Elaby's LiveJournal - 57 Academics

I'm happy to finally unveil something that's been months in the making: Rachel and I have started a blog together!

Arboreal Rainbow

This summer, while we were spending a quiet week dogsitting for our friend Bethany's adorable puppies, Rachel and I decided that we wanted a place to chronicle our story and preserve the some of the precious bits of our lives together. We came up with the blog name Arboreal Rainbow as a meeting of the symbols we both love best: trees for me and rainbows for Rachel. It evokes the image of rainbows living in the treetops.

We only have a few posts so far, but we plan to add all sorts of things, from knitting adventures to tea reviews to the story of how we met. I hope you'll take a look! <3

Rachel and I went on a whale watch yesterday -- Rachel's first ever and my second, though the first was long enough ago that I don't remember much about it. It was one of the best experiences of my life.

This morning, though, I was going about my business, getting ready for work as normal, when I got suddenly very sick. I'll spare you the gruesome details, but I think it was due to dehydration (it was pretty hot yesterday, even though I tried to drink a lot of water on the boat). So I stayed home and slept until noon. I feel worlds better now but exhausted, so I'm writing up our adventure.

I don't have very many pictures because I was too entranced, too captivated by the whales to try looking at them through a viewfinder. But I do have one or two :)

The whale watch was out of Rye, NH and was organized by Granite State Whale Watch. Rye is one of the prettiest towns in New Hampshire: it's located on our teeny tiny inch of coastline and is home to Odiorne Point State Park, the Seacoast Science Center, rolling dunes, bird-filled estuaries, really nice beaches, and about a hundred eye-popping mansions. The sun was out bright as we drove down the shore road past all of these and made our way to Rye Harbor.



We got there about a half hour before the ship was going to depart, so we got a pretty good seat on the starboard side near the bow. It was HOT waiting for the ship to leave; there was a bit of a breeze but it didn't do much against the sweltering sun. Once we started moving out, though, the wind picked up and it was utterly perfect.

Rachel bought me a hat at the ticket counter, and I was very glad I had it!



I was pretty much exploding with excitement, and as soon as we started moving, Rachel was too <3



We chugged out past the harbor walls and caught a glimpse of some harbor seals on the port side of the ship. As we passed the Isles of Shoals, the captain told us a bit about the islands (although I could scarcely hear him over the sounds of the engine).

It was such a gorgeous day, with the sun blazing above and the horizon swathed in haze, creating a pale shimmering curtain against the blue sky. I always expect the energy of the ocean to be this deep, heavy, mysterious thing, imposing and powerful, and that's how it is with your legs in it on the beach... but out there on the water with the wind and sun and the sparkle of the waves, it just felt free. Light and floaty and untethered.

The first whale we sighted was a fin whale, the second largest creature to ever live on earth. They're the most commonly sighted whale near Jeffery's Ledge, the bountiful feeding area we were exploring. This one was identified as Dingle, a whale they see pretty often. It was so, so huge. Its black back with its small curved fin kept sliding up out of the water and in again as it sent plumes of breath up. The ship turned to keep it in our vision, so we watched it long enough to recognize the extra-arched back that signaled a deep dive. It came up again for several more breaths every five or ten minutes.

After we spent some time with this whale (and a couple of minke whales that we could just see in the distance), we moved along to explore some more.

The next thing we came upon was a surprise: a basking shark. We could see its dorsal fin puttering along (the naturalist narrating the whale watch said that they normally can only see basking sharks on calm days because their fins aren't visible in choppy water). It didn't notice us for a while and so it swam quite close to the boat, and we could see its huge, grey bulk just beneath the surface. Basking sharks are the second largest shark in the world (and they only eat plankton!). It was pretty amazing because the fin whale hadn't gotten close enough to really see any of it except the parts that came out of the water.

Next we encountered another fin whale, Crow. This one came closer and closer, finally close enough that we could see the swoop of paler grey coloring just behind its blowhole. The whale's skin shone a gunmetal color in the sunlight. Then, as we all watched spellbound, it sunk under and resurfaced again right next to the ship. Its fin breaking the surface was incredible to behold. It lifted its head slightly out of the water -- something neither it nor the other fin whale had done -- and the naturalist pointed out its white lower jaw. Fin whales are asymmetrically colored and only the right side of their lower jaw is white. It was so beautiful, so amazing, that it took my breath away. I think it raised its head to get a look at the ship, because it was so close by.

The next whales we saw were both humpbacks <3 And I got a couple of pictures of the first one! This is Patches, a humpback that Granite State Whale Watch sees frequently but hadn't encountered yet this season, so they were really happy to see him.

Here's Patches' back as he started curving for a deep dive.



And here's his beautiful tail!


We got to watch him dive over and over, displaying the unique pattern on his fluke as he went down. When he was at the surface, we could see the most remarkable thing -- his white pectoral fins shone an incandescent green underneath the water. The next one we saw was called Quill, and gave us an equally impressive show. Humpbacks are so lovely -- I would love to see one a little closer <3

Eventually our time was up and we had to turn back. But on the way back, just past the Isles of Shoals, we saw a bunch of harbor porpoises! They were splashing around, feeding, and a flock of gannets were gathered around them. Once or twice we saw their dark silvery backs arch above the water.

Back in Rye Harbor, we talked to the naturalist and some of the interns and adopted a humpback whale, Owl (for Athena).



It was such an experience, full of wonder and amazement. Whales are such beautiful, otherworldly creatures. I want to go on another soon <3

We had a pretty busy weekend for one where we didn’t have anything planned!

On Friday, our gaming group got together for L5R – always a fun time :3 There were satisfactorily arranged marriages, drug trafficking, a giant freaking oni who very nearly walloped us (but was vanquished thanks to Kyo-san’s two well-placed knife-to-the-nuts thrusts and Kirito-san’s awesome Matsu badassery, set aflame with divine fire by Satomi-san!), and a plan to reinstate the Hare Clan! Hahaha we’re an ambitious bunch XD

We got up on Saturday morning and immediately set to shoveling off the porch roof, which is flattish and was covered by a 3-4 foot snow drift. Heavy snow/freezing rain was forecasted for Saturday night, so all the local radio channels and so forth were telling everyone to clean off their roofs. There have been a lot of collapses lately. We climbed out the temple room window and shoveled and pushed snow off the edges, carefully keeping close to the house wall. It was done in about 40 minutes, much to our relief!

After that we flopped about in exhaustion and played Majora’s Mask until the afternoon, when we ventured out for lunch/dinner at Popover in Epping. I also discovered that I somehow own only one pair of jeans (where did the others GO? O_o) so we went shopping and I got a nice pair for $10 at Marshall’s. It’s getting hard to find the style of jeans I like (i.e. somewhat baggy) since even the supposed “straight leg” jeans at Dress Barn were skin-tight. I also got some dress pants at Dress Barn and they’re very lovely and comfortable, but I discovered today that they have no pockets >_<

We got groceries after lunch and drove home as the snow started. It kept up into the night but didn’t amount to a lot (haha, in comparison to the snow we’ve gotten lately! It was about 5 inches or so).

On Sunday it was WARM WTF (around 40) and the sky was blue and it was GLORIOUS. When we were out at Target in the morning, we saw an entire flock of cedar waxwings in one of the trees – I’ve never seen so many at once before. They’re my favorite birds and they’re so pretty; they remind me of spring and herald good things. I counted 24 in one tiny tree, scarfing down berries, and there was another tree full of them too.

We’ve been watching Flea Market Flip on Netflix and we fell in love with a dresser that one of the teams had decoupaged with old love letters, and we have a beautiful dark wooden desk that we picked up off the side of the road last summer…

So off we went to antique stores to look for letters :3 We didn’t have a ton of luck, but we did find one nice letter dated May, 1890 from a pastor’s wife to a friend describing how her family was settling into their new parsonage after moving. There was a really cute part about how her husband had just gotten a new cart and all she could see when he took off in it was a cloud of dust and pedestrians staring after him “in wonder” XD



We also found some really beautiful postcards with photographs of pretty ladies (actresses, I assume) and flowers. The messages on the postcards are all in French!



The other letters we found weren’t very long so don’t suit our purpose perfectly, but they were cheap so we bought them anyway. I think they were being sold for the stamps on the envelopes (we saw a TON of empty envelopes at the antique stores for stamp collectors). We also got some Easter post cards and a few pretty Valentines. One of the Valentines is from one man (or boy, perhaps) to another <3





I also discovered an interest in Wedgwood pottery. I went to the Wedgwood museum/factory in England when I was there in 2001, and I thought they were pretty then, but I’m especially drawn to the classical imagery now. Most of the jasperware pieces are covered in beautiful classical ladies with flowing hair and dresses, with little winged babies and trees and things. They’re so beautiful and smooth and cameo-ish, like the figures are emerging from within the porcelain. We saw some green and purple pieces (along with the more popular pale blue) that were really stunning. I didn’t buy any, but they ranged from under $10 to over $100 at different antique shops, so there’s a good variety of prices. I want to learn more about the different designs and maybe find a couple that I really love. I don’t have a collector’s instinct but I long to have something to search for when I go antiquing. Letters are definitely going to become something we always look for :)

We didn’t end up finding enough letters to cover the surfaces on the desk that we wanted to decoupage, but we’ve decided not to decoupage it anyway. Instead, we’re going to lay out the letters and post cards and put a slab of clear acrylic over it (like glass). That way, we can swap out letters and things when we find new ones :3

I had a really nice, low-key Christmas. We invited my parents over to our house on Christmas Eve and ate delicious appetizers and desserts. We popped Christmas crackers, played with the little toys inside, looked at nineteenth-century photographs of Kittery Point (where my parents and I grew up, not to mention both sides of my family going wayyyy back), and giggled over a Victorian young woman’s health and hygiene guide I borrowed from Rachel’s library.

On Christmas morning, Rachel and I drove over to my parents’ house with three boxes stuffed full of gifts. We ate bagels for breakfast, opened the stockings (a Rachel tradition! My family always opened stockings last, but we converted when Rachel joined us :3), and spent the next several hours opening presents. We open them one at a time so everybody can watch <3 I was very blessed with goodies this year! Here’s a run-down of my favorites:

- Additional RAM for my laptop. It makes SUCH a difference! My laptop only had 2 MB before, and just opening/closing Text Pad was a nightmare. Heaven help me if I wanted to open more than five tabs in Chrome. Now I have 8 MB and things work so much faster. I can actually load multiple .gifs now without Chrome asking me if I want to kill the page!

- Rachel got me a set of Lord of the Rings sampler teas from Adagio <3 <3 <3 IT IS SO COOL. Teas include White Tea of Kings, Elevenses, Wizard’s Grey, Second Breakfast, Barrels of Tea (the only one I’ve tried so far – DELICIOUS), and Enchanted Tea.

- My parents got both of Rachel and me Fantasy Life, a 3DS game that we absolutely adore. It’s a mixture of questing, crafting, and monster-slaying where you’re able to choose a Life (like a profession – I’m a cook right now) and improve at it until you’re a master. You can switch Lives as often as you want so you can experience all of them, and your progress in previous Lives remains the same. The plot is charming and the dialogue is hilarious. I have yet to become frustrated with any aspect of the game, which is really remarkable. I love it <3

- I got two books on Neolithic tombs and monuments, one that explores the spirituality associated with them and one big coffee-table book full of lush photos. I can’t wait to immerse myself in both of them.

- Aster got some really badass new clothes, which you can see on my Flickr. She also got a gorgeous pink/purple galaxy-patterned sweatshirt which I haven’t taken pictures of yet.

- I got a DVD of AKB48’s documentary, To Be Continued, which follows their career throughout 2011. It’s swoonworthy. They’re all so freaking cute. It had a lot of interviews and discussed how they’re encouraged to put their personality into their performance (when most of them assumed they’d have to conform to a specific “idol” image). I don’t know how much of it is fabricated for the fans, but they seem to really care about each other and consider themselves a family.

- Rachel got me several scarves from Mexicali Blues on sale, and they’re soft and happy <3 I’m wrapped in one right now! I also got some flannel-lined khaki pants (man, should’ve worn those today ¬_¬), a sweater, and some socks at the L.L. Bean’s outlet. Yay for discount Bean’s clothes!

- We took advantage of the Fable Tribe closing sale to get a bunch of gorgeous Glamourkins <3 <3 <3

We had snacks for lunch, as usual (chips and dip, devilled eggs, crackers and cheese, and nuts), and lasagna for dinner with my mother’s apple pie afterwards – she makes the best apple pie known to man.

This year, I took the week after Christmas off, for the first time (when we weren’t traveling to Colorado) since I graduated from college. It was PHENOMENAL XD We spent whole days playing Fantasy Life; we visited bead shops and stocked up on varied and nutritious bird food for the finches; we moved a table my dad had fixed up for us from my parents’ basement and set up a new doll photography area; we went to the movies TWICE IN ONE DAY (something I’ve never done before XD Made possible by a movie gift card I won at work and my manager’s holiday Chipotle gift card); we cleaned and rearranged and flopped around doing nothing. I had to go back to work on Friday, but I was one of three people in the office so it didn’t feel like a “real” work day. I haven’t had such a relaxing holiday in a long time :)

Comings and Goings

Rachel’s parents are visiting us right now, which is really nice <3 Her mum has been out a couple of times this year to handle Gramma stuff, but we haven’t seen her dad for a year and a half, so it’s wonderful to get to spend time with him. He’s currently up north visiting his family and Rachel’s mum is staying with us to visit Gramma, who’s been in the hospital. The poor old lady is just getting more and more confused. She knows who people are (in general) and is fairly calm most of the time, but she’s never quite sure what’s going on or what’s been happening to her at any given moment.

Last night, Rachel’s mum taught us how to make stitched bead stars. It was SO much fun and so easy, and I love how mine came out:



I want to make a million more!

Prehistoric Monuments

Lately I’ve been having a surge of interest in stone-age monuments like Newgrange and Stonehenge. I’ve always felt a connection/fascination with barrows and passage-tombs (I blame Tolkien for terrifying me with them and Brian Froud for telling me faeries live in them). When I was younger, I had a very vivid dream about being inside one. It seems like the less available information there is about a time period, the more I’m interested in it – my favorite part of Anglo-Saxon England takes place before Christianity arrived to help people write things down, and now I’m very interested in prehistoric Britain. I’m especially interested in the monuments that include stone-carvings (like Newgrange has) and ones that were erected to align with the solstices. Learning about the daily lives and religion of the people who built and used these places excites me. I’ve asked for a couple of books for Christmas :3

Rachel’s brother and sister-in-law currently live in England, and we want so desperately to visit them – both to get to see them (which we hardly ever do) and to sightsee. My dream vacation would be a folklore/history/pagan-themed tour of the U.K. It would include visits to so many Neolithic and Anglo-Saxon sites, and probably a great many locals giving me the side-eye for my epic amounts of squee. Newgrange has a lottery where you can be chosen to enter the barrow (!!!!!!!!!!!!) on the winter solstice, when the rising sun illuminates the passage and falls on the spiral-carved stone at the end. SO. AWESOME.

Reading

Because it’s winter and this time of year always gets me in the mood for some Tolkien, I’ve been reading Unfinished Tales, a compilation with notes of some of Tolkien’s unfinished bits of lore. It’s fascinating because it gives little details about the characters and shows how Tolkien’s conception of them changed over the years. I have the vapors for Galadriel, so it’s especially exciting that there’s so much content about her. My favorite bit of knowledge is this:

So, Fëanor, right? Elf of extremely bad judgment who made the Silmarils, shiniest of the shiny gems, and was so possessive of them that he got a large portion of Elves booted out of Valinor and subsequently triggered generations of tragedy and warfare? In those gems, Fëanor captured the light of both of the Trees (the pre-Sun-and-Moon gold and silver trees that lit the world) and he was inspired to create them because Galadriel’s hair was the color of the light of both Trees mixed together. He begged her three times for a lock of hair, just a single strand – but Galadriel told him to get bent because he and his lust for personal glory creeped her out.

AND SEVERAL THOUSAND YEARS LATER, SHE GIVES NOT ONE STRAND OF HAIR, BUT THREE… TO A DWARF.

I can just see her graciously handing her gift over to Gimli as the Fellowship depart Lothlorien, and Gimli walking off with little hearts popping over his head while Galadriel turns toward the Halls of Mandos to righteously give Fëanor the finger. As Rachel said when I regaled her with this story: “Wow, long game.” XD

I love that lady.

It's been forever since I put up a bunch of pictures, but I've been taking them all the while :) I find that I like taking pictures better than I like looking actually through them and uploading them XD Rachel and I have been doing all sorts of happy things together this summer: taking walks in the elegant old Victorian cemetery down the street, going to the beach, seeing fireworks up close and personal at our neighbor's Fourth of July party... and today, we did a little redecorating and rearranging in our bedroom to give it more of a cozy, witchy, magic-cabin-in-the-woods feel.

Lots of pictures ahead!

( Violets, gazebos, waves, and exploding stars )

We've had a wonderful Solstice and Christmas season. It seemed to come upon us so fast, but we got organized quickly and I really feel like the gifts we gave and received were meaningful and a good use of our funds. Because I just got my new camera, a lot of the gifts I received were photography-related gear :3 And so I took TONS of pictures.

( Tons of pictures of ornaments, people, and presents. )

The other day I discovered a series of woodland trails not five minutes away from our house. I'd always wondered what the "Recreational Area" sign behind the skeevy and oft-deserted gas station was all about, and on Monday, while Rachel was at her knitting group, I decided to drive down there and see.

The well-kept dirt road past the sign wound through the woods for longer than I expected, and ended in a little grassy parking lot. A couple of trails headed off into the trees - pine, oak, birch, and aspen - beyond which was a glinting pond. There was a sign that told of a picnic area 0.2 miles away, and rest benches every 0.2 miles until the 1 mile mark at the other side of the pond, in a different town.

It was a glorious evening, mid-seventies and all slanting sun-rays, and so I headed down the path toward the pond. First, I came across this mysterious structure:



I have no idea what it is, with its half-turret shape and iron railings around the top, but a curiously symmetrical hole in the wall led away into the hillside.



Beyond the structure, the path split, and the way I took came out presently at the water's edge.



There were paths all over the place, leading up into the woods, but I followed one by the shore, where birds and dragonflies flew and crickets sang.



The land rose sharply on the other side of the path, and there were root-woven staircases that would take travelers up to the forest, where I could see the backs of wooden signs. I climbed up after a ways and circled around to find myself in the reported picnic area. This was one of the signs:



The others described the kinds of trees in the area, with leaf-identification charts, and the kinds of fish that could be found in the pond.

While the other paths had been narrow and winding, the main path up here was wide, clear, and level. It would probably be well suited for bike-riding.



There were some AMAZING trees - towering pitch pines, wider around than my arms could reach, with furrows in their bark two inches deep. Some were blasted and white, but still standing strong on either side of the path.



I turned back as the sun got lower and walked through a shadowy section where rare beams of sunlight shot through like spotlights. I tried to get pictures of them, but they didn't come out well.

I can't wait to go back and take Rachel :)

I've been working on a post about the Fairie Festival for the past few days, so hopefully that's coming soon <3

Rachel and I had a really lovely day today. It's been ridiculously hot in NH (yay 99 degrees when I left work yesterday! o_o) but we got the air conditioners installed in our bedroom and TV room. Last night, when we got home, it was clear from our jungle of a lawn that it was time to mow. Rachel loves to mow (I always offer!) so while she did so, I walked around barefoot in the ankle-high grass and looked at all of our flowers. There was also a bird calling in our Grandpa tree and I wanted to figure out what it was :3 (I didn't.) Right now we have irises, some beautiful purple things that probably lupins, bleeding hearts… it's gorgeous. I can't believe our luck that so many amazing flowers were planted here before we arrived. We planted some out front (and they're doing great!) but the most magnificent ones were already here.

Something wonderful and strange happened to me. There's a poplar tree behind our garage that I call our Mama tree, and she feels very protective to me. I always greet her when I'm over there and thank her for looking after us. There's another tree, also a poplar, beside her, and I tend to forget it's there. Last night, I said to Mama tree, "Maybe sometime I'll get to know that tree better."

Later, when I was falling asleep - not dreaming, but scarcely awake - the Mama tree told me who the other tree was. And I can't really remember what she said. It was something about the other tree being a/the Goddess, and I remember being surprised because I had been under the vague impression that the tree had a male sort of feeling. I wish I could remember exactly what she told me, but at the time, it was such an important revelation.

Today, we went bra-shopping (such fun XD) and I managed to find some inexpensive ones. When we were at Kohl's, I found the CUTEST DRESS… It's this one. It was in Juniors, so I assumed it would never fit me, but Rachel convinced me to try on an XL and it ended up fitting really well. Er, except for the fact that it's ULTRA SUPER SHORT XD But it's so incredibly mori that I was envisioning wearing it over a longer skirt anyway, which is what I'll do. It was also on (humongous) sale, so I didn't even feel bad buying it. I've discovered that I like pink, which is a color I never thought I liked - or never allowed myself to like because I thought it would mean I was conforming to society's dictation of what color I should like as a woman? Well, I like it. Nobody should tell women that they ought to like pink, but nobody should tell them they can't like it, either, or that liking it makes them unfeminist.

Afterwards, we went up to Portland to Dobra Tea, which was our main destination. They were having a poetry/book reading, which was really cool, though unexpected. It was nice to get to hear people's stories. I had a chilled tulsi tea and milk with bobas, and it was INCREDIBLY delicious. We also had warm pitas and goat cheese, my favorite of Dobra Tea's snacks. While we were there, Rachel asked me if I had a lot of weekly points left (we're doing Weight Watchers), and I said I did… so she lead me to a secret destination <3 Cupcakes! Portland was beautiful today - much cooler, with petals blowing on the sea breeze.

When we got home, I went to greet the other poplar tree (I'm not sure yet how to address her), and her upper branches were lit by the sunset. I hope I get to learn more about her.

Oh, December. I always think "I'm not someone who gets stressed out by the holidays!" Ha. Ha.

We've been really busy the last couple of weeks, and luckily many of the things we've been doing have been fun things. Our after-work and weekend hours seem packed, though. I have physical therapy for my ankle twice a week (it's going well) and there have been lots of things going on at both my and Rachel's workplaces that require cooking, baking, present-buying, schedule-rearranging... @_@ Because the holidays are coming up, we're trying to cram in a few visits to relatives we won't be seeing on Christmas along with making and buying presents and helping out with stuff at our local Unitarian Universalist church. We were going to go to the Hanging of the Greens there yesterday, but we decided we just had too much to do at home :\ That stretched-thin feeling of never being at home was creeping up on me last week, though, so it was ultimately a good thing.

I'm weaving some Christmas presents this year, and it makes me super happy :D I always wanted a craft that's as fulfilling to me as knitting is to Rachel, and while I don't know if I can achieve that level of squee when it comes to crafts, I find weaving really fulfilling and I look forward to doing it. I wish my loom was more portable XD It's not something you can whip out at a cafe after you're finished your sandwich...

(Okay, now I want a Tofurky sandwich so bad. I may have to stop by Trader Joe's and get some sliced tofurkey. <-- Written earlier today. Had a Tofurky sandwich for dinner! Best 6-point sandwich EVER!)

I'm also really excited because, for the first time ever, I took the Solstice off work. This is the first year I've really had the opportunity because a) I have paid vacation time now and b) this is a New England Christmas year, whereas last year was a Colorado Christmas year. We're going to do a ritual at home during the day and then go to the Solstice service at our U.U. church in the evening :3 SO EXCITED. As I've gotten older, I've longed more and more for the moment when the sun starts coming back. The Solstice means a lot more to me as part of my personal spirituality than Christmas does; Christmas has an important place in the realm of family tradition instead. Even though we're not Christians, we both grew up in Christian families (nominally Christian, anyway - with various strengths of belief at various times). I want to honor the traditions we made as children and that our families passed down, and also to treat with respect the beliefs of Christian people I respect, even if they're not my beliefs.

Also I've been drawing ponies like whoa and I need to scan them or something. I have yet to find an acceptable mixture between the Friendship is Magic animation style and my own style. So things are looking kind of awkward at the moment. My first attempt at deviating from strictly FIM-style ended up looking so much more like a deer than a pony that I just turned it into a little reindeer... ^^;;