CP arrived

The second grandson this Spring arrived within a week of the first. He came Weds AM, the 11th of April, a little before 6:00. We are happy. Both mother and son are doing well. This little guy also has red hair. A few photos follow. I would have posted them sooner but we had been young man sitting J and A for a couple days and then I went camping with the Boy Scouts to Antelope Island. There were two highlights of the camp, a bag piper played from atop one of the hills we climbed at sunrise, and we saw the rings of Saturn through someone’s telescope.

The photos:

Yom Hashoah

Sunday is Yom Hashoah or Holocaust Remembrance Day. That such a thing as the Holocaust could occur is beyond my understanding. I have read a number of books on the subject and WWII in general. There was a line from a movie some years ago where one of the actors gives a line, a question, “How could this happen in the land that gave us Beethoven, Goethe and Schiller?” Given the ethnic cleansings and wholesale massacre of so many minorities in our own generation I guess one cannot, not ever underestimate, man’s inhumanity to man. Fortunately there are Schindlers and Rusesabaginas. Lest you do not know, Paul Rusesabagina was the hotel manager who saved more than a thousand Tutsis from Hutu butchers when war erupted in Rwanda in 1994. According to one UN source, within 100 days of war 800,000 people were dead. 'Hotel Rwanda' is worth renting at the video store.

Untoward and racist comments by a talk show hoast aimed at the Rutgers Women's B-Ball team, ('nap headed hos' or slang for street prostitutes), remind us that gender, cultural religious, and ethnic prejudices still exist in America. Maybe we have not made enough progress yet.

Sunday should be a day to reflect on Yom Hasoah and other things. I am profoundly grateful for the addition of two new grandsons to our circle and for other things.

LG arrived

The little guy arrived Weds. night, 7-1/2 pounds and 20 inches long. He was three weeks early but still a muy grande caballero. Note the sideburns between father and son. Enjoy the photos. Mother and baby will be home on Sunday. What an Easter present!

Flowers in our woods

Trillium flowers grow in one place on our four acres. We had not seen these flowers before growing in our woods. They are quite beautiful and we thought might be in the orchid family. Turns out that RA's book says they are members of the lily family and can bloom as early as March. They grow from Central CA along the coast to British Colombia. They should not be picked as it sets the plant back. They are, furthermore, impossible to grow in a garden. They prefer moist and shady wooded areas. The seeds are spread by ants, we read, who are attracted to oily structures attached to the seed coat. Thnaks to the ants for spreading these around our woods and hope you enjoy the photo.

A tragedy

A Silicon Valley engineer launched his dive boat north of us in Humboldt Bay on Saturday morning and drove it 20+ miles to a little north of us and about 5 miles out. His location was Blunt Reef. It is a dangerously beautiful place and the site of a number of wrecks off Cape Mendocino. It has strong rip currents, can have heavy seas and is home to Great White Sharks. Lots of reasons to not dive alone. The article about the loss of this diver and world class amateur photographer is found in today’s San Francisco Chronicle. I and family members have been diving along the coast for decades and attest to its beauty and pristineness. The Coast Guard found his 17’ Boston Whaler awash and half submerged, still anchored to a rock outcropping at Blunt’s Reef.

I have seen a number of underwater photographs over the years but never any as beautiful as these. They are posted on his
blog and we hope they will be there for a while. Our condolences to his family and friends.

The self image was taken by Kawika (David) Chetron with the unexpected harbor seal wanting to be in the picture.