P is for Poppies

P is the letter of the week on Denise Nesbitt's ABC Wednesday Round 3 (with Mr. Linky and commentability, if there is such a word) and ABC Wednesday Anthology.

P is for Poppies.

California Poppies to be exact.

Click on photos to enlarge.

They will be appearing about January, the month that I photographed these. In my childhood and right through the 1930s whole hillsides and all the vacant lots were covered with poppies in their first exuberant burst of bloom. Then they became few and far between, at least until the time of the great Oakland fire in 1991. In the season after the fire they covered the burnt area, the place where thousands of homes had stood, in blankets of orange. But then they almost disappeared once more, except where poppy seeds had been deliberately sown.

When I was in elementary school, back in the 1920s, we had regular music classes, and one of the songs we sang (which I may not have a completely accurate memory of) went like this:

Poppies, golden poppies, gleaming in the sun,
Closing up at evening when the day is done.
Flower of California, children of our state
Rolling from the mountains to the Golden Gate.

My son-in-law, Clinton Shock, phoned a little while ago and reminded me that P is also for President. I'm posting this on Tuesday, election day. It's surprising that I can even use my keyboard, since all of my fingers are crossed in an effort to ensure that our next President is Barack Obama!

Warm weather

It isn't spring, but more like summer today. This has been a great year for California poppies. They have been flourishing in road dividers as well as gardens and vacant lots. It's an abundance that almost rivals that of my childhood years when we thoughtlessly picked them by the armload. Only once since then have I seen as many. In the year after the great Oakland fire, poppy seeds, that had been dormant ever since houses were built above them, sprang forth in the ashes of said houses.
Otto and I have been searching our files and printing photos to try to convince the world's most suspicious IRS auditor, that, yes, we really are a business, and that, yes, we did actually take those business trips that we deducted. And yes, we did pay for tests of our equipment at certified laboratories. We have been audited every year for the past 2 decades. This particular audit is of the year 2003. Our tax lawyer is himself an ex-IRS employee, and he can't believe what is happening. If anyone reading this wonders what our business is, here is the link to Otto's website, PhaseAble .