Colorful Abstract

I merged a detail from my big blue cat poster, including some reflections from the window, with a detail from a painting done by my neighbor, Ann Rosmarin. I quite liked the result and thought it fulfilled the brief quite well.

The day dawned clear and cold. I noticed when I looked out the door in the night that all the stars were twinkling through the clear cold air from their usual places, reminding me that I hadn't seen them in quite some time. We seem to have weathered all the storms nicely while other parts of the coast are digging out and entertaining a visit from President Biden.There have been a lot of earth movement and landslides everywhere, including in the hills just above our old Berkeley neighborhood. I feel quite secure perched here above the creek on a stable bit of hill that is 50% rock, even though we are in the middle of the most recent burn scar and the hills are still covered with burned trees. 

The weather forecasters are meeting this week and discussing whether the use of such terms as 'bomb cyclone',  'polar vortex' and even 'atmospheric rivers'  color coded or numbered as to predicted severity. Using terms like that is news,  but it can be confusing and not very useful for those deciding how to prepare for them or if they even can. The one bit of advice that I'm not likely to forget is 'turn around, don't drown'. Apparently a flooded street with as little as 12 inches of water can cause a car to float. A mother of four drowned in her car in Santa Rosa before rescuers could get to her. it is a small blessing that her children weren't in the car with her. 

My only accomplishment was to get a haircut today. I didn't have time to make an appointment around the holidays and was kind of liking it a little longer. But it needed some trimming at the least, and I know Amy the hairdresser well enough to know that it would probably wind up being more than a trim. My hair seems to have a mind of its own and Amy is pretty good at not trying to change it!  We were having a nice chat about our usual random subjects including remodels, former houses and what we liked and didn't like about them and pets to name a a few, but I had to rush home with the car afterward so that John could go off in a different direction to get his hair cut....

We're now both neatly shorn (in my case with that carefully arranged disheveled look that I will never be able to accomplish myself) and ready to settle down in front of the fire and watch the news. The Republicans are in such disarray that it would be pretty funny if the consequences didn't seem so dire....