More Munch Moments (sort of)

Watching the sunset from Mugu Rock looking towards Anacapa and Santa Cruz Islands, the sky reminded me of the sky in Edvard Munch's Scream. Nice to know that life on the beach in SoCal is much mellower than that portrayed in the painting. Our sky did have something in common with Munch's Oslo sky yesterday - particulates caused the unnatural light. Oslo that year had ash from Krakatoa's eruption; Ventura County had ash from a Santa Paula controlled burn. In spite of wanting to scream about our current leadership in the White House and all the harm it has done to our country and planet, I have to say that life in my corner of the world is much, much brighter than an existential painting will ever be!

Google's Cool Logo Today

Today being Edvard Munch's birthday, the folks at Google created this special logo for their search page. The Norwegian Expressionist was born on December 12, 1863, and it is especially fitting that the creator of The Scream, as this image of existential angst has been popularly called, is being celebrated this year. The original painting, one of four versions created by Munch, was stolen from the Munch Museum in Oslo on August 22,2004 and was recovered this year - two years and nine days later.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

. . . well, sort of. This is what Port Hueneme Beach looked like yesterday when I spent my lunch hour enjoying the sun. If you click on the picture and enlarge it to its real size you can see both Anacapa and Santa Cruz Islands. I took these other pictures after Messiah rehearsal, when Tom and I had dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen near our house .
Here's shot of the decorated palm trees and the rising moon.

Hope you had a pleasant and happy Thanksgiving. Dad, Jane, Bryan, Jessica, and Chelsea came up from OC and helped make Tom's and my day very nice. We missed Sam, of course, but look forward to seeing him at Christmas. Here's a little ditty created up the road in SB. Warning: I hope you enjoy it, but if you don't want to find yourself humming "gobble, gobble, gobble that turkey" all day, you might want to turn the sound off and just watch the people turkey dance.
The Gobble Song

Back to our Thanksgiving, here's Tom and Bryan playing guitar after dinner.

My New Workplace

Much has happened since the last time I posted some thoughts. On November 4th, I started working for a new employer - the City of Oxnard - as a Librarian at the South Oxnard Branch Library (SOBL). Originally scheduled to close on October 31st, the current 4,000 sq.ft. facility is in the Community Center at 200 E. Bard Rd. Construction is behind schedule, so I am working there until we close our existing facility and move next door into this state of the art building. (In the meantime, I took some vacation days and separated my employment with UCSB on November 14th. On March 8, 2007, I will retire from the University of California - on the anniversary of my 14th year with the UC!)
Take a look at this video of all the activity as the interior of the new South Oxnard branch of the Oxnard Public Library moves toward completion.

This photo shows where the Young Adult area will be; it is to the west, on the other side of the shelving.