The sign beats any holiday decoration. In a city where there are three seasons—early, mid, and late summer—flutterbies are welcome year `round. I have seen a fair number of Monarchs and the Cabbage variety this month. Even on this last day.
The sign adorns a lovely house, with manicured-plant yard and occasionally playing kids, at North and Monroe Avenues here in San Diego’s University Heights neighborhood.
The workspace in our new apartment is something for me to be immensely grateful for this Thanksgiving. While the smaller of two bedrooms, one benefit is larger: The expansive window that looks out onto the street. Hehe, the cats and I share the view, which is on the same side of the building as our living room wrap-arounds. The dimensions offer better usable area than the larger room from our old flat.
The Featured Image, captured at 5:27 p.m. PST yesterday, using Leica Q, shows the view from the doorway. Vitals, aperture manually set: f/2.8, ISO 2000, 1/60 sec, 28mm. My vintage Guerciotti bike, held upright by Saris “The Boss” stand, is in the foreground. Looking straight down from the roadster to the wall is the Casabelle Mail Center, which I purchased from Pier 1 Imports in late-Spring 2009 for use as my primary writing place. I now mostly use the handsome piece for storage and as pseudo-standup desk.
Our old apartment is up for rent—and for lots less than I expected: $1,750, which is just 15 bucks more than our raised rent had we signed a new lease from first of this month. On the last day, November 8, 2017, while waiting for final inspection and to hand over the keys, I took some quick pics using iPhone X—for the Wilcox scapbook, so to speak, and to document the condition in which we left the flat.
We moved into the place on Oct. 15, 2007, sight unseen. We relocated to San Diego to enable my now deceased father-in-law to remain living independently. He found the second-floor apartment, on the next block from where he lived, during its complete renovation. On the promise of everything being new, we took the chance that benefit would be enough—and it was. We lived at 4514 Cleveland Ave., Apt 9, for 10 years.
At long last, the philosophical debate about the definition for good versus evil is over. What a relief! We now have a definition that rises above this post’s sarcasm (ah, yes, another kind of evil). […]
Park Blvd. divides University Heights East and West—for reasons that make no sense to me. This San Diego community is about 12,000 people living in an area around 1.132 square miles. My hometown, Caribou, Maine, is residence to a little less than 8,000 folks in a city spanning 79.3 miles. Oh, Hell, I fuss. But you get the point?
Yesterday, as I walked West to East, down Monroe Ave. towards our recently rented apartment, a beautiful cluster of morning glories demanded that I stop with iPhone 7 Plus and honor them with a portrait. I shot the Featured Image—an auto-generated HDR composite—at 12:13 p.m. PDT. Vitals: f/1.8, ISO 20, 1/474 sec, 3.99mm.
Until San Diego Comic-Con 2017, I took attendance for granted. From 2009-14, I obtained a (deserved) press pass, and when later it wasn’t reverified, I luckily bought full-event passes for 2015 and 2016. But this year my luck ran out during early and open registrations—as it did this morning for next summer’s Con. One other opportunity will come next Spring.
Unexpectedly, Saturday of SDCC 2017, I was able to obtain a legit pass for Day Four—not to explain how. I knew one benefit could be opportunity to participate in 2018 advance registration, as I did this morning. Last year, the session ended with my disappointment. Today, I feel grateful to have participated at all.
On Oct. 15, 2007, our family of three relocated to San Diego from the metro-Washington, D.C. area. Looking back at my blog posts from a decade ago, I see very little writing about the move and regret not recording the poignant personal history. It’s not a mistake to be repeated. My wife and I will soon change residences—and while the move is nowhere near as dramatic as the last, this missive you read begins the chronicle of our next adventure.
Strangely, or not, the decision to leave the current apartment is fallout from our failed home-buying effort—for the property we call the Schoolhouse (and affectionately, at one time). Anne and I learned enough to know that we aren’t ready to own, certainly not in overly-priced Southern California. As such, staying put for another year looked likeliest option; we have, or had, until October 20 to sign another year’s lease for our second-floor rental of 10 years.
Before the Internet, I listened to shortwave broadcasts for news and cultural information. There was something thrilling about catching radio programs from Australia, Austria, Canada, Cuba, Ecuador, Germany, Russia, or United Kingdom, among many other countries—hearing local perspectives about all things current or past.
Among the big broadcasters, whose programs I could regularly listen to, BBC and Radio Canada International were favorites. I also found Radio Cuba and HCJB to be engaging, and they were easily received from any of our Washington, DC suburban residences, including the last one of nearly a decade.
Aug. 18, 2017. I travel back to San Diego after visiting my niece in Long Beach. Meanwhile, two blocks from our apartment, my wife attends an Open House for a cute, Spanish-style property listed for $586,000. Anne tells the seller’s real estate agent that we can’t afford to buy the place—an effective diversionary tactic. But the 900-square-footer is within our means, and we will nearly come to own it.
This is my story of wanting and walking away. I take with me disheartening lessons about the home real estate market.
Feeling a little glum about mum—she was laid to rest back home in Maine yesterday morning—I took a long, late-afternoon walk through the neighborhood. As I approached Mississippi along Monroe Ave., a cute craftsman with “coming soon” for sale sign piqued my interest. I would later discover that the property listed the same day (Aug. 25, 2017). Striking: The unbelievably low price for University Heights: $525,000.
I have not seen such interest in a home! Jumping ahead in time, briefly, I later took my wife to look at the Monroe house. Cars and SUVs of various types pulled over in and around as we approached; I am amazed there wasn’t a vehicular or pedestrian collision. A small mob had formed before the informational brochure holder. One man walked in circles, flip phone to ear, one hand waving, and frantic—no panicked—expression filling his face. Dare I say foaming at the mouth, as he desperately tried to contact the listing agent? If you need a metaphor, think Black Friday outside Wal-Mart. Even this morning, when I shot the Featured Image and its companions, using Leica Q, this little ramshackle rustled as much attention.
The other day, my sister Nanette reminded how much my younger self bore some (let me editorialize fleeting) resemblance to singer John Denver. During high school chorus trips 40 years ago (or so), somewhere, somewhen, […]
The world is full of narcissists, who gain popularity by self-broadcasting themselves, boasting their own accomplishments, and in process taking praise or gaining glory. They are false. Ingenuine. There is another type of character—someone who naturally gives, asks for nothing in return, and (often too rarely) is well-regarded for their generosity. They are true charmers in the sense self-proclaimers pretend to be.
My mom, who passed away today, Aug. 5, 2017, was social through grace and a kind of innate likability. She was short in stature—adult height of four feet, ten-and-a-half inches—but tall in presence. In any room, she easily became the sun around which all present orbited. I often marveled at how people just gravitated to the small woman without any seeming effort on her part, other than flowing friendliness and generosity. Her buoyant, positive spirit, supported by unstoppable, advocating determination, made mom the person others wanted to be with—and to be like. She was authentic. Genuine.