Sometimes you have to say goodbye.

I hiked six miles in hiking shoes in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains this morning without incident. Back at the trailhead, I changed into my town shoes - my well-worn Berkinstocks - and went about running errands. In the Farmer's Market parking lot, my dear old (worn-slick) sandals met a painted right-turn arrow and turned into a banana peel.

*splat*. Luckily, not ¡Boom!

It's the first storm of the season and rain was collecting in murky puddles, so my pants legs, and my shirt sleeves, and the seat of my pants soaked up tire residue, asphalt dust, and whatever natural particles were swimming there, as I rolled around into position to stand up. Now what? I'd come to the market to buy a turkey hind quarter, but I was a mess. Could I proceed in my soggy clothes? 

Yes, I could and I did and when I got home, I tossed these old friends in the trash bin.

¡Boom!

Edmund de Waal at the Huntington

Visited Edmund de Waal's installation(s) at the Huntington Gardens and Museum yesterday.

This was the last display we visited and it is a haunting one.

Joan

323-828-8334 

Just learned a cool thing

My camping cookset has a trick that has escaped me until now.

The short pot has this indentation around the bottom.

The bottom fits perfectly into the rim of the taller pot. 

Voilà! The pots stack!
The wider pot becomes a lid and allows me to heat a second food at the same time.

How have I missed this feature all these years? 

Desert Guitar

When I first spotted this feature in the desert south of Bakersfield I thought it was a mirage.

Looking West of the Grapevine

Gorman's burned hillsides

I hope these burned hillsides near Gorman can withstand the forecasted El Niño rains and produce a multitude of wildflowers. 

What looks a little like a pinhole capture is really a windshield capture, focused on the raindrops. 

Yosemite Conservation Heritage Center

A young visitor set up a tea party in the YCHC.

My home in Yosemite National Park

Up at 3:00am for a bit of a walk. When I returned to my tent, I saw a scene and snapped a frame. 

I never expected to get this magical capture.

Done Done DONE!

Yes. Finally done. The Nightmare Before Christmas was completed and packed up before Labor Day, even. I thought it might be here until December 24. 

It only took 10 days of piecing, but it was hard right down to the 1000th piece because I "finished" with two holes. I was not surprised because this is a garage sale find - it even has one possibly cat-chewed piece missing a tab! Happily, I found the missing pieces on the floor. 1000 pieces are safely back in the bag and box.

Yes, I should have made a photo of the completed puzzle but, frankly, I just wanted to get it off the table. It's kind creepy - that stare! And, you know, I like the look of the puzzle in deconstruction. 

The puzzle is in keeping with the Nightmare Before Christmas as the border is irregular and the pieces are irregular and the whole thing is monochromatic. Tim Burton has a kindred spirit in the puzzle designer who charted the layout of this puzzle. It is good quality - I could pick up and dangle the completed puzzle by the edge and not a single piece dropped out. It was made in China under a Disney license.

I pulled out a 1000-piece Charley Harper puzzle as the antidote - The Sierra Range. So colorful and serene. But I'm not going to dump it out for a little bit. Need a puzzle break, I think. 

Summer on a plate

I made olive oil-maple granola this morning to top this peak-of-summer ripe peach. So good. 

Enjoyed it with iced oolong tea.

I started with this recipe maybe 14 years ago and have tweaked it along the way, initially swapping  walnuts instead of pecans and reducing the maple syrup to a half-cup (those are my standards now). Also standard: start with a teaspoon of Morton's kosher salt in the slurry. It's tempting to add more but I resist (most of the time). Today I considered adding Malden salt crystals to my bowl but held off. Salt and sweet is almost irresistible so I rein in that tendency early in the process.

Other experiments include reducing or omitting the oatmeal, adding hemp hearts, sesame seeds, almonds, or [salted] pistachios, reducing the brown sugar by a third (that maybe a new rule from today forward).

I'm always trying to find a way to make the granola clump so I can eat it out of hand. I've added egg white, used more slurry, varied the baking-stirring method. No satisfactory clumps yet, but it's always delicious.

This seems to be almost universally enjoyed. One year for a charity fundraiser, I sold a quart jar of granola for $20. It probably could/should have been more.

Here's a link to the original recipe: 

https://food52.com/recipes/15831-nekisia-davis-olive-oil-maple-granola

It's come to this...

I decided to hide from the Nightmare to get things done around the house. 

Progress on the Nightmare

It is slow-going on the Nightmare. And still, it is completely absorbing. 

I started another puzzle

It is diabolical.  A real Nightmare in 1000 irregular grayscale pieces corralled by a sort of - but not really - round border. 

The morning after our family feast

Scrambled egg with Patrick's scone and fruit, perfect. 

My Family

Best family portrait we've made in a long time... maybe ever. 

D'oh!

 

 I was cleaning up the table to arrange the puzzle for admiration when someone flipped the edge of the tablecloth, jumbling the corner. 

So, I guess it's not quite done yet.

Ta-da!

RIP  David Hockney.

 

I turned this puzzle out on June 13 when I heard David Hockney had passed.  Then I listened to, watched, or read  tributes, interviews and remembrances while I sorted and pieced.

It was a joy to learn more about the man, the artist and this work.

Well, today is July 30 and I finally completed the puzzle! It was fun and a labor of sorts but well worth the time and effort.

I'm no David Hockney but I like to think there is a ginormous photo collage in me. I just need to find my subject landscape and kick off the project.

This collage supposed includes fragments of 750 prints. I think I heard that he created 3000 images over 10 days to distill to the final collection. That was 1986 - before digital cameras were accessible.

That's a lot of shutter clicks.

Beach shade with style

My friend Will brought this sunshade to the beach at Leo Carrillo on Saturday. It was quite effective casting a nice patch of shade but it was also beautiful and the movement was mesmerizing.

I found it online here Shibumi Beach Shade Canopy – blaenag.

Mount Shasta

It's like the mountain stands on its own. 

In Yosemite Valley - UPDATE

I posted this GIF of Vaughn making a photo back in May. Very lately, he shared the photo that could have been captured just as I was making this GIF's ingredients. 

Thanks for completing this story, Vaughn.

Upper, Middle, and Lower Yosemite Falls
captured by Vaughn Hart, May 2026 (All rights reserved.)

See more of Vaughn's beautiful work here:

 www.vaughnhart.smugmug.com

Instagram: @vaughndhart