I had a very productive morning yesterday, but put off running my errands until the afternoon.  Bad move.  We got some serious rain in the early/mid afternoon, and I decided not to venture out; four hours later it poured again.  Obviously I won't be mowing for a while, but hopefully it will dry out enough for me to do so before irrigation later this week!

There was considerable wind accompanying the rain, and look what I found when I looked out back yesterday (although I waited to snap the picture until this morning.)

That's a heavy wrought-iron panel (between the front and back yards) so I'm going to need some help to pick it up and lay it across the wall until Tom gets home to deal with it.

Glad it didn't land on Pokey, who often hangs out by that tree.  BTW She wasn't at all happy with the rain yesterday, and took refuge in her crate on the porch during the worst of it.  Guess her burrow was full of water!

Last night was yet another late night for me - not sure why I was again still wide awake at midnight, but I don't get much done that time of  'day' so mostly I watched TV.  Speaking of which - just found out from Mom that there is a documentary miniseries on penguins on PBS on Wednesday evenings.  Looks like I missed the first one, which aired on September 24, although I may be able to watch it on the computer.  Surprisingly, the PBS website is not easy to naviagate.

Yesterday I swept the house (it REALLY needed it!) and this morning I've been mopping.  In between, while sections have been drying, I re-sized and cropped the pix from my California trip.  So now I can start sharing them.

In San Luis Obispo, looking for the Visitor Center, we came across a flip flop store that 'gets it':

These folks also had the right idea!

It was still early, so this store, like the others, wasn't open yet.

In Morro Bay, this was my first sighting of the sea lions.  I was a little frustrated that they weren't more cooperative with regard to posing for pictures, but as Tom said, we'd see PLENTY of them during our travels.

Unfortunately this turned out to be the best shot I got of a pelican:

Looks like Tom is off to check out the 'soup'...

Smoobage: an esoteric word for something you really Love.
We didn't go in to check out this store, but I loved the name.

"Smokin' hot and seasoned to perfection"

This sign was posted on the dock where we had our lunch that day.
(Don't think the birds read it...)

Here's proof that I did get 'into' the water further on down the road while rock hunting.  (This was the beach where I found the PERFECT rock for Bana.)

And yes,the water was chilly.

Even the seals were trying to warm up in the sun!

These pix were taken at another beach further up the coast.

In the parking lot there was a table set up where a woman was giving out conservation information and selling sea lion toys.  I'm guessing this car parked nearby belonged to her.

That's all for now since I really should must get some more stuff done.

Check back later, though.
Next in line are my pix of Gilroy, the garlic capital of the world!