Margaret, Pip and I kept busy today, wandering around the Duke campus and Margaret’s neighborhood in Durham. I have about enough energy to blog some highlights, accompanied by appropriate photos.
First, after we woke up and had a breakfast, we went to the Nasher Museum at Duke. It’s new even to Margaret; it was under construction the last time Pippa and I were here. Only one gallery was open, but even that was a treat. In the permanent collection I found a painting of The Feast of Herod, which I photographed for my New Testament II class (which spent a good class session probing that pericope in Mark).
Toward the center of the room that includes the painting, the museum displays a statue of St. Matthew that delights me. I’m not quite sure why; I suspect that this one strikes me for its lack of axegrinding. This Matthew doesn’t seem to me to typify anything.:
After the Nasher, we wandered in to the Bryan Center for lunch. I browsed the Gothic Bookstore, where I noted with disappointment that they weren’t displaying any of Mark Goodacre’s books. I mean, he’s only been working there a year and a half! Maybe they all sold out.
After the Bryan Center, we wandered back to East Campus via the Gardens, where Pippa perked up for the duck pond. We were pleased to see a Hooded Merganser, a Muscovy Duck, and a couple more whose names I’ve forgotten (and I’m too sleepy to look them up at the moment).
Then a lovely dinner with Sarah and Clay and their impressively wonderful son Luke, home to Margaret’s apartment for a movie, and so to bed. It’ll be hard to leave tomorrow, even granted the vexingly Chicago-ic weather of the past few days.