Hyper local

The camellia on Pacific Street in its grand finale Friday evening in a light drizzle. Every year at this time the brownstone's steps are adorned with dropped blossoms, two for a step.

In the chilly night now, as I write, the quiet hum of generators on the street, the massive white arc lights of a big budget movie lighting up the brownstone opposite us on the corner, inside which scenes are being shot, the street and blocks around us turned into a village of trucks, catering tents (BBQ!), and dozens of crew on the sidewalk, chatting quietly all night as work carries on. Rolling! and cut! are cried into the air where breath rises as steam at the end of the first week of April. It is Gary Marshall's sequel to Valentine's Day, will probably be pretty awful, but is fascinating to watch from the terrace.

Up here, three floors above, all the daffodils have opened in their glass vase, the cat laps water from his bowl on the floor, Mimi's clear chicken broth is reducing on the stove, two loaves of brown bread cool in a white napkin. The kitchen is clean of dinner - roast chicken with asparagus, broccoli and caramelized carrots, and I contemplate the prospect of either a peeled mango (to share with the cat) for dessert, or a slice of warm bread with butter and honey (uninteresting to the cat)..

The cat sleeps, head hanging from an orange chair, and Vincent coughs at his computer, next door. The fridge hums.

The slice of warm bread with butter and honey has won.