Beware the Ides of July

This morning, the internet weather report showed a tornado symbol for each day of the week in Watsonville. I kept clicking on "refresh", and the symbols remained. So, I decided to take the day off, and run some errands. I was in search of pants, since I've clay stained many pairs of late. And, I also needed some plate stands for Open Studios. During the lengthy drive, I listened to the news. Really, our world is a mess. There was a report about our "Do Nothing Congress", where a Tea Party spokesperson called in to say that our country is really a republic, and we are "kidding ourselves if we think otherwise". There was a report about the strife in Gaza. Children being killed and hospitals being bombed. Then, Vladimir Putin. A formerly well-place politician in China will soon be tried for corruption. An American doctor now has ebola. And a person suffering from ebola, took a flight to Nigeria, and died there, leaving doctors to wonder if it will now spread to that country. An author of a book about global warming was interviewed. The world was feeling a bit like the plot from "Survivors", a scary apocalyptic British television show...

After running my errands, I kept hearing birds screeching. So, I pulled off the road to see what was going on. Near a sandbar, there was a scene that would make Alfred Hitchcock proud. Because of the extreme overflow of anchovy, there were thousands of birds, feasting on them. I walked into a nearby pottery shop. A young man stocking heavy pots stopped to talk to me about the insanity of the swarms of birds. The internet has recently been flooded with photos of humpback whales, and other sea animals that are cruising very close to the shore. I could also see a large pile of sea lions on the sandbar. I've never seen them there before. All of this seemed to go along with the theme of the day: mayhem, and a disturbance in the order of things.

Looking at the glazes on pots seemed kind of soothing.