Saturday reflections

I took this picture as we were trying to navigate our way out of the car rental lot at Minneapolis-St. Paul airport in June. I liked the abstract weirdness of that grid and the reflections on the car.

Saturday reflections

Here's something more recent and local for a change: cars waiting for a light on Walker Street in Lower Manhattan on Thursday.

I had just had my annual eye exam, and with my eyes dilated the patterns on these windshields looked practically psychedelic.

Saturday reflections

Punts under Magdalen Bridge.

Saturday reflections

Another castle, back in Oxford this time, reflected in one of the city's many waterways.

Saturday reflections

Flowers reflected in the river at Magdalen College this morning.

Saturday reflections

A portrait of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, reflected in a display case of his uniforms at Apsley House, his home in London.

We toured the house on our field trip on Thursday. My course this year is on the Brontës, who were all great admirers of Wellington. (Charlotte Brontë named the hero of the imaginary kingdom she created with her brother “Arthur Wellesley” after the duke.)

The Brontës weren't alone—the house is packed with trophies, silver, fine china and most of the Spanish royal collection of paintings looted by Joseph Bonaparte, all of it presented to the victor of Waterloo by the grateful royal houses of Europe.

Jumping back to, say, North Dakota

 

There's a drought here in the UK, and most of the lawns at Merton have gone brown—they water a couple of the smaller ones. And many of the flowers in the gardens are dying or dead. There's been a little rain this week, but clearly not the amounts they need.

So here's a flashback to rainy and quite green North Dakota, the morning we set off from Jamestown, heading west. Flat, flat, and then more flat.

Saturday reflections

At the Natural History museum in Oxford today.

The museum isn't air-conditioned, and the ceiling is glass, so it was very hot inside. But the adjoining Pitt Rivers museum is air-conditioned, and the kind woman in the cafe gave me a huge cup of ice with my lemonade just because she thought I looked like I could use it.

Saturday reflections

Something very different: windows on the main street in Deadwood, South Dakota.

Saturday reflections

Another look at the infant Mississippi River in Itasca State Park. The reflections are pretty feeble, but it's what I've got.

Saturday reflections

 

Downtown Minneapolis, in 2022.

I'll be back in Minneapolis Tuesday, though only for a quick overnight at an airport hotel before heading west on a road trip early Wednesday morning.

Saturday reflections

Pier 34 on the Hudson in the rain this morning. One of my fellow teachers was doing a mile and a half swim in the river today, and several of us turned out to cheer her on.

Saturday reflections

Palm trees reflected in a car window in Berkeley.

Saturday reflections

This one has been sitting in the folder for a while—the no longer used El Ferdan Railway bridge in the Suez Canal.

Saturday reflections

I've been taking a lot of buses again, something I got out of the habit of doing during the pandemic. But with school and tutoring on the Upper East Side, and my knee no longer up to walking as many miles as I used to, it's either buses or Uber, and buses are a lot cheaper.

Another phone picture

This was taken from the couch in my stateroom, in Antarctica obviously.

We were somewhere in the vicinity of either Neko Harbor or Paradise Bay. I probably got up off my ass at some point and went out on the balcony to get a better picture, but I love this reminder of the sheer magic of that trip.

Saturday reflections

Cars in a parking lot sporting some amazing reflections.

I took this picture about six months ago—I remember that I was cutting through the parking lot on my way somewhere in a tremendous hurry, though I no longer remember where I was exactly or where I was going. But obviously I had to stop and take this picture.

Anyway, it promptly got buried in the hundreds of photos on my phone related to school and our group chats, and I found it today when I was trying to clean some of the junk out.

Saturday reflections

The Upper East Side reflected in a car on East 68th Street, taken on my way to the bus stop after class today.

Saturday reflections

The São Sebastião Cathedral looks better as a reflection.

Saturday reflections

Neko Harbor, and a picture that really shows how spooky Antarctica can be, with the mists draping over the mountains and the water that looks almost black in the dim light.