A Weekend with Mother

Over the weekend my mother was in town, and I took Friday and Monday off work. We packed the days with scooter rides, food, parks, natural scenery, Alameda Flea Market, visiting an old family friend, Catan, and walking around. The weather was great, and the parrots were out in gregarious flocks. The time off also brought clarity to work and life questions that had been building up. But that’s the subject for another post.

Flower in the Botanical Gardens.

Lush greenery.

Mother and palm.

Palm seed?

A squirrel munching on the red seeds of a Chilean Rhubarb.

Plant on a pier pole.

Sea stars.

Old deck.

Stone stairs.

Red fruit for snacking.

Walking to dinner on Friday.

A starter salad from Pizzetta 211.

Goat cheese pizza.

Cones.

The old guard tower near Rob Hill in the Presidio.

Trees in the mist.

A banana slug investigates greenery stuck to its tail.

Ivy on an old guard shack door.

Bald man, red tracksuit.

Dry fountain in Sutro Park.

Overlooking the sandcastle building contest on Ocean Beach.

Water buckets.

The top of the Sands-America Pyramid.

A bike-powered water pump.

A man with a large kite took aerial photos with a remote-controlled DSLR.

A sandy sandwich.

The number 12 stairs to the beach.

A coyote in the Marin Headlands near the Sausalito exit.

Shed in Alameda.

Old tennis rackets.

Doll head.

Negotiating.

Trinkets in cigar boxes.

Clown buying produce.

Woman with basket and cart.

The VANSICKLEs.

Hairspray covers shaped like owls.

Junk.

Handsets.

Old soda cans.

A mass Alf burial ground.

Pink panda.

Vials.

Used dentures.

Our new typewriter.

Jackrabbit poop.

A couple examines the distant skyline.

Lunch, with my clog for scale.

Abandoned building in Alameda.

Warehouse 10.

Old barracks.

A retired aircraft carrier on display.

Mega mushroom in Alamo Square Park.

House-ware in a family friend’s warehouse.

Mattresses.

Old friends, reunited after many years.

Parrot at sunset.

Another parrot.

And another.

Parrots in silhouette.

The stepped balconies of the grandly ugly Hyatt.

It’s back to a San Francisco without immediate family, a city not nearly as good.