6 cups of tea

Ha ha! Tea! One of my aunt's client's gave her a box of tea for Christmas. My aunt told me to come down and pick it up because she is a coffee person. I expected multiples of many kinds of tea. Actually, there are only 6 elegantly designed tea bags in the box. Each flavor?/kind comes individually wrapped in a pyramid paper package. Unfold the paper, and I find the tea bag, also triangular, a short string poking out of the top and a paper leaf attached to the end of that. 

From left to right: Citrus mint (caffeine free), chamomile tisane (caffeine free), white ambrosia (low caffeine), Jasmine Green (contains caffeine), African Solstice (caffeine free), Oasis (low caffeine)

I can smell each scent distinctly. I've never seen tea like this before, but that's not saying much because I have never shopped for or looked for specialty teas. But it is saying, I saw something I hadn't seen before and I am taking note of seeing something new every day. Anyway, its a nice design, though there is no credit for any designer that I can see. The tea is great too, thanks Laurie!

a rainy tuesday

Its another grey, rainy day. I only like country rain. Good for getting work done though I suppose. I don't know where the time went. I did spend two hours in the library.

Oh, and I noted the lovely hue the yellow beets gave my soup. And how like sea-weed the russian kale became when wet. 

going back

I am going to make a library run soon...browsing through notebooks to find books I may have scribbled down to read. Found some. Also came across this observation from the summer: 

I like the round smooth stones, black, Ramona has. 

I like the fact that they are lying on a book about rocks, 

lying on the corner of the book's cover photograph 

of similar round smooth stones, black, like the ones Ramona has.

* the idea of real objects being on books/photos of the objects

Directions for Reading a Flow Chart

A stop sign is a reason to cry

A rectangle is a process

An oval is an endpoint

I love how these directions are meant to explain a flow chart, but when the context is taken out, they become poetic!

Connections

"Mapping is a way of helping to understand the bigger picture" my geography teacher for Religion, Environment, and Society said today. "What makes a study geographical?" "Its the study of a phenomenon in a spatial way." The discussion centered around the relationship between religion, environment, and society in the middle east. I'm just remembering all the maps in the Travel Bug, again, and how looking at those maps helped me make better sense of relationships between things. Coincidentally, I'm on my 2nd book in a row set in the middle east, I finished 3 cups of Tea, and am nearly done The Storyteller's Daughter. The author tells of the beautiful myths and ancient fables her father and grand-father passed on to her. Many have the same allegory/moral undertone as the Afghan tale of the king I laid out/illustrated recently. The author expresses her dream for her country that, "we'd export apricots and karakul lambskin instead of war" (201)

Illusions

My aunt just forwarded a group of these street art images from the pavement artist...and these are some of my favorites. I love the illusion and the creation of another world.

Blue sun days

I noticed a lifting of spirits with the first sunny day since I've been back. And today is even better. When I walked through Pease Park this morning, I saw many little kids with parents off for MLK day. 

Yesterday I noticed a 3 legged deer limp past my grand-mother's kitchen window. I noticed a cat dart out from beneath a car. I noticed how nice it is to go into Whole Foods with some one else. To follow someone to the dessert section and not cut my own path through busy buyers.

Now I am noticing new bands. It took my aunt to tune me in, no pun intended, to the amount of free streaming music available on i-tunes radio. Now, I'm listening to the station "Whisky from a Wire" in the alternative category. And they just played Brett Dennen, who I'll see on friday! "Darling, do not fear what you don't really know"