It’s the time of year for storms, lightning and hurricanes, so that means afternoon and evening thunderstorms: This is a shot looking east down our street. Apparently I got pretty statically charged. Fun fact: Florida (specifically Orlando) is, according to John, the lightning capital of the world, so in a way we were taking our [...]
In February, my parents went to Byromville, Georgia to attend the funeral of my mother’s uncle, Haessler, and to attend to his estate. After much goading and persuasion, my father has written a guest post about Byromville, and he took some pretty nice shots to go with it. So everyone, please welcome the man who [...]
There is a general misconception among non-Floridians concerning the city of West Palm Beach and the affluence of its residents. The words palm and beach together evoke images of Donald Trump, pearls with Lacoste shirts, and men’s loafers without socks. These are all apt representations of many citizens of Palm Beach but not, however, West [...]
While walking on the beach yesterday, John and I were treated to a special exfoliating pedicure. The newest luxury exfoliator: Tar! (I put in the bottle cap for size reference. This was a small to medium sized tar pool.) It’s such a good exfoliation method that it doesn’t even come off your feet. It just [...]
While I was living in China, locals in every city used to tell me to visit the city parks because they were ‘natural.’ Indeed, the pretty plots of grass, flowers and trees wedged between concrete behemoths were both social hubs and the closest one could get to anything containing the slightest whiff of nature. Growing [...]
I originally wrote this poem, a tribute to Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas, when I was living in Huzhou back in 2009, just after the riots in Xinjiang catapulted the region into instability and shut down most of the Internet in China. Plate of Wander was, for a time, blocked, along with many [...]
One of the little rituals John and I have is that every Sunday is Pasta Night. This started back when we were living in Shanghai; Sunday was my longest and most grueling teaching day, and he would have a comforting, carb-y pasta dinner ready when I got home. I actually hadn’t eaten Italian-style pasta (except [...]
At the Garlic Festival in Delray Beach the other week, this was the most interesting thing that happened (though we didn’t try the garlic ice cream): For ten dollars per person at the gate, one would have thought that the landing of a Coccinellid on a t-shirt would not be something to overshadow the actual [...]