Klimt, collapses and car crashes

 

See how the tire is revealed by the entire bumper being demolished?
It almost took off his axle.

The other day I was hanging out with a friend and describing how someone had rung our doorbell around midnight and I looked out from the balcony and saw how one person had hidden himself behind our Spanish arch while the other was at the door and called out frantically to my husband, "Don't open the door! It's bad guys! One's hiding" ...

and how my husband called 911 before we understood they were the law (it was two sheriffs on a very strange mission that I still don't fully understand, and I guess one had hidden himself in case my husband opened the door and shot his colleague), ...

and in the same conversation we talked about how I'd forgotten my purse at a teachers' meeting and how the (very nice!) person who took it for me since campus was closing happened to live an hour away, and just a few other things, and she said, "You have the most drama in your life of anyone I know."

I had to laugh, but it kind of hurt. In fact, after the sheriffs departed, I had asked myself, "Why does all the weird stuff happen to us?"

So that was Jan. 11.

On Jan. 23, we were part of two more 911 calls in the space of 40 minutes. We went to San Francisco for the Klimt and Rodin exhibit which closes Jan. 28–if you live in the area, you have four more days to see an absolutely incredible exhibit. It was fabulous. We loved touring the exhibit and then the permanent galleries of the Legion of Honor.

We looked at the time and realized our hope of getting a fun lunch in San Francisco had evaporated time-wise. So we headed down to the basement cafe of the Legion to grab something quick and head home. At the bottom of the stairs was a woman on the floor surrounded by a small group of people, having CPR administered.

My husband works in the ER, so he went over to check in. Things were already underway, but we were part of that drama for about 20 minutes. I stood there, tears prickling in my eyes, thinking, "Is this how this woman dies? On the floor of the museum?" and thankfully, she opened her eyes eventually and was able to speak to the caregivers.

Someone had called 911, and soon enough the paramedics were there to take over.

Kind of a sacred moment as a life was saved.

So incredible.

And then, as one does, we resumed the concerns of the living: food. But there was a long line to get into the cafe. We resolved we would get on the road and see how traffic treated us; maybe we could get something fast on the way.

This is how quickly that long line of cars forms after an accident.
I wonder how long traffic was affected.
There was a ton of debris in the road, glass and metal, so cars had to slow
to get past the accident site. To make things better, that meadow on the left was filled with cows.

About 20 minutes into our drive, something happened in front of us. I can't even say what it was (I'd make a terrible eyewitness), but there were cars in front of us colliding, and it was only due to my husband's excellent defensive driving that we were not involved. He braked hard and swerved, and we missed the car in front of us by mere feet.

It was a three-car crash and we were almost the fourth. 

We pulled over to be witnesses (my husband had paid attention and knew who was at fault) and give our number to the other drivers. Both our phones had died (despite being charged all night the previous night and my not running any draining program: more drama) but luckily his had been charged just long enough in our 20 minute drive for me to call 911.

After a long time, the police officer arrived and we took off. We knew we were never going to get home in time, so we changed to charging my phone just enough to call the wonderful person we were going to be late for.

Traffic sucked and because we were on the road an extra hour because of it, we had to stop for gas. More drama.

So, we were part of three 911 calls in a week.

Let's hope things slow down for a little.

I guess the one thing I can say is, the Klimt exhibit was still worth it. And tomorrow I'll post photos. Undramatic photos.

Best defensive driver and CPR overseer ever.

Me, art lover. Our parking spot just happened to have a spectacular view of that
Golden Gate Bridge (I'm so used to typing Bridget, my character in The Murderer's Maid
that I literally just wrote, Golden Gate Bridget)

(And that's what I love about San Francisco. You just, you know, pull over on your way to the museum and there's a world-class view people get in an airplane for.)

. . . .

Lizzie Borden's staircase

The staircase, seen from the top looking down

In any story, there’s always some detail, large or small, that sticks with you. For me with the Lizzie Borden narrative, it’s the idea that the front stairs curved around such that at some point as you climbed, you’d be looking into an upstairs bedroom at floor level. And that when Mrs. Borden was lying murdered on an upper floor and the maid Bridget Sullivan was trying to open the front door to Mr. Borden (thus facilitating his murder), Lizzie Borden stood on the stairs behind Bridget and laughed.

She may have been looking at Mrs. Borden’s body, eye to eye, when she did that.

I believe I'm standing on the step that lets me see under the guest room bed

The idea simply chills my bones. I opened my novel with that scene (and circled back to it towards the end in an altered, poetic-license kind of way).

The 1893 jurors actually visited the Borden household to see its strange layout and, yes, to climb those stairs and see if it was possible to see a body on the floor underneath the guest room bed.

If you visit the Lizzie Borden B&B, you are given the same chance the jurors were given. A docent may even lie down on the floor where Abby Borden lay, so that you get a more visceral experience.

Stairs are somewhat creepy even without corpses at the top. Discuss?

. . . . .

Fancy some taxidermied animals in a cool historic museum?

Gargoyle outside front entry

Look no further than the Natural History Museum on the K.U. campus in Lawrence, Kansas. Its official name is the KU Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum.

Housed in an absolutely gorgeous four-story stone building that looks exactly like an 1800s professor built a castle to house his antiquities, the museum is a true pleasure to tour.


Many of these dioramas were created for the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago.

There are taxidermied animals galore. Of course, we have shifted away from the idea of hunting animals to stuff them for display, but since these already exist, they are definitely fascinating. I once wrote about Oakland's no-longer-extant Snow Museum and continue to be intrigued by these frozen creatures.

When we were there last year, a contemporary artist had added some flair, let's say, to the main diorama. This huge exhibit may be the largest in the world (? I've lost my notes) and has many wall-sized glass vantage points. It's a two-story exhibit so you can also look down on it from the second floor. The artist had added a human figure to the diorama at the watering hole...with legs but no torso or head. It really looked like a serial killer's fantasy. The docents were similarly baffled and said the installation had not been met with excitement.

Second story view of inexplicably dismembered body

Kansas is known for its fossils, and here's a larger-than-human fish that makes me somewhat glad extinction means I won't run into this swimming in Lake Shawnee.

This hangs from the ceiling in the entry.

I must apologize for my photos' quality. I took these last year with a desperately ancient droid—surprised I did not find a fossil of it on display, ha ha— and have since happily joined the iphone world (or the 21st century itself, as a friend put it). I'm sad because I took a lot of wonderful family pictures with grandparents and uncles that are similarly blurry. Hopefully, though, there's enough for you to see what a cool museum this is.

The star of the collection is Comanche, the stuffed horse owned by General Custer and the only living thing to survive his Last Stand in 1876. Comanche was previously shot by an arrow in another confrontation with the Comanche (in 1868, hence earning his name for continuing to carry his commander), and was shot by bullets three times at the Battle of Little Big Horn. When he was found two days later, he was there weakly poking around, barely able to stand: the only one left alive.

He was used in parades and lived at Fort Riley, Kansas, until his death in 1891 when he was stuffed.

Comanche's skin being stretched over an armature

The armature

This was my second visit to the museum. When we had gone before, sometime in the '90s to early Oughts, Comanche was in a glass case that permitted you to walk around him and see him from all sides. The top was open to the ceiling. Apparently, the ceiling had leaked and flooded the museum floor and the poor horse was drowned in his own case. This time, he was in a closed case that only permitted viewing from one side. He was in a darkened room to help preserve his multiply-insulted body, which didn't permit my challenged camera to capture it. Here's a link to see his current exhibit status, though.

ANGER

Dinosaur lovers will find much to see at this museum.

Dinosaur bones

Interesting collection of various creatures

Finally, across the street we went to the student union and enjoyed the Kansas University spirit. Many thanks to my Kansas relations for taking us to this extraordinary museum!

It's not too late to read the next post under this one and comment on it to possibly win a free copy of my latest novel The Murderer's Maid. I'll pick a person tomorrow morning (Jan. 5) randomly from all the correct entries. Hint: there are only two correct entries as of noon on Jan. 4 and so you have a very, very high percentage rate of winning!

Lizzie Borden attended the 1893 World's Fair with tickets she won!

Lizzie Borden may have actually seen these taxidermied exhibits at Chicago's World Fair. We know she attended with tickets she won in a raffle.

I'd also love it if you'd comment on this post and/or follow my blog. How to follow? If you're on your desktop computer, simply scroll down the right-hand column until you see the blue "follow" button. If you're on your phone, scroll down until you see "view web version" and then read down the right-hand column. This seems to be a one-click pain-free opt-in if you have a gmail account or other easily recognizable email account. There is no need to sign up or give any information, just click.

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