Theme: Starry, Starry Night

The Parade of Lights streamed through our harbor last night, some two dozen boats decked in twinkle lights & imagination, their captains and crew singing out Christmas wishes & “vote for this boat” admonitions as they vied for “best costume”, and though I intended to jump on local whale watching boat: the Condor and rock it, too, my seafaring intentions were sidetracked by a bit of en route, retail therapy.

Parade of Shoes…

Revised theme: Shoes & Ships

What can I say? The girl in me needed the balm of new kicks, and with on the spot resourcefulness—aka a fistful of fare dollars—I purchased several pairs at a local outlet store, quickly revising my intended viewing platform to: free. The pier would do nicely I decided, pleased with my “shoes for cruise” exchange. So what if that meant I had to hoof it a half mile or more after parking at City College? I certainly had the footwear to do so!

Besides. Hadn’t I read online about a fabulous “city pier of snow” and “Santa wonderland’ feature? With sunset still a half hour away, there was plenty of time to snap a few pics of the incongruous white stuff before the show, and so I beat well-shod feet to the wharf.

Sure, I noticed the sprawling crowd of folk on the harbor’s fuel dock, but I didn’t for a minute equate that with pseudo North Pole wonder until I reached an all too sandy Stearn’s Wharf. There, with a few other misdirected folk, I stared in wonder across the expanse of water at distant whiteness, belatedly realizing the term ‘city pier’ was the dressed-up name for fuel dock. A regular: I say potato—you say city pier kind of thing—but there was no use crying over iffy semantics. Better to buy a pound of overpriced candy instead, and snap some shots of seasonal flora. Continue reading →…