Favorite trip photos

I think I’m finally over the jet lag from our trip. Last night I slept without waking at four in the morning, and I feel very well rested today. I’ve heard that it takes a day for each hour we travel away from our time zone, and at one point we were twelve hours on the other side of our clock in Dubai. So it’s close. Today it is exactly eleven days since we returned home.

Although the main intent of our trip was to go on an African safari, besides visiting Kenya and Tanzania we also spent several days in London before Africa and a night in Dubai and four nights in Paris after our African adventure. It was a trip of a lifetime. I’ll never forget it.

I’ve already posted a few of my favorite safari photos – and I promise to post more in the next weeks. However, today’s photos show some our favorite sights in London, Dubai, and Paris.

 My third time on the London Eye. 

Try it. It's a great ride.

 Stonehenge - an amazing site

 The "silver guy" in front of 

London's National Gallery

 Dubai's old city spice market

 The largest aquarium in the largest mall 

in the world - where else? Dubai

 While riding on the Seine on a cloudy 

rainy day in Paris

 Monet's lily pond at Giverny

Monet's House at Giverny

Back to writing work

What a relief to not have to drive an hour to Anaheim and back anymore. I finished my consulting job - which I loved - but I'm very happy not to have to do that stressful drive anymore. 

So instead, I'm using my time to catch up on my writing work.

The first order of business is gathering my November 2012 challenge poems into a chapbook. Robert Lee Brewer's instructions are to submit no more than twenty by January 7 - this coming Monday.  I went through them this afternoon and picked out fifteen. I have a little editing left to do, and then I plan to get the document off tomorrow. After that I'm on to the next item on my list. 

It gives me great joy (there's my word Joy that I picked for 2013) to tick items off my to-do list.

Here's a preview of a couple of poems I'm submitting.

This prompt was to write about something just beneath my skin.

Just Beneath My Skin

Unfortunately

those miracle creams

that are supposed to

get rid of age spots

fine lines, deep wrinkles

don’t work

No matter how much I slather on

they just linger there

like a film on my face,

neck and décolletage.

They never get to where they belong

just beneath my skin

This prompt was to write a poem about a wheel (my suggestion) - any use of the word wheel.

Photo by Madeline

The London Eye

Every 30 seconds a capsule door opens

to let passengers in or out.

Yet the giant Ferris wheel

doesn’t stop so that

slowly, carefully

we see the London landscape

from every angle.

As we gaze through the glass oval

capsule walls

we also see into the capsule below

and watch a couple

in full wedding regalia

get married.

The only thing we miss -

enjoying a sip

of their celebratory champagne

with their thirty guests.