Honeysuckle

This is our home. There are eleven other apartments in this building.
This honeysuckle bloomed well earlier this year. The lot in the foreground is completely bare now. It was full of interesting weeds for a while, but eventually filled up with thorns and burs, so I was glad when they mowed it down. I was surprised, though, that in all these months not one speck of anything has sprouted. There must be millions of weed seeds in that lot, but with no rain not even weeds can grow.

Beware of the Orange

Beware of the orange,
For in his bright peel
Is acid so strong
It will make your throat peel.
And how does that feel?
Not too good. Pretty bad.
Why ate I an orange?
Twasn't all that I had--
I had grapes and bananas,
Tomatoes and bread,
But for some strange reason
I had "orange" in my head.
I removed the orange part
(But not quite enough)
Trying to save
The nutritious white stuff,
Leaving some of the dents,
And that was my error,
For d-limonene
To me is a terror.

I have this weird way of peeling an orange. I use a knife. But if you don't get down to the smooth white part, you can get some pretty strong acid-y stuff. I have heard of orange peel being used as an acne remedy, a heartburn remedy, a de-greaser, and a stain remover. (But not necessarily straight from the orange.) My experience is that it burns! My throat started burning immediately, and within an hour I had all the symptoms of the flu. Maybe it was an allergic reaction. By evening it was affecting my breathing. But I had a good night's sleep and today I am much better.

This is the second week of Hebrew level 3. As in the last level, we have two days with a slow teacher and two days with a fast teacher. Or rather, one teacher speaks moderately fast and the other speaks extremely fast. There are two new countries represented, Finland and Czech Republic. There is one super-brain in the class who knows all the answers and gets them out before anyone else has a chance to think. A bit annoying. So far I have written a story and an essay. I like doing this, and look forward to getting papers back with red marks all over them. That's how you learn--make lots of mistakes!

"Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again." Franklin P. Jones

October 12, 1979

One of the happiest days of my life -- Sharon was born.

Isaiah 35:1-2
"The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.
"It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the LORD and the excellency of our God."

I got her name from this verse, with the hope that there would be created in her that excellent work of the Holy Spirit, without which we are all ruined sinners.

יומ הולדת שמח שָרוֹנ





An evening primrose. Different varieties of these grow anywhere from a few inches to six feet tall. Some are pink. And some of them bloom all day.

Many evening primrose, like this one, have reflexed sepals and an X-shaped stigma.

An unidentified flower. I believe I also saw these in England.

October

Muffix is just about the perfect dog. He belongs to a neighbor, who says he behaves better than her children ever did. I ran across Muffix on another street the other day, and told him to come, sit, and shake hands, and he did.

One who possesses beauty without vanity,
Strength without insolence,
Courage without ferocity,
And all the virtues of man without his vices,
This praise, which would be unmeaning flattery
If said of a human,
Is but a just tribute to my dog.

~~Lord Bryon

I wonder if he wrote a poem about cats.

Young.

Old.

There are lots of beautiful dogs in Jerusalem. And potentially beautiful cats. And people too. But I don't feel free to take pictures of people. But maybe they wouldn't mind. A true photographer sticks his nose in about anywhere to get a good photo. This person consented to having her picture taken -- just this once.

Another Kitten

Adorable. Yes, in a way, tiny kittens are adorable. Although they look a little bit like rats. And they are so pitiful.
I found a little black kitten that was in a terrible way. It smelled ever so bad, and its eyes were stuck shut from infection. (It was old enough to have its eyes open.) So I washed his face till his eyes opened up, and when I put him down, he walked like he was blind. After a couple minutes he started walking normally. Then I gave him a thorough bath, which is not always a good idea when they're very small because they chill easily, but he really needed it. Afterwards he shivered a lot, but even before he stopped shivering he was purring and pouncing on everything that moved. After he was dry we put him outside and he ran off.

New Residents

This one prefers to be outside where it can get more sun. It is Solanum Lycianthes Rantonneti. It grows in warm climates. I know they have it in South Carolina. So why not Texas?


This is one of the nicest things about this apartment. The artist is Mangeri, but I must not be spelling his name right, since I can no longer find him on the internet.


A tame cat. No, he doesn't live here.



This one does live here. I have seen him twice--once on the floor and once on the ceiling. I think I prefer him on the ceiling. You can probably guess why.


A nearby playground. I don't think these make good city trees. Maybe they would grow straighter if there were a mass of them planted together all about the same size.


Our neighbor's nice planter sometimes gets used as a doorstop.

Kokie

A couple days ago I took a walk down to the next street where there are lots of stray cats. Actually on every street there are lots of stray cats. There are too many stray cats. But there are no mice or rats, so hooray for the cats. Occasionally you meet a tame cat, and I did, and stopped to pet it, which prompted a woman to ask me if I wanted a kitten. She didn't want it because she had four dogs. So she took me to the woman who had the kitten. It was tiny kitten, really too young to survive without its mother, but I decided to take it home. It could die just as well at my place as at hers.

It was nearly impossible to feed it. I had to soak milk in a cloth and let the kitten suck on the cloth. The kitten was always screaming. I kept it in a walled-in area outside. (I certainly don't need a house cat.)

Today I walked down the same street and two boys saw me--they must have seen me before but I don't remember seeing them--and asked me if I had their kitten. They told me they had bought some special kitten formula for the kitten and were going to feed it with a baby bottle. So I ended up giving the kitten back to them. It probably wouldn't have survived on cows milk. They will hopefully get a syringe or kitten bottle. I don't think they could master the trick of prying the kitten's mouth open while it tries to grab you with needle-sharp claws, holding a cloth in its mouth and dripping milk onto the cloth--a three-hand job really.

I believe I understood one of the boys to say the kitten's name was Kokie. Anyway, it sounds good. That's the fourth kitten I've tried to help. I'm not sure why people even care about them, there are so many.