Polly heard there would be a women’s march, but found the buses from Bakersfield to LA were full, so on the 21st of January we went north to Visalia. (We later learned there was a small march in Bakersfield, but we had no advance notice on it.) We arrived just in time to join in. There were speeches after and then we had lunch at the historic Depot. (Prices have gone up, but it’s still a fun place for lunch.)

On the 2nd of February we went to Fresno and heard Woody talk on Namaqualand. We have been there, but it’s always fun to see how others see a place.

On the 5th we went to Anne’s for an anti-Super Bowl Party. As usual we played games during to Bowl and watched the ads. We did watch the Bowl at the end, however, when it went into an unprecedented overtime with the Patriots winning after coming from behind.

On the 14th, of course, we heard Pananyoti Kelaidis and his trips to unusual places. I’ve never known anyone who went to Kazakhstan. I had heard of growing succulents in Denver and was not surprised that he knew of me on the basis of my work on Lesotho.

On the 19th we were out at Cal State for the garden weeding. Many of the plants are hidden by the tall grass due to the heavy rains.

Hey! How about that rain! I hope we can get it into underground storage to bring things back to a reasonable water table. I am watching the Oroville Dam story with special interest. As a kid I remember swimming at Bidwell Bar which is now under the dam. In recent years we have watched the water level drop as we drove across to visit James in the mountains. Why didn’t they fix things then? (The same goes for Isabella!)