza at the new joint in town. Tonight, ladies holiday dinner at the home of a friend. I baked two types of crackers yesterday and will make the mushroom carpaccio this afternoon. I’m one for solitude also, but I do love the occasions with my friends.
Rehearsals start in Jan. – Preview perfomances start in February.
Those packages under Caroline’s tree has piqued my curiosity.
Marilyn
Mine, too!
I’m like you in that social sense where I have to be dragged kicking & screaming but then once I’m there with people, I have a good time. But my default is ‘hermit’.
I can’t imagine something so fun as having a paid-for apartment in NYC. What an opportunity to explore every facet of the great city. This is the time to do anything you haven’t done there yet, Claudia, although I know you know NYC well. Such a nice development for you & Don; so glad you live in NY and can be nearer to each other for the time he’s on Broadway.
A little tense here. Smoke was so dense yesterday; then the wind started whipping up and was bad from 2am (out of the northeast; how this all started on Dec 4 with SoCalif wildfire); it’s blowing fiercely as I write this about 1:30pm on Sunday although I don’t think we’ll ever see again (I hope I never do) the hurricane-force wind we saw 13 days ago. I figured the power might go out so last night while I took firewatch, I did laundry, got the dishes in the dishwasher, got in a shower, packed another bag for possible evacuation (just in case); then, I went to bed at 4am and husband took over, so I’ve gotten a late start to my day today because I slept restlessly til 10am although we each individually got in about six hours sleep which is certainly better than usual.
There’s smoke in all directions but the wind has temporarily blown it toward the sea so we’re enjoying a spot of blue sky. The blue sky just fills your heart and soul with HOPE. (I’ve decided that I may not be a candidate for living in weather where a lot of the days are gray, i.e. the Pacific Northwest; it is oppressive to me [dark smoke, too, is of course just scary]; I’m feeling pretty sure that I’d probably be a candidate for S.A.D.)
Anyway, we didn’t lose power, we’re feeling uplifted by the temporary blue and sunshine – like real sun, not one obscured in murky smoke in the middle of the day – so we’re taking that and running with it; enjoying it (indoors). I’m coughing like crazy (asthma) and will probably have to go to the doctor this coming week for prescription cough syrup (but everybody is coughing; the smoke/ash is dirty; it irritates the airways; it still comes in to the house every time you open a door; same for the car; they’re asking us to drive as little as possible so as to not add to the pollution; also asking for nobody to grill or BBQ outside).
Very interesting to watch youtube/online the community meeting held yesterday in the town of Ventura and the progress they’re making with dealing with the aftermath of such a large-scale natural disaster; how all the gov’t agencies mobilize to help people. 100 questions from the audience, and I think one of the really unfortunate circumstances is when your house didn’t burn but everything around you did, you can’t get in there til authorities clear other debris of toxic crap (like burned home insulation, garage contents like pesticides, etc.), they spray a green fibre matrix over the debris and land/lots to hold the hillside which puts a green crust all over everything, once you can get in, you have to wash everything down inside and out of your house (ashes, char, dirt) and of course you have rotting food in the frig/freezer – but, oh, with the washing down on the outside, you are not allowed disperse ash so you can’t power wash or sweep or blow; it’s a frick’in nightmare, ‘scuse my French. The police have now lost the National Guard to Santa Barbara for the fire there, so they’re stretched but policing neighborhoods to prevent looting – like some people’s homes, again, aren’t burned, but maybe their windows are blown out, yet they can’t get back in there but the crooks somehow do, so the authorities were saying to hire a board-up service and get your windows/doors boarded up for the time being. They’re telling people just because you still have your home and can get back into your neighborhood doesn’t mean you should; not yet.
My heart goes out to the senior-aged population because they were who owned a lot of the homes in the burned-out neighborhoods; had lived there for a long, long time; so overwhelming to them and not everybody has adult kids to help and maybe some of their friends have grown too old to be of any help either, like just going through the paperwork and forms alone although of course that’s why the recovery center is there to try to help as much as possible.
Another question I found interesting but it affirmed what I feared: Expert panel was asked of (why continued vigilance?), what’s left to burn? The fire chief said, yeah, we got a good burn perimeter around us now but the problem with this unusual and deadly fire was that it was propelled by uncommon winds which made it leap frog and jump over itself to where it left large swaths of dry brush untouched, so there’s a lot left to burn and all our cities are still threatened (pray, pray, PRAY for rain). He said complacency is wrong and they’re depending on the public to help them keep watch because a red flag warning is very serious and we still have all the ‘perfect’ elements to create horrible wildfire.
There was also talk that the cities around here need a warning siren, like a tsunami warning system but, in this case, for wildfire. This particular situation was left to police going thru neighborhoods (and remember it was night; some people were sleeping) with sirens, bullhorns, knocking door to door and, again, it’s a miracle they got everybody out because it’s so many thousands and thousands of residents. Police and fire are unparalleled heroes.
I love this; the City of Ventura has been working day and nite, going thru their archives, to gather as much info for a homeowner about their home as possible. In their city file, a homeowner may have a record of home improvements and even the original plans/blueprints as submitted I guess by architects for a planned subdivision (although of course we have a lot of custom, not tract homes, in this fire). They’re going to be able to hand a homeowner all this info in one helpful packet for next steps about rebuilding or not. If you rebuild, you have to do it with current code and most people’s homes from the 60s, 70s, 80s cannot use any foundation that remains, so the burned-out homes’ foundations will be cleared with the rest of the debris by the government.
Anyway, enough fire talk; so much is positive; the firefighters worked diligently/tirelessly on the Fillmore fire day before yesterday to keep it out of the downtown where the bulk of the population is; I’m not as informed right now as to what’s going on in Santa Barbara county although I heard they got damaging sundowner winds which can carry wildfire a long way.
I am so impressed with the City of Ventura which is a city I love so dearly and which always has my heart and it’s so wounded right now. I slept in my street clothes last night but maybe tonight will be better; maybe the winds will die down and, you know, we’re moving forward, I just planned my holiday dinner, my husband is shopping for everything right now including our comfort foods. KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON.
Yesterday was one of my weepiest days because I was out and talked to more people who are struggling; but I bought some pretty little portable things to give to one of my friends to perk up her temporary living quarters (her house is gone; all that’s left is a chimney, a retaining wall and, miraculously, a green front lawn with groomed bushes which makes absolutely no sense whatsoever) and it made me feel better and I hope any of it comforts her: Several sachets of garden scents to tuck in her hotel furniture drawers to help her momentarily forget the acrid smell of smoke; a beautiful journal with a floral/matching ballpoint pen; little inspirational tuckaway cards with soothing, encouraging messages, poems and quotes; a porcelain, rose-themed teabag holder (she’s girly; loves her hot tea); some citrusy-flavored lip balm in a gorgeous round tin (we’re all so dried out and chapped in this low-humidity weather of wind and heat although it’s cooler today by far); just little things that won’t be more stuff she has to pack up once she finds better housing. Continues to be so hard to know what to say or do for these suffering people.
I think the whole of our county should have community Christmas/Hanukkah/ Kwanzaa celebrations – – in April! Do everything we would have done in December that has gotten postponed or abbreviated. We’ve been robbed of our festivities. Maybe we’ll have had non-damaging rains by then so that the hills have begun to spring some green. People will be on their way to getting their homes rebuilt. It would be a great time to renew our gratitude and share the beauty of a delayed season when we’d have been enjoying local concerts of carols, all the fine community traditions, walking downtown and seeing all the lovely holiday window displays (without having to wear a respirator mask); re-light the community holiday trees. Give the merchants some business who have lost so much money with nobody shopping on the streets right now. The experts at this town meeting said that the smoke could linger for as much as four months, so I’m thinking April is just about right!
Claudia, I could look at Caroline’s cottage every day. I love it that much.
That’s a good idea – holiday celebrations in April when this will be past and people will feel better and are more likely to want to celebrate the festivities. I wonder if you could speak to the county about it?
They’re looking for suggestions. I’m going back into the recording of the meeting at the end because they mentioned something about ideas/input on a host of things from the public. I don’t want to appear silly or childish, so I’ll figure out how I can best put my thoughts to words.
I told my grass-cutter/weekly gardener (I’ve gotta let him go when my husband fully retires but he’s helped our family for so many years, so I keep him on, although it’s an expense I could do without; he gives me a hefty senior discount as he did my folks) to take a vacation and not work on my yard right now because it’s not healthy for him with ash/smoke and I don’t want him using the leaf blower; they’ve also asked us not to mow grass; nothing more getting flinged into the air I guess. He always wants to cut my roses back down to the ground (seasonal pruning) too early. Anyway, I noticed this morning that every rose bush is blooming. I have beautiful new buds. How?
My husband just brought me his phone with the latest headline that Santa Barbara is in fearsome trouble as the winds have carried the fire now (threatened; still okay but it’s not good and under mandatory evac) to the beautiful Queen of our historical missions, my beloved Museum of Natural History nearby that I’ve been visiting since I was a child; possibly worst of all although the priority list/prayer list is huge and all-encompassing, the ZOO; that wonderful zoo and its precious animals and birds. The zoo has evac plans, I do know that, but still…my God, the zoo is on the beach. Again, how? Burning right thru Montecito to the sea and from Mission Canyon toward town I guess. I hope it doesn’t burn the copper baron heiress’ (Huguette Clark) mansion called Bellosguardo on a bluff overlooking the ocean on over 20 acres; it’s been gifted to the city, is a city landmark from the 1930s and they’re still working the issue of how best to utilize it, but it’s absolutely sumptuous; a jewel. I understand it’s bogged down in a mess of IRS red tape. I’ve looked so forward to someday seeing it; the plan is to open it to the public. But the main thing is to save the lives of animals and people right now.
ABC News: “Santa Barbara County Fire Division Chief Martin Johnson Saturday night described fighting the fire as a battle against a beast. ‘It’s a monster,’ he said. ‘We all recognize that. But we will kill it,’ Johnson said.” AP & Fox, “The evacuation zone near Santa Barbara on Saturday was 17 miles long and up to 5 miles wide and the new expansion encompassed about 3,300 people.”
These are days of hell, never to be forgotten. What can be our future in such an inhospitable environment?
I would look at your roses blooming amid all of this as a sign of Hope for the future Vicki! 🌹 Nancy
I will. Thanks, Nancy. We told our gardener today to not come back to do any work here til Jan 8; he got a free paid month in there (Dec) but the guy never takes a vacay and we don’t want him inhaling ash or blowing it around with a leaf blower either. So, now my roses will keep growing til then, before they get chopped for pruning. I will do my utmost to enjoy every single bud!
We have some blue sky today again but I still wear my respirator mask whenever I’m outdoors. When I come in, I change my clothes, brush out my hair and wash exposed skin (easier to just take another darn shower); they’re telling us the ash can really irritate the skin because of what it’s all coming from and not just trees/bushes. The wind didn’t die much so it’s keeping the smoke out of here for a little while. But ash is…everywhere.
I just came off the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History site and they posted a message today that they are of course closed but their collections have been safeguarded. I wish they were a little further down into the city instead of Mission Canyon. My husband seems to think the Old Mission compound itself (18th century; Franciscan fathers’ church) and Santa Barbara’s zoo are okay – we’d be hearing about it now if that wasn’t the case – so I’m hoping the evening news will have some info. I know they moved the reindeer to the showgrounds further north by about five miles although that’s not, to me, such a huge security measure but they’re the experts, not me.
I’ve still got helicopters with water buckets going over my roof today in the sky above but this is now so commonplace for the past two weeks that it’s de rigueur. LA TIMES today: ” It’s rare for a fire to last this long, threatening homes for three straight weeks.” It’s the wind; it’s the stupid wind that just never stops. And it’s supposed to be bad again Weds for SB and then Thurs for Ventura County, like why won’t it end; why doesn’t the wind dissipate? The firefighters are quoted as saying, though, that they can get a huge advance on things, today and tomorrow, ahead of that bigger wind event starting Weds. They are geniuses, these firefighters. They figure it out. Over 8,000 of them on it, God Bless ’em all. But I’m not unpacking the car yet.
I’ve probably gained ten pounds from all the stress eating. Serious dieting come January, for sure.
xoxo
They are indeed days of hell. Unbelievable. Keeping you and everyone out there in my prayers.
Thank you as always, Claudia. I mean, really-really thank you. You’ve been incredibly supportive here when I’ve needed it as have your compassionate readers. I love your blog so much.
xoxoxo
Thanks for the update Vicki…I do keep up with things online but that doesn’t compare to you describing what is happening and how you are feeling while you are sitting there in the middle of everything that is going on!….I also think that your idea for a holiday celebration in April is excellent…I do hope that you can get the community to join in on this….Take care and know that we here at Claudia’s blog are thinking of you! Nancy
Nancy, thank you for being so kind; I really appreciate your words. I don’t want to ever live thru anything like this again – this horrific wildfire that won’t die, affecting so many people I know of, so catastrophically; it’s just too much pain and loss; they are devastated – so I don’t know what it’s going to mean for my future and where I live; my husband and I have been talking nonstop about it although it’s been on our mind to move even before the fire began as we near retirement and the end of his full-time work life.
I got a Christmas card today from longtime friends of ours, from when my husband worked with this other guy in the 90s when both them and we were newbies in the Gulf Coast area of Texas, them from Maine and us from California, so we bonded. Now, they’ve left Texas and have permanently retired to New Hampshire this past year where they own a home near the shore and they are loving being in New England, so this is another finger crooking at us, with them saying, “Move here! Move here! Think of all the fun we could have!” (Not unlike your friends, Claudia, moving so close to you now, to where you can share Christmas together with those two nice guys.) And my husband has a niece in Rhode Island who’s also anchored where it’s really appealing. My cousin lives in Pittsburgh (after the Bay Area of California) and loves it; she’s dug in now.
People on the move. So, what to do; what to do…hard to leave my California; and my Midwest-raised husband despises snow. But it’s a California which continues to change thru often no fault of its own, and I’m feeling I can’t change with it. We’ll see. I’ve flip-flopped on the topic over and over and over again.
Our firefighter heroes will win this battle. Just pray for an end to wind and a beginning of rain. That’s what I’m doing. (And drinking too much high-caloric peppermint mocha coffee to stay awake from nighttime fire watch.)
I know how you feel about old friends…there are some old friends that I would love to see….unfortunately most of them have gone on to the next adventure…maybe I will get to see them when I get there…I’m glad Don will have a nice apartment in NYC….it is great that he will be so close to home this time…I know it will be so good for both of you and we will enjoy hearing about your adventures in the Big Apple!
A big difference knowing he’s only 75 miles away and that I can go into the city any time I want!
You know, Claudia, I was thinking about all this (great distraction from fire on the brain). How you can keep a few changes of clothes at the apartment. You won’t even have to pack a weekender bag. With your things hanging in a closet, it’ll also make Don feel less lonely. I just think it’s an amazing development in a long period now where everything is going so swimmingly for you two; you’re in one of those really-good periods that we all hopefully get from time to time in our lives. I’m a huge dog lover/pet lover and I can’t ever know how much you miss Scout although I can imagine, because I’m of a similar heart, but it’s as if she knew it was her time and she released you so that you are free to leave the house and join Don here & there without having to worry about her and being confined to the cottage to care for her. I know you didn’t get to pull off your England/France trip (yet) but you’re doing so much other travel and having so many adventures that it almost makes up for it. It really uplifts me to hear of all the fun plans you and Don have; thank you for sharing it all with your readers. I’m happy for you!! I love to see people living their dreams. I’ve said it before, but you’re both such active, productive and engaged-with-life ‘seniors’ that it’s really inspiring for those of us in your same age group. Am I fawning? Don’t mean to. Just some healthy admiration. You two just make me feel motivated to get out there, move out of my comfort zone; live life and continue to make memories; have some new experiences!
Aw, thank you, Vicki! I’m going to write a post in the next couple of weeks about this year and what it has meant to us.
Gratitude. It comes down to gratitude, doesn’t it. It’s my whole Christmas for 2017; gratitude. I was thinking this morning of that Rock and Roll Hall of fame production, when Pearl Jam got inducted in this past year (I guess because they’re talking so much about Bon Jovi getting in this coming year; has been in the news), and Eddie Vedder was looking back over the life of the band and he said, rather quietly and eloquently, “I’m just glad…to be alive.” I imagine he may have been thinking of other bands and how so many musicians/performers succumbed to drug/alcohol addiction; who knows. But, yeah, I kept thinking of that this morning, in the aftermath of the past two hellish weeks…just glad to be alive. Because life is fragile, and beautifully-wondrous for as much as it can break us.
Beautifully said, my friend.