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Monday, November 9th, 2009
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3:25 pm - November
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Posting frequency is obviously way down, and that's largely because the novelty index is down too these days. The progress of the oddly demarcated seasons here remains interesting to me, but perhaps not so much to you any more. I also am spending a lot of time and thought these days with a bunch of fictional characters, and it's neither helpful to me nor interesting to you if I write about them here instead of in the places where they belong.
There's a door handle on a meeting room here at work that looks like it should turn, but it doesn't. It's just a handle for pushing.
I've been a little prickly in the nose and sore-throaty lately, with a bit of a cough; experiencing some attendant paranoia but basically otherwise fine.
The cottage in the back still isn't rented. Scott the landlord is getting pretty worried.
Today I am mostly sad about Sunny, who is a dog only a handful of you know. I'm about to leave the building early, run a few time-sensitive errands, and finish the day from home.
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| Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
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11:45 am - Wet season
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Someone in a local novel I've otherwise completely forgotten said one thing that stuck with me about this time of year around here: that it's the season when nasturtiums start sprouting out of people's armpits. I keep looking. Not yet. But they've climbed right up to the overhang. And my doormat must have been full of seeds, because suddenly it looks like a chia pet. Everything is clean. The salt flats are shining and glassy again. If I haven't made this adequately clear over the years, I love the rain out here.
The DC trip was lovely. Aside from some phone upfuckage which laid waste my plans to see ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) ursulas_mom and inpetto, everything was terrific. Flew over Thursday night; on Friday morning right after I stumbled off the plane Mike took me around the Library of Congress (including the tunnels between the buildings! that go to the Capitol! and have conveyor belts!), then I took the metro out to the end of the orange line where everyone came and got me, and the festivities began. I shared a room with Doug, which was extra nice, and oddly our place (which adjoined Lu and Howard's) became party central for the duration. Flight back was amusingly bumpy but despite problems all up the coast we made it on time. Or, in plane speak, we had an "on-time arrival."
(While I was out there I did get to see the Blackbird spy plane, which on its last flight made it from LAX-IAD in one hour and four minutes. Puts that "on-time arrival" in a different context.)
The following day I headed over the pass to Modesto after work, hung out with Lisa for a while, and brought Crosbie back. He clearly had a wonderful time and the histiocytoma in his armpit -- man, I guess it's been a long time since I wrote anything here, because apparently I hadn't mentioned it -- is almost completely gone. That's way ahead of schedule; typically it takes them a few months.
We're having a work potluck today, in preparation for which I had a potluck-related anxiety dream last night. It featured a weird mix of KB and Nominum people in an imaginary setting. For some reason it fell on me to do a lot of presenting at this party: I had to introduce a new person called Tillie, and also tell a bunch of people about their accounts. ("You may not realize this, but you all get real old-fashioned shell accounts," I recall saying.)
Alice's novel is making publishing history. I mean that literally. She's going to be a star!
I'm wearing a skirt, boots, and a scarf for the second day in a row. (Different ones.) Makes me feel like a teenager in Montreal.
The real potluck, as opposed to the dream potluck, will begin very soon, probably as soon as scrump and tyee arrive. Over here at the back end of engineering we have already detected dish-clanking sounds and delicious smells from the kitchen.
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| Saturday, September 12th, 2009
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2:18 pm - Cough, corpse, fennel
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We had a little rain last night. There was even some thunder.
I have decent insurance, but my employer has changed plans since I last saw a doctor and since I'm generally ridiculously healthy I didn't worry too much about it, aside from taking a moment a few months ago to fill out the requisite online form. Now I'm sick and it's not clear from the materials whether my existing doctor even still takes the plan I have now, or what, and I can't even find my plan card so don't have an ID to get me into her practice group's urgent care clinic. I was up most of the night with a wheezy cough -- I could quietly manage a regular cough between the bubbles and rumbles, but if I succumbed to an itchy reflexive back-of-the-throat cough, it'd be all spikes and coarse sandpaper and feeling like I was going to throw up. Today I've still got the wheeze and bubbles. Oddly, I feel all right otherwise, but I'd like to see or at least talk to someone about it, and I'm frustrated that I can't and furious at myself for paying so little attention to the paperwork.
Also, Crosbie seems to have found what I think was a dead cat back behind one of the tents. I couldn't see anything clearly back there, all wedged in tightly behind the tent, but there was some brown-black fur and a trail of ants, and he was making crunchy slurpy sounds. He came away when I called him, but grudgingly -- the treats I had in my pocket don't quite compete -- but I guess I found that a little more disturbing than I'd anticipated.
Those of you who've lived or spent time around here know that there's wild fennel all over the place, growing near roadsides as a giant frondy weed. Over the last few weeks it's turned brown and gone to seed, and what's interesting about that is that you can smell it everywhere, like sudden biscotti. Also, peppertrees -- those weird gnarly trunks with weeping filmy branches -- are now loaded with tiny pink peppercorns.
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| Saturday, August 29th, 2009
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6:51 pm - Hot
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According to http://forecast.weather.gov it briefly dipped down to 99 degrees in our zip code a few hours ago, but we're now right back up to 105. It's been like this since the middle of the week.
I don't generally wear gauzy long hippie skirts, but I'm relieved that I do own a couple. This is exactly what they're for.
At least I get to sweat all over my whole body. Crosbie is stuck sweating through his tongue. He's also incredibly bored, because we won't be going out till sunset -- the pavement would fry his paws.
Landlord Scott is back after a couple of weeks in Oregon. He brought back a vat of blackberries from the woods behind his girlfriend's place, and gave me a gallon bag full. I had some for breakfast and froze the rest. They're perfect.
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| Saturday, August 22nd, 2009
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9:54 pm - Collar, tomatoes
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The giant satellite dish around Crosbie's head started to dig painfully into his neck and chest, so I got him something inflatable and blue, more like one of those neck pillows people sometimes use on planes. It's much, much better than the plastic umbrella lampshade thing but he's still feeling kind of low about having to wear it. Shouldn't be longer than a couple more days, though.
At this time of year all I want to do for food is slice up tomatoes and have them with bocconcini.
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| Sunday, August 16th, 2009
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1:55 am - Plastic cone part 2
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Crosbie's doing a lot better. He's made great strides figuring out how to navigate with that ridiculous thing attached to his head. He's figured out how to mush it right up against things to sniff them. His paw seems to be healing up well. He wanted to go for a regular-length walk today, but we didn't.
Been wiping him down with a cloth since he can't wash himself, giving the paw occasional saline baths, and occasionally helping him disengage the plastic cone when it gets stuck on something. I told him this was a perfect opportunity for him to take up lacrosse but he wasn't amused.
Long past bedtime.
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| Thursday, August 13th, 2009
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8:53 pm - Crosbie's Cone of Silence, lycoris, finger puppet mouse
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Lycoris (aka magic lilies or naked ladies) are in flower, and that -- along with the Perseids -- always brings to mind my first few weeks in Bloomington.
Poor Crosbie has a badly torn-up paw pad. Not only is he limping significantly, but he's taking antibiotics and painkillers and wearing a colossal plastic cone around his neck. He's not a big guy, but he has a massive neck, so the cone he's been fitted with (which would generally used by much bigger dogs) drags on the ground if he looks down. He still hasn't quite figured out how to get around with it, and he seems very much taken aback by the whole experience. (Blurry phone pic of him looking mournful.)
My trackpad and its accompanying button won't click. I don't like using a desk surface, so a mouse isn't a good option for me. Until my replacement trackpad comes in, I'm using a bizarre finger puppet mouse I found for <$6. (Oddly, the price has soared in the week since I got it.) It's kind of scary-looking -- people run if I point it at them -- but it works fine.
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| Monday, August 10th, 2009
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8:56 pm - Getting dark early
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We just got back from a walk and it's almost dark. How's that possible?
It's been oppressively hot all day, and it's cooling off outside, but back here in the house it's still pretty stifling. Yesterday I made ceviche -- what could be simpler and easier in this kind of weather than seafood and lime juice and peppers? -- so there was some left over for dinner and I didn't have to make anything.
The jazzy old Carlsberg Light...all right! jingle has been running in my head on and off for a few weeks now. (Get it here...and it's one good beer!)
Place is strewn with stuff but I've been gettting record amounts of writing done which I guess is a good thing. Also saw Amina for the first time in ages. That was nice.
I miss lots of people. Wish it were simpler to get on a plane and see everyone.
I've been staying up too late lately, and right now I'm sleepy enough to be feeling a little stupid. I'm going to remedy that tonight: take a long long shower then early to bed.
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| Friday, July 31st, 2009
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11:34 pm - 'Tis summer...
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There's a Stephen Foster song running through my head with a lyric that is so itching to be reclaimed and repurposed as the title for something, or at least as the theme of a fantastic party. Regrettably I am way too white, way too heterosexual, and insufficiently Kentuckian to do it myself. I sure hope someone picks up the slack.
I am currently very busy but I am thinking about almost all of you almost all the time.
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| Monday, July 13th, 2009
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10:55 am - "I was a ranger in the city..."
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This morning I dreamed a whole series of excruciating puns based on Broadway standards. Thanks to the dream-cdent and dream-inpetto for making me laugh so hard I woke myself up.
The salt pond that's immediately outside our building is almost entirely dry now. It's still reddish, but it's beginning to sparkle. I love this crazy landscape.
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| Friday, July 10th, 2009
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2:29 pm - Odds, ends
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Spam subject of the day: "You can be ugly and stupid if your shaft is up."
I failed to mention earlier that once again I'm taking two classes. I should have known better. I'm not managing it all very well; I've been up till 1:30 most nights, and I'm a little sluggish and literal-minded. The continued eye prescription delay hasn't helped with the sluggery and literal-mindedness. I'm still wearing the ancient glasses, duct-taped for stability. It's a damn good duct tape repair if I do say so myself, but it was never intended to last this long. Latest ETA is Tuesday. I'm skeptical.
The vegetable supply has been on an avalanche-like scale lately. It occurred to me that it'd easier to deal with then if I got a mandoline, so I did. (No relation to the Verlaine poem, of which I'll sing Fauré's setting by way of proof. See? Shredded vegetables right here, "Les donneurs de sérénades et les belles écouteuses"* over there.) Now things slice up neatly into bowls. Seriously, it's a big help. Because I value my fingertips I also got the KEVLAR GLOVE.
Sam's moved out. His place isn't in good enough shape to show, so Scott the elder and his girlfriend(!) Sherry (who incidentally is also the second of his three ex-wives(!)) have hired some people to help fix it up. It's looking nicer every day. If it had a bathtub I'd suck up the difference and move there myself, but -- fireplace niche and private courtyards notwithstanding -- I'm not going to fork over several hundred dollars extra every month for a place where I still can't take a bath.
The 4th itself couldn't have been nicer: various excursions up around the hills with jkonrath and Sarah and Crosbie, gazing at overlooks across the entire bay, squiggling through redwoods, etc., culminating in a picnic on the coast at San Gregorio. Not sure what's in the works this weekend, other than meeting up at Coupa with Alec and Denise on Saturday afternoon, plus the inevitable rounds of homework and cooking and laundry.
*"Echangent des propos fades
Sous les ramures chanteuses!"
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| Sunday, June 28th, 2009
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12:26 am - One thing at a time
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So after a long stretch I'm back online at reasonable speeds. I'm still squinting and peering at things -- accurate vision is still in the works -- but still, that's progress.
Since I last wrote anything here, the salt flats steadily turned redder and rustier. Just in the last few weeks they've started crusting over. Now they're ashy-looking and cracked like mud.
It was weirdly hot today, well over a hundred, and now it's night and perfectly cool and comfortable. I'm going to sleep. Expect more soon.
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| Monday, May 18th, 2009
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11:09 am - Floor Mutton, Bighorse Arnetta, and who wants to be my neighbor?
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Recent spam senders of note: Floor Mutton and Bighorse Arnetta.
News flash: being sedentary feels horrible. For various reasons -- deadlines, projects, trips and thus lots of time spent in planes and cars -- aside from dogwalking and my morning 96-step program en route to work (four huge flights, or eight normal ones), I've had an unusually buttbound month. As a result I look and feel like crap. Things are already better after a saner weekend.
Over the last few days it was so hot here that the coconut oil on the kitchen shelf was liquid all the way through. Last night at dusk the entire neighborhood drifted outside for a walk. Seriously, between about 7 and 8 I saw, on the quiet leafy blocks surrounding my place, about twenty families and other groups out walking, with or without dogs, bikes, skateboards, strollers. It was as if they'd all finally congealed and come to life.
Speaking of that leafy neighborhood, etc, hear ye:
I NEED NEW NEIGHBORS. Sam has bought a house, so he and Molly will be moving away at the end of June. Who wants to move in?
It's a self-contained little cottage at the back of the nutty property. I am suddenly unsure whether it's two bedrooms or three; I'll have to check and update. Scott's hoping to rent it out by word of mouth. It's $1750. (Non-locals will, of course, freak out at this, but obviously they aren't the target audience.)
It's not for everyone -- you'd have to be comfortable living behind a conspicuously ramshackle property in a neighborhood of multimillion-dollar houses, and traversing a chaotic garage to get to your entry. But once you're in, Sam's cottage is idyllic and private: high walls surrounding front and back courtyards -- a shady front courtyard cobbled with bricks, and a potential kitchen garden in the back (though Sam, a single dad whose third daughter is only just now finishing high school, was too busy to grow anything but rosemary.) Right outside the back garden gate are lemons à volonté. Shared laundry, which isn't ideal, but it's free, and there are grapefruits outside the laundry room door.
It's in the LOS ALTOS SCHOOL DISTRICT.
Scott is a daffy, eccentric, kind, responsible, and thoroughly honorable landlord. He'll be absolutely direct with you about what works, what he can fix, what he can't. Occasionally he will run a compressor or a milling machine right outside the courtyard gate, and that will be loud. But your rent will not increase capriciously, and animals are not only welcome but loved. |
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| Wednesday, May 6th, 2009
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10:04 pm - The month of maying
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Spent the day at work thinking about interesting things. At lunch people from a faraway country made me a meal I could never have prepared myself. Came home, spoke on the phone with some people I love, walked outside with Crosbie under leafy trees and tall hedges. It was dusk so there was perfime from orange flowers. Gathered up some sage and thyme from the brick planter, drizzled some olive oil into a pan, and sautéed up some fava beans with a little garlic. Poured a glass of the wine I'd opened yesterday for a friend who came to visit.
There's a new book to read and some new music to listen to. On Friday I'll get on a plane. When it lands, people I love will meet me at the airport and I'll be in a place I've never seen before.
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| Thursday, April 30th, 2009
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9:54 pm - Cloud cover and a couple of dreams
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Just got in from a walk outside. It's surprisingly light out there given that it's dark. I mean, there's a low cloud cover and everyone's house lights (no lamp posts on this street) are reflected back. We also felt a few drops of drizzle.
Two recent dreams:
- Chuck was alive. He was hosting a barbecue somewhere out here in California, and lots of people were there, including friends of mine who never met him in real life. There was a stucco house with a long slopey roof you could slide down, and plenty of people to talk with inside and outside.
- All my friends were living with their parents like teenagers, including those who in real life are married and/or have children of their own, and those who no longer have parents. I was over at a friend's house. The friend and I started...not exactly making out, but snuggling. Then my friend's mom showed up unexpectedly. The friend was very embarrassed and told his mom that he was consoling me because Crosbie had died. I was dumbfounded. I was trying so hard to figure out how best to respond that I woke myself up. By the time I figured out what to say -- it was going to be something like: "Crosbie isn't dead. Whatever impulse led to that fabrication was probably as fleeting and aberrant as the impulse that drove us to snuggle up together like that. I'm going home." -- the dream had ended and I was awake anyway.
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| Sunday, April 26th, 2009
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9:24 pm - Little things
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I managed to get lots of little things done this weekend, including a good chunk of writing.
Crosbie is completely flaked out on the couch, having had a taxing afternoon of barking at wheels. Worst offenders: skateboarders.
On bintblue's recommendation I'm watching Ranya's baladi DVD. It's excellent.
It would be great if I could take a bath, but otherwise things are very, very satisfactory.
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| Wednesday, April 15th, 2009
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5:51 pm - Wind
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Yesterday there was a fierce windstorm all day. It was terrific during the day, bright and intense, and after dark it got strange and Halloweeny.
I like airports.
I picked up Simms and Josh at SFO and took them to their conference center hotel place, which was hard to find, not least because my GPS had never heard of it. We eventually found it in the Fort Baker complex. It was funny; I've seen Simms fairly recently, but he looks radically different; Josh I hadn't seem for something like six years, and he looks exactly, exactly the same. We had fun driving up there, but we did not have time to get lunch, so after my two o'clock meeting where scrump was yelling companionably at April I had some coconut chicken and pad thai left over from something the sales people were doing. Meanwhile Simms and Josh spent approximately $17 each for a burger at their hotel.
It was also Thank My Parents For Hooking Up day, so I gave them a call. They sounded relaxed and happy. It took them a long time to pick up the phone, so I figured they were carousing to observe the occasion; but no, they were just wrapped up in some moon landing documentary they'd been watching. It'll be nice to see everyone in Georgia in a few weeks.
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| Tuesday, April 7th, 2009
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1:38 pm - Hailstones as big as packing peanuts
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The forecast said rain last night, but I checked the sky before bed, around midnight, and nothing was obscuring the stars.
By seven this morning there were patchy clouds. Right around nine, when I was getting in the car, the rain started to fall. Somewhere between University and Willow I started to see fat white things blowing around. At first I thought a truck might have spilled packing peanuts onto the road, but they couldn't be packing peanuts -- they were bouncing. They had to be hailstones. Never before have I seen hailstones as big as packing peanuts. I've rarely even seen hailstones as big as regular peanuts.
There was a guy driving a motorcyle through them. He looked pretty miserable, all bundled up in yellow. I hoped mcl wasn't out getting bombarded too. (He wasn't; he'd left earlier and was already at work.)
I did a lot of scrubbing-intensive cleaning on the weekend. I even took the stove apart. My hands are still sore.
The sky is swirly out there. When a beam of sunlight breaks through the clouds, the reflections on the salt flats are rust-colored. I guess they're moving into the red phase.
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| Monday, March 30th, 2009
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9:44 pm - A good day
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tyee made cinnamon rolls and brought them into work.
Then I got a birthday earthquake.*
After that, mavjop brought Vera in -- she's just a little over three months old -- and a bunch of us all sat around on the floor trading noises and facial expressions with her, and then some of us, including Vera, went out to lunch.
Lots of people called; that was nice. Crosbie and I went out for a walk in the dark. The air's all tingly and aromatic. We just got back.
Sleepy now.
*This is when the planet gives you the bumps.
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| Saturday, March 28th, 2009
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5:42 pm - Pickle ride
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Today Crosbie and I went for a pickle ride, which is when you just head out in the car with no particular destination, stopping to get out and explore on foot whenever it seems like a good idea. It's a magnificent day: warm, breezy, songbirds twittering. Fields and roadsides are covered with beautiful, unrecognizable flowers.
We found a public USE AT YOUR OWN RISK horse-training ring up in the hills, with cavalletti. They ask that you pick up after your horse, and invite you to use their pitchforks.
When we got back, Scott was in the driveway with doo-wop music blasting out of his truck, working on his latest project/acquisition: a tidy little pop-up camper top. He's making a teak folding table for it.
Sam and Rosanna came back from a round of errands with enormous volumes of bottled water.
I did a little work in the garden and now I'm sitting down with some peppermint lemonade. Crosbie's flaked out on the sofa. I can still hear Scott's doo-wop music out front.
Hello, everyone.
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