The start of a sunny Saturday...

...until the fog rolled in...

...and rolled right out again:

We're in a cycle of mid-afternoon low tides here in Malibu. It frees wide swathes of lovely beach for long, long walks. With the fog (temporarily) gone and the winds busy elsewhere, what better place to burn off the fevered joy this weather brings than on the California coast? Here's Broad Beach, its visiting rights hard-won and well worth the battle. Week days, it's all gardeners and housekeepers, carpenters and catering trucks. Nary a homeowner in sight. Help keep Broad Beach free - exercise your body, and your rights.

That's all I've got to say right now - sun! Golden sand, gilded cliffs and, thank god, after a week of cold, gloomy, atmospheric fog, sun! And if that's just a snore to you, there's the edge of my neighbor, Barbra's house (yes, that Barbra) peeking over the bluff.

On a cool and foggy morning like this:

you can take refuge in colors like this...

He's back, the great blue heron who occasionally hangs out in the vacant lot in the center of town. Just stands there, stock still, for long minutes at a time. Then he'll give himself a little shake, fluff those feathers and, elegant as Fred Astaire, take a few long-legged steps to a new spot.

PCH was shut down for much of yesterday - a fatal hit-and-run that cut off traffic to and from Pacific Palisades and beyond. Once newscasters got the word out, the thousands of cars that jump off the 101 and use PCH as a shortcut to the west side stopped as well. It was quiet here, a little like the old days, the Malibu I remember when I was a little girl and my dad used to take me to the pier for lunch. I couldn't get to my appointments in town so I went to Point Dume to do some whale watching. Saw about a dozen of them. Was able to photograph about zero. Here's the sea surge on the rocks below the Point. Restless, ceaseless, a low roar played against the counterpoint of gulls' cries and the bell buoy's rhythmic ring.

A week of fog, a day of rain and suddenly, on the first day of spring, wildflowers blooming in Bluffs Park. Here's what I think might be Blue-eyed Mary, a fragile stalk of open-faced flowers, blue like the sky before sunset. Check the National Parks Service wildflower page and let me know what you think.

I lost my camera on my JetBlue flight to DC last week. Tried and tried to get it back, with no luck. Called Long Beach, which had me call DC, which told me to call Ft. Lauderdale, since that's where the flight kept going. Ft. Lauderdale had me call Long Beach again, who told me to call DC. There's no centralized lost-and-found for JetBlue, it seems, and you have to personally track the path of the jet you flew in on. Wherever that camera wound up, someone is looking at pix of this Great Egret, shot before I left. It's a lovely and somehow goofy bird, a regular visitor to the tide pools here in Paradise Coves

It's back. The trusty (and rusty) '49 Plymouth sedan is back on the roads of Malibu. Kelly at Malibu Auto rebuilt the carburetor and the thing purrs now. (As does Patsy, the cat, who loves this warm spot on the hood.) Drove to Home Depot in Camarillo yesterday - when your inner masochist longs for truly bad customer service, it's hard to beat the big box retailers - a gorgeous ride up a mostly undeveloped stretch of PCH. Can't wait until summer, cruising the coast in the Plymouth, Vin Scully on the radio, the sun taking its sweet time sinking in the west.

A little flip-book of stuff to see around our nation's capital, where the cherry blossoms are still asleep but global warming is much in evidence. The winter coat I brought was useful for a day, and then the weather turned. Warm, balmy and slighty scary as thousands of mummified office workers shed layers to reveal winter white skin.

(False) springtime for Capitol Hill:

Here's the court house where Scooter Libby got the bad news:

At the National Gallery (this is the east wing)...

...there's a photo exhibit...

...that lets you know Paris hasn't changed much in a century or so. (That's a 19th century working girl.)..

Here's the marvelous Metro, a miracle to a prisoner of the 405:

And at the National Building Museum, it's all about lines and light:

Here's a hint of home: a bookmark from a South Bay book store, part of a collage of bookmarks found in used books purchased by a little indy shop in Alexandria, Va.

I'm back in Malibu now, where the sun says 7:30 but the federal government insists it's actually an hour later.

While in line at the Firehook Bakery and Cafe in Dupont Circle:

"And I'm all, 'Yo...' and he's, 'Yo yo!' "
"And that's all?"
"Yeah."
"That's it?"
"Yeah."
"Whoah."
"Yeah..."

Heading out of town for the next few days to visit (and blog) the ice and snow of our nation's capital. Meanwhile, waves and sea birds make their mark here in Malibu.

Among the many useful things I wish I knew how to do (use jumper cables, make a good vinaigrette, curse fluently in Italian) working with Adobe Photoshop hovers near the top of the list. I can only ask for help from my brilliant photographer friend, Diana, so many times before she cuts me off and confiscates my camera. So here's a nice photo of a pelican about to hurl itself, head first, into the chilly shallows of the Cove in hopes of catching a live fish. (A rough way to make a living.) The close-up is much cooler but no matter what I try, I can't seem to save the zoomed-in image. So until I learn the basics of this infernal Photoshop (if there's a more counter-intuitive program out there, I'd like to hear about it - no, wait - I really don't want to know) all I've got to offer is a far-off photo of a really great bird.

It's just a game of Monopoly here in Malibu, with our local billionaires buying up properties like game pieces. David Geffen bought the Malibu Beach Inn last year and started a ground-up remodel, because paying $425 a night to sleep on PCH was really just slumming. Software hotshot Larry Ellison, who already owns two restaurants in town, broke locals' hearts when he bought the beloved Casa Malibu last month. He paid a reported $20 million for the sweet little inn on the sand. Speaking of restaurants, the popular and affordable Pier View, has remained closed since Ellison bought it a few years ago. Seems he can't quite decide what to do.

The Malibu Times says Ellison has bought 12 properties since moving to town in 2003, including the most beachfront of anyone on exclusive Carbon Beach. And he's not the only one looking to own a bit of the 'Bu. Here's the latest swath of story poles to go up - a new shopping center located just southeast of the library.

Could be, in the right spot, in the right light, with the right bartender...

And now for Part Two of the trifecta of chaos that brought this blog to a screeching halt last week. Yep, that’s the living room ceiling of my trailer here in Malibu, where some water leaked during the rains last month. Not just some water, mind you, but gallons of it. And not just leaked. It poured. Gushed, really. Raged through here in a torrent. OK, not a torrent, but enough that the mixing bowl I had left under the drip filled up in an hour. By the time the night was over there were no fewer than five leaks, each dispensing rainwater at different rates, and I had slogged barefoot through the storm in the mud and dark to find the galvanized metal trough we use as a beer cooler for barbeques, because the worst leak was spilling gallons, literally gallons of water into the house. It’s a long story filled with lots of phone calls to the truly crappy contractor who had ‘fixed’ my roof last year, and a single call to one very, very good contractor who interrupted a job to really and truly fix my roof last week. So there’s a happy (no leaks!) and expensive (new roof!) ending.

I bought my first 1949 Plymouth four-door sedan when I was a sophomore at the University of New Mexico. It cost just $800 and I think it reminded me of a car our landlord had when we first moved to the United States. My Plymouth was shiny black, encrusted with chrome and drove like a dream. It had the original flat-head six engine, way more powerful than you'd expect. You can cruise at 70 mph without even knowing it. (If I ever figure out how to use the scanner portion of my new fax machine, the one that's also a copier, printer and 12-speed blender, I'll post some pix)

I drove that Plymouth everywhere, all over town, all over the state, all over the west. I finally - reluctantly - sold it when I graduated college and took my first newspaper job at the Phoenix Gazette in 1989. I never stopped missing it though, and as soon as I could, I bought another one. Drove it everywhere, all over LA and Ventura and Orange counties. Drove it to Malibu, where it's lived happily for the last 11 years. Until last week.

The dogs, who must yesyesyes right now RIGHT NOW be walked every day, were at Bluffs Park. One of their favorite spots any time, but since the fire? Doggy heaven. You can see everything all at once all the time, no pesky grass or shrubs or trees to get between you and that bunny. And something about the crispy smell drives them a little mad.

So we've been there for an hour or so, finally exhausted. Get into the Plymouth. Turn the key and it starts. But instead of hitting that nice, growly Plymouth note, the thing just screams, roars and shakes like a jet at LAX. I don't even remember turning off the key but I must have because we're still on the tarmac - I mean, in the parking lot - and the car is silent. Pop the hood and the caburetor's got this thingy hanging off of it and there's gas all over. AAA tows us to Kelly at Malibu Auto, who takes a look and delivers the bad news: the piece that fell off may have dropped bits of metal into the engine and cracked a piston. Final diagnosis to come.

So here's the photo of the wonderful guy from Malibu Towing, who not only picked up my car and me, he let Jake and Maisie, two crazed and stinky dogs, ride in the cab as well. And then he waited for us at Malibu Auto while the guys gave the bad news. And then he drove us all the way home.

Now the dogs and I ride around in my crummy little Toyota wagon while we wait for news of the Plymouth. Kelly at Malibu Auto won't know what the damage is - cracked piston? snapped cylinder? until he starts the car. But he can't safely start it until the carburetor gets re-built. And that can't happen until the mechanics track down some 58-year-old parts from who knows where.

So we wait. And drive a really boring car.