It was the last day of this much-needed vacation weekend, and oh, it was lovely weekend. I finished it up with a coast down the hill to pick up R. for a ride out to Fort McHenry on the promise of froyo at the end. I snapped this picture looking out toward Canton across the bay. Fort McHenry was behind us, all nostalgia for the great days of the War of 1812, that mostly-forgotten second revolutionary war. Across the way are today’s permanent wars, three military ships docked. At least two of them, I think, are so-called “comfort” ships, sent to help in cases of natural disaster. Yep, we’ve tied that social function to the military–great idea. I could go on and on about this, but it would be a lie, because mostly this is what I saw while riding my bike around today: the bluest blue sky, the marshmallowiest marshmallow clouds, and the summeriest summer winds as we sat and caught up on the happenings of the previous couple of days. Hey, things move fast on the other side of the solstice. “Do we still get frozen yogurt?” R. eventually asked. Um, yeah, we always get frozen yogurt when we’re out here. We made our stop, crammed a whole lot of yogurt in our yogurt holes, and then it was time for a quick ride back home. The skies were completely different on the way back, slabs of dark and darker gray covering up that blue as another storm moved in. The winds kicked dirt and grit in my eyeballs and coated my sweat-and-sunscreened legs and arms, and I fought the winds for the last few blocks, happy to be home with time to think about what a lovely weekend I just had. But yeah, war. We’ve made it so the whole show falls apart if we’re not at it. Quite a pickle, that.