Surprise day in SF with Mimi

Last Friday Mimi and I had a morning of adventure that wasn't planned. I decided to purchase some Himalayan singing bowls from a fellow in San Francisco who, in a strange twist, is actually a renowned ABM and Feldenkrais practitioner. I found him online when I was looking for bowls and I vaguely recognized his name and face. When I googled a bit further it all made sense since he was, until recently, Anat's assistant and he is in LOTS of the videos of her work with kids. I found bowls that fit my needs for pitches and on a whim I decided to just go and pick them up at the store in SF. We found the place very easily as we have been in that area of SF quite a few times. It is just at the end of Golden Gate Park. We spent quite a bit of time in the store checking the bowls and swapping out one of the ones I had picked out online. It was rather surreal choosing these bowls online! Ancient meets Modern technology.

After we left the store I decided we should check out the Randall Museum which is a place I had on my list of things to see and do! I wondered about waiting to visit there with Ami and Katie but thought it would be quite fun to go to see something by ourselves- a little Mum and Daughter date. Indeed it was fun although I had the feeling that Mimi really likes having Ami around - for interpretation, for giggles, for kid energy. The museum is located on one of the Twin Peaks and it overlooks the city and therefore has marvelous views. The museum specializes in exhibits about local flora and fauna. They had lots of rescued animals there which seemed pretty funny to be there - crows, a squirrel, a toad, a turtle, a king pigeon (rescued from starvation in Golden Gate park). Actually it was neat to see things up close that are usually running away from you. Mimi and I really really liked the California Quail- they looked very prosperous- and we even got to hear the male crowing. Mimi also really liked looking at the bee hive that they had with the little tube so that the bees could go out the window. I thought my Mum would be very excited to see the 3 or 4 owls that were living there. They were up on platforms in the exhibit room. An employee told us that every animal at the Museum is unreleasable. The owls were either blind or injured in some irreparable way. The barn owl was especially cool to see.  They had a nice photo display of images of a coyote seen on the Twin Peaks. Hard to imagine a creature like that in the middle of such a huge city. All of the photos were taken by a regular dog-walker on a point and shoot camera. They were remarkable quality.

One funny thing that happened was I thought I would help out by expressing my concern for the deadish looking upside-down beetle I saw in one vivarium. I couldn't quite believe my ears when the  employee said that "Oh, yeah, I'll go and stand him up again". He then told us was that this beetle only had 3 legs and was about 12 years old!!! Wowzers.

Mimi was really interested in the re-creation of a 1906 earthquake emergency house. It was about the size of our dining room and apparently people lived in them for up to 3 years. It had a little bed and a sewing machine set up in it. What more could you need?!?

After we had finished at the museum we were getting pretty peckish and I decided to continue to use the sage advice of Mighty Girl who writes the blog "Famous Among Dozens". She wrote a column which tells you how to see SF as a local. As a result we went to check out the restaurants at 16th and Valentia and got a super yummy veggie burrito and watermelon juice. We need more time to wander around the area. I'm sure we will go back there. 

We headed home in order to meet Ami at the bus. On the way home I think I saw a roadkill of a coyote on the freeway just off the Bay Bridge. Such a beautiful bushy tail. A very sad testament to the reality of the Bay Area.

Oh Deer

The other day I was taking Bodhi around the block late at night. When we rounded the 3rd corner we came across a buck who was scratching his teenage antlers on a very small lollipop (manicured!) tree which was really no taller than he was.  We stopped and stared at it for quite a while enjoying this little encounter with wild-life.  Bodhi didn't seem to wonder what we were doing and he was nice and quiet with me. I was thinking about something my friend had told me about a shooting at a BART station a couple of days before and out of the blue a guy came rushing past me. He totally startled me and I jumped. He sort-of muttered something, questioning whether he had scared me. I said "yes, you did" and then I proceeded to tell him about the deer while he whisked up the hill. Of course his fast movement scared the deer away. The guy barely glanced to see what I was talking about but I don't think the concept of wild-life really registered with him. Bodhi and I carried on and the guy was way ahead of us on the block. Then he suddenly came to a stand-still in awe. He had seen the deer. He could hardly believe his eyes. Then he wanted to talk to me! He wanted to know where it lived, where it came from etc etc. He said he hadn't seen one since he was a kid. Perhaps if he just slowed down he might get to see things. . . .

pressure to blog has worked!

Fran and Helen at the Lawrence Hall of Science (or "Lauro hollow science" as Ami likes to call it)
Abundant heritage tomatoes at Monterey Market


Golden Gate Bridge from Sausalito

Gran, Phoebe, Ami and Mimi (and Bodhi too) outside our door on the courtyard

The MacPappas visit - Berkeley Pier


it has come to my attention that there are folks out there eager to hear more about the adventures of the MacElferts in Berkeley. My humblest apologies for disappointing you!!! i would feel even more inspired to write if YOUR blogs were updated too!!!! why not start your own?

October has come and gone since I last wrote and we have been up to all sorts of things. Hard to summarize really. Let's see.
October was a month of visitors with only one party actually logging their visit in our guest book. (I must do better remembering!)
First we had Caitlin and Panos who were with us over Canadian Thanksgiving
Second we had Helen and Frank Elfert
and Third we had Sue MacRae!

It was a busy month but the kids and I were able to see things in our new town that we hadn't ventured forth to see before. Perhaps I could write on those things in a later epistle but first I think i must tell you about one of the places we have been that is amazing. Early in the month, (and before we had visitors) we visited the Discovery Museum in Sausalito which was really fantastic. The first wednesday of the month is free and so now we have been twice! The image of the golden gate bridge posted above is from the vantage point of the museum. It is rather a difficult "museum" to define. It is an outdoor/indoor adventure "park" for the 0-7 set which is all about experiential learning. We spent a long time fishing for plastic fish, loading plastic crabs onto a crab net which you could then crank up to a dock where you stand, playing with a massive train set complete with ferry-boats (the best part for Ami). Then there were outdoor things with a real fishing boat for play and (human made) tidepools and a cave and a crow's nest climbing structure and a sandbox with hidden treasure in an old wrecked boat. Then there was the tot-spot where indoors there were these wonderful creations that were akin to water beds. They were blue and had big leather lily-pads on them. The kids can pretend they are walking on water and fall and wrestle and fool around without getting wet, knowing how to swim or hurting anyone!
All around the indoor part of the tot-spot they have buttons on the wall which you can press to make the sounds of what ever creature is depicted on the button. Things like frogs, ducks, crickets, owls...
The other side of the indoor tot-spot has a sort of underground theme where you can climb through an ant tunnel - Ami particularly likes this for some reason, the challenge is appealing i guess. I think he will miss the tot-spot when he gets too big for it. Oh yes, in the indoor part there are all sorts of cute costumes of bugs and small creatures that the kids can just put on and play in. There are also lots of puppets of animals, bugs etc.
Here is a picture of my favourite part of the Discovery Museum this last time. HUMMINGBIRDS!! whizzzing and buzzing over all this wonderful hummingbird and butterfly- friendly vegetation.. so cool. They would sit for long periods in one spot and show off their luminescent colours. It meant that i could get this great shot! I just wish Mum/Gran/Gan stayed for an extra day just to come to the DM to see the hummingbirds!!

Let me know what you would like to know more about!!!!