Took a quick trip to the Glen Cove Waterfront Park near our home in Vallejo with a bright moon. The Yorkies had gone along for a ride with me. You can spot at least one of them in these photos if you look closely.
Trees of Glen Cove
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Harvey & John visit
John and Harvey and I go back decades. They were my upstairs neighbors in Brooklyn at one point and moved back to California after years in New York City within months of me while either of us knowing the other was moving. I have since seen them many times in the Bay Area and in various parts of southern California. Harvey took most of these pictures, so unfortunately we have any with him!
My Daughter’s Video on the Audacity of Blackness
My daughter’s recent video about Black inventors brought to you by Cadillac.
Enjoy!
Glen Cove Fire Station #26
Many people may not know that I have been affected by the risk of fire at least four times in my life. My mother’s home was destroyed by fire in 2016 which prompted her, my brother, and my nephew to move in with us for months. Even more unfortunate, my mother was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and was lost just a few months thereafter, and never got back into her house again.
In addition, three times while living on base in New York City’s Governors Island, the apartment across the hall from us on the top floor (the 11th) had a pyromaniac little girl who caused emergency evacuations and running down the stairs (usually at night), only to return back to find holes in our walls from firemen’s axes and the stench of burned drywall. It’s no wonder I’m very on edge about the risk of fire, even with my own daughter during her teenage years between candles and hot combs, with which we had some close calls. There were even a few times where fire extinguishers were needed in my own kitchen when two different friends in different incidents caused fires that could have gone out of control.
I’ve been living in Glen Cove for over a year at this point, but after more than 11 years without this area having adequate fire protection despite literally being in a cove with few arteries of traffic in and out, we had the grand re-opening of Fire Station #26 officially take place on Saturday, November 6, 2021! This was personal to me, particularly given the armageddon-like fire seasons we’ve had of late with surreal orange skies that were well-documented in the region.
Make sure to check out the website of the Glen Cove Community Association, which I’m on the Board of, at this site!
GCCA lobbied hard to make sure we got this re-opened with many others and me speaking at a City Council meeting. Citizens of Vallejo also sent hundreds of emails to the Mayor and City Council, some with a boilerplate hyperlink I developed creating an email with all pertinent addresses and relevant content to let the Council know how welcome this Fire Station would be to re-open in our area. It serves not just Glen Cove, but South Vallejo and other adjoining areas for a faster response time to our underserved but high-risk fire area. This fire station’s presence even alleviates the demand from Benicia’s fire department.
October Videos with Hayden Dog Boarding
Puppy Zeus Starts to Itch
October Guest Dogs
Hayden Dogs October
October Garden Improvements
This month I added life (finally) to every pocket of our living wall. The dogs knock out some of the lower plants once in a while, so I try to put the heartier ones down there.
I’ve sacrificed the potted rose bush as my luck with roses at this house has been erratic. The gardeners who constantly trimmed the front rose bushes at the Hayward house had them blooming many times a year, including the dead of “winter.” So in the potted wall at the end of our deck, the small rose bush is abandoned and that pot is eagerly and efficiently being overtaken by a succulent. I’d be happy if 90% of our garden became succulents as they are so easy to grow and so pretty to me. Indeed, I’m on a Nextdoor.com group called, “Wait a Succulent” with other lovers of the African rose and whatever else these other types are called. I’m easy to buy gifts for because succulents are a no-brainer.
We’re hoping our adolescent lemon tree will survive with intense watering, as well as the palm tree we planted in the front. All our other trees seem to be thriving, even though our plumb tree needs pruning. The garden is constantly undergoing changes with dogs running into things, but we reinforce the garden and most plants survive the inadvertent brutality. We added two bona fide compost bins which are helping with the plants which will help with the potting material and the added benefit is that it helps reverse carbon emissions.
Our bamboo is starting to leave its previously allotted area, so we’re not sure how we feel about that. We sort of wished for the extra privacy, but it might be a case of “careful what you wish for” if we cannot keep it contained.
You’ll see the damage the atmospheric river did to our neighbor’s backyard. We can now see into the neighbor up the hill’s backyard!
Frame Restoration
I’ve had these scenes from Italy, including the nighttime mountainscape of Naples, in my family since before I was born. I saw them in pictures at my grandparents’ home and I remember them being in my parents’ living room no matter where we lived my whole life. I believe they were obtained by my parents who had part of their chaperoned courtship in Naples. I’ve been going to Naples my whole life.
When my mother’s house was destroyed by fire in 2016, these paintings survived and were professionally cleaned. They came out of storage after she died of cancer a few months later. I had no room for them in my home in Hayward, so my daughter, who had moved back to the Bay Area again, took them for the year she lived right on Lake Merritt in Oakland. I don’t think she ever put all three up and now I think I know why, although it may not have even been her fault if they were damaged while being professionally cleaned.
Upon getting the pictures back when she moved back to New York, I saw there was some serious damage to the bottom corners of the largest frame, which she had not disclosed to me, so that stung. After moving to Vallejo in 2020, I had a wonderful space in the family room with our cathedral ceilings to mount them so I can now see them every day. While most people did not notice it, the damage to the frame pained my heart every day.
At one point before I relinquished them to my daughter, I did observe drips had formed coming down the face of a few of the paintings. That too is imperceivable from a distance. I might also have to settle for that being the cost of the professional cleaning and just remain grateful they survived the fire as well as they did.
So the good news is that when I was lamenting the frame damage, a good friend suggested I use a gold marker to fill in the gaps. I didn’t even know that there was such a thing and I was a little skeptical. However, as an avid fan of the Antiques Roadshow, I did not think a serious investment in the frame would be worthwhile, but then again, who knows?
So I went online and ordered some gold Sharpies. I was skeptical about it, but I just kept on coloring it in, and voila! While I neglected to take the “before” pictures up close, you can find them in an earlier posting on my blog when I first mounted the pictures. I’ll try to find those and link them here. All told, I’m extremely happy that it is much less obvious at a glance that there was frame damage, and one would really have to scrutinize the frames to find it since they are up so high. Now my only concern is that if we put a skylight in that room, as we’re intending to do, that we do not do any further damage to the paintings themselves.
Here are the “after” pictures:
