Magister mundi sum!

- I am the master of the universe!

This has been an interesting week at the office. Shortly before I left on vacation the other Underwriter left to open his own office and become an agent. The search for a replacement is slow, particularly here in Portland where the pool of candidates is pretty slim. So for the time being the office staff in Commercial Lines has been me, two assistants and the Admin assistant.

My assistant left for Hawaii this week, and the Admin is on vacation someplace ( I forget where), which left us skinny this week but, I thought, all should be okay. However Sherrie, the other Underwriting Assistant had a medical problem and found herself in to Emergency Room on Monday. So the count was down to me.

The Office lights are on motion detectors, and apparently I am not exerting enough motion. The lights keep going out. To compensate I have to stand up and wave my arms about once every half-hour. This would not be too bad except my first-floor office has windows opening directly out onto the building entrance, so that anyone arriving from the parking lot sees me jumping out of my chair and bouncing around to make the lights comer back on. Not that this would necessarily be unlike me anyway, but I usually only perform for friends. Monday afternoon we had a building fire-drill. The alarm went off, and of course I had to exit. Generally the office would have others in it as well, but all the Engineers were out in the field, so it really was only me, standing in my appointed spot in the parking lot. When it was time to return to my desk, the lights had of course gone back out, so I had to wave at the detector as I passed.

It is terrible to be King if there's no-one to carry your cape.

Bye, Bye Blackbird

- Where somebody waits for me,Sugar's sweet, so is she,Bye bye Blackbird!

After writing my last entry, I have recalled that there is another Blackbird who has shaped my life....

There she is, fifth from the Left. That would be Mary, in one of her recital costumes. Tutu and all. I really love the photos she has from those years in dance class. I think if you look closely you can see the beak emerging from her forehead. If only there were home movies as well. She looks as if she is moving in to pinch someone though....I have to wonder what the unpublished followup photo might have revealed.

Nightingales are put in cages because their songs give pleasure. Whoever heard of keeping a crow?

- Jalal-Uddin Rumi(1207-1273) Turkish Sufi Mystic Poet

Every evening at the end of dusk, we have a fly-over of crows. I am not referring to three or four - but hundreds of them, swooping and swirling from the South. A Murder of Crows, as such an event is called. They make a huge noise, and had I never seen Hitchcock's "The Birds" I might have never given them a second look. I think it rather astounding though, that they have this same pattern year-round...and frankly I now look forward to it, occasionally making a point to be out in the yard at the last moments of daylight to be there for the dark cloud as it passes overhead.

Personally I have liked crows in general for a long time. My parents' place at Mats Mats Bay had always been a haven for crows, and I remember waking up early in the morning more than once to the sound of one cawing loudly from a tree outside my bedroom window. As a teenager I was annoyed, but as time went on I tolerated the rude alarm. I realized that my parents were making the crows into pets, and fed them on a regular basis. Even after Dad died, Mom would feed one particular crow who would perch up in the top of a fir tree and complain until she emerged. I think in a way she thought of him as being Dad, returning every day to make sure she was okay and wanting her to fix dinner on time.

When we were in London, we of course made the tour of the Tower, where a flock of ravens is kept. Legend has it that if the ravens ever leave, the monarchy falls. So the ravens are given a pretty royal run of the place, and while their wings are kept clipped to prevent them from making an unscheduled flight out the top, I didn't notice any of them making a run for it out any of the open gates. What took me by surprise was the size of these critters - I had imagined them to be slightly larger than wild crows, but in fact they are enormous and make the most obnoxious guttural growl. I thought about the poetic image I have had of Edgar Allen Poe with a somber Raven perched on his shoulder - in fact one of these birds would feel more like carrying a small goat around. Blackbirds come in all sizes it seems, and none would make a good songbird. Rumi's comment about Nightingales makes a good point, because they sing even when they are caged. Somehow I don't think this could be said of either the crows or the ravens; but they do give great pleasure. They are reassuring in their constancy, and they are surprisingly loyal.

We have a large ceramic crow on the front porch; we bought it in Montana, and I nicknamed it "Joe" after my Dad, and I often say hi to it when I get home in the afternoon. Somehow I think Dad would approve.

Looking outside I notice that this afternoon is warm, and it might be a nice evening to hang out and wait for the fly-over.

The Smuggler

So, there I was, an innocent in paradise....I was on the last leg of our trip home safe and sound, so's I thought on home turf at the SeaTac airport. I was at the baggage carousel, heaving off bags when a customs agent approached Mary to randomly ask about her arrival. I had given her the hastily completed customs checklist I'd been given on the plane from London, the one that had about six tiny lines in which I was supposed to itemize our purchases over the prior month's travels which were burgeoning from every bag and pocket....



Conscientiously, I had checked the appropriate boxes, all negatives on contraband items but had in fact indicated a "yes" on the food box. I raced over to the customs agent grilling Mary, my bags flying in every direction, and answering his question about the "yes" with "olive oil...and some Pasta - is pasta a problem??" I queried....



"nope, pasta should be all right..." he responded, scrawling an illegible initial on the page. I retrieved our seven suitcases, piling them awkwardly on carts - I was really missing the Public Porters we had used through Europe about then, and off we huffed through a corridor and out into a waiting room off lines and swarming people. Through the first booth we went, a customs agent smiling and stamping our passports while I finished the customs forms, quickly putting vales on all the various items listed. He smiled. "Food...is the olive oil you mentioned on the back all that you have?"



"Yes," I blustered...or wait we also have pasta!" He smiled again and stamped away a few more times and sent us on our way. The next waiting area was like coming through Ellis Island....hundreds of bodies sweating away, hauling all types of baggage, babies crying....oh the humanity. An agent approached us and took a look at the scrawl on our customs ticket. "Follow the yellow line...he snarked"....



I knew this was a bad omen. No one else was following the yellow line. None of the suspicious-looking types I had earmarked were in the yellow line. This was bad. I turned the corner, Mary was ahead of me and already having words with a customs agent...he was rummaging through her handbag. She had not eaten the breakfast box we had been given on the plane, and had in her bag a small packet of apple slices. She was mortified as he waved them in the air chastising her for all to see for having tried to sneak apples into the country. Shame. Fortunately for her, his tirade was minimized by the fact we and four customs agents were the only ones in the yellow room. Everyone else had followed the blue line or the red line and were happily on their way home by now.



I started to unload the baggage onto the (yet another) x-ray belt...the luggage passed through, but a sharp-eyed agent snapped up the blue bag, the one we had bought in London for our purchases. The one with the pasta. He had the customs ticket in his hand. "Olive oil...is that all the food you have in here???" He grilled. "Yes...er no..." I replied weakly. "We have pasta. we were told that packaged pasta is okay..."



"Yes, Pasta is okay." he muttered as he opened the bag and began rooting though it. Through the clothes we had packed in there, through the souvenir books and postcards. He ripped open a plastic grocery-type bag filled with bags and pasta and dove in like a surgeon extracting a harpoon...."Nope, THIS is what we saw..." he snapped, producing two plastic shrink-wrapped sausages. He glowered at me. "You didn't declare these," he said.....



"Honestly I didn't even know we had them..."

He looked at me incredulously...

I stammered some more..."We were considering them, I forgot that we bought them....."



"Hmmmm. This is a serious offense. You can't bring these in - they aren't stamped with the blue seal."



(I still don't know what the blue seal is. I was not even sure if he meant an insignia or a member of the whale family.)



Mary muttered into my ear ''I forgot I bought those....I was going to put them back at the store and then guess I bought them anyway...."



"These look expensive too" the agent said...but we'll have to keep them. The question is that this is serious. This could cost you a fine...$400."



He looked at me to observe the wave of fear his words would no doubt send rippling thought me. At that point I was thinking that if I would have to pay the $400, I should at least be able to take the sausages home.



"I will see what I can do. I will have to discuss this with my supervisor." With that he turned on his heels and stalked off to a little cubicle past the x-ray machine. After a minute (I was actually wondering if there was a supervisor behind the screen or if this was a ploy like the one practiced by used-car salesmen who have to leave you for a few minutes to discuss the offer with their supervisor....after a minute he returned.



"I can waive the penalty, but I will have to have your passport, and I will have to make notes regarding this problem. You need to be aware that this is serious and the next time you go through customs, if you have meat products and don't declare them you will have to pay the $400." He looked at me sternly. I asked if I could repack the underwear sitting in the conveyor belt. He walked over and typed for a while on the computer...then gave me my passport. I scanned it to see if there were any nasty notations there regarding my meat-smuggling, but it was clear. I realized however that on future travels I will be watched for sausages in my carry-ons.



And so, I am a marked man. Mary bought the sausage but her passport is clean. Mine is marked. I will be known forever more as a smuggler of preserved meat products. I am sure I am doomed to forever walk the yellow line...to be searched mercilessly for apple slices and pocketed hot dogs. I will have to bear the yoke of sausage shame....it is my burden.

london

SO - we have been in London a couple of days now.....yesterday we spent the day doing the most touristy of tourist, we jumped the on and off bus and rode around the city seeing the sights from the open-air top of the bus. We got off at Westminster Abbey and had intended to go in but balked at the cost of it, £20 ($40) for the two of us to enter ...we decided that it would be more prudent to return on Sunday for services...so that is the plan. We walked around a bit then got back on the bus for the rest of the morning.

We had lunch by the Thames in a very nice park, there was a little restaurant there where we could order inside, then they'd bring it out under the trees. We sat surrounded by statures of all the great English poets, specifically at the foot of Robert Burns.

After that we got onto the River cruise and spent the afternoon gliding along under the bridges enjoying the very nice sunny weather cooled by a nice breeze, passing the Globe Theater and ending up in Greenwich. We were only there a few minutes, but knowing that we had spanned both hemispheres was a moment to remember.

When we returned to shore back under the tower bridge we took the on-off bus again to Harrod's to buy dinner in the famous delis there. I will have to say that I was less than astounded by the famous department store, I think it has become a little full of itself and the security measures taken by its current owner along with the shrines to Dodi and Diana make it all a bit cheap - while the prices a re the only thing breathtaking. Nevertheless, we did choose some nice meat pies, a great salad and some desserts to take back to the room with us.

This morning we got off to an early start and went to Kensington Palace. We had thought of going to Windsor, but because we have spent so much time on trains lately decided to stay closer - and besides it has a tribute to Diana in the main-floor gallery right now, with the clothes that she had auctioned just before she died, and Mary really wanted to see it. The palace itself is interesting, it has been a historic residence for many of the Royals over the centuries, and is one of the older palaces for the family. Because the Queen is in residence at Buckingham palace right now, it is closed to the public, but the half of Kensington not currently occupied is open. We walked through Princess Margaret's apartment, interesting and nice, but it really paints a picture of life for the Royals that is not so enviable - we realized that there was every kind of convenience and comfort there, and she had all kinds of staff running around, but it was so completely cut off from the world, for security, that she and the other Royals are really like well-kept prisoners. It was pretty claustrophobic, really. Upstairs we walked through the state rooms and what had been Victoria's apartment before she became queen. It was furnished pretty much as it had been, including the bed brought back from Buck to the bedroom she had lived in there, just as it had been when she was awakened there to be told she had just been made queen. Interesting.

After lunch we went to Kenneth Grahame's house, the author of "Wind in the Willows". Most of you know me well enough to know that that was "my" book growing up - Aunt Buddy gave it to me when I was about 8, and I always have allied myself with Mole. Standing on the steps of the house was to me like Mole coming home - it was great.

We then went to the Victoria and Albert - this is an incredible museum - filled with old and new, and really more dedicated to the study of design as it has evolved over the past 3000 years from every corner of the globe...an afternoon at the V&A is really invigorating, I can only imagine what it would be like to spend more time there.

We are about to find someplace for dinner, we had thought of taking in a play but I think we are just a little worn out so will probably watch a movie in the room...I had to laugh this afternoon as we got back form these two days of intensive tourism, realizing that we have been having more trouble with communication here in London than we did in either Italy of France; London is such a hub for immigration that many of the shopkeepers speak only broken English, and the mix is heavily Middle-Eastern, Indian, Chinese and Eastern Bloc (lots of Polish) making negotiations very interesting. Both of us are still using a lot of Italian picked up as we traveled from Venice to Rome - it just comes out of us without thinking. So when one of these shopkeepers pick up on that they will occasionally respond in broken Italian making it all the worse. United Nations here we come.

Tomorrow we have plans for Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London and the Royal Mews. And today we found Starbuck's - which I had not had since we left home. Ahhh, civilization at last!

This is our last stop on this adventure - we'll be heading home in a couple of days...it has beebn a great tour, and we had to buy yet another suitcase to bring back all the books and souvenirs we have picked up along the way. I am really glad we discovered Public Porters.