Long Weekend

I just had three pens run out of ink as I was making out my check to LJ for another year of paid service. Could it be an omen? Or is it merely because I haven't gotten my ass to a store to buy a new pen for ages?

I'm going to pretend that I have something very exciting planned for this weekend. In reality, I'm counting on my last remaining cat to keep me entertained between onerous tasks and during Sluggo's periods of unconsciousness. It's always difficult to be stuck in the house this time of year, when everybody else is going places and doing things with the long, bright days. Of course, there will be no fireworks for the holiday in this most flammable place. A few people risk the wrath of the authorities by setting off bottle rockets and such, but I'm not one of them. I will see the diminished representations of the displays on television, and that will be it. Maybe I'll get lucky and there will be a meteor strike nearby, causing a nice, big explosion. Hope springs infernal.

Now I have to get to sleep, so I'll be well rested for my imaginary Big Night!

Strange Day

Just before going to sleep this morning, I was overtaken by a strange combination of emotions. There was a sense of melancholy and resignation mingled with anxious excitement. It was such an odd mixture, and its sudden appearance so inexplicable, that I tried examining it, but fell asleep before I could get my thoughts organized. When I woke, the details of that moment had grown vague, and I had the impression that I had had disturbing dreams, none of which I could remember. Then I stretched, and something went out of place in my left shoulder this time. So, it's a good thing I have an appointment to get re-adjusted Tuesday. I've decided to write today off as weird.

Heat lingers outdoors even in the deepening dusk. All day, arachnids basked in it, hanging in their webs, waiting for more of the abundant prey which has already made them fat. I have seen more spiders this year than any other since I have been here. But the lepidoptera, after a promising start, have grown fewer. A while ago, one small moth lit on a curtain. It was very like one I saw a few nights ago whose outspread wings bear on them markings which closely resemble a broadened cat face- eyes, ears, nose, small mouth, all in miniature. I have no idea what moth predator would be intimidated by the vision of a tiny cat, but there it is-- another of nature's diverting phenomena.

The Sacramento Bee has recently run a few articles on a new pedestrian bridge which has been built across the Sacramento river in the small city of Redding, which is a hundred miles or so north of where I live. (I was going to go check out the pictures on the Bee's web site, but didn't get around to it, and now, despite the air conditioner being on, I think Sluggo is near his limits for the time being. The article in today's paper says that the pictures can be accessed from http://www.sacbee.com/links .) It's called the Sundial Bridge, and it is the first north American work of Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. The pictures in the paper show a remarkably imaginative structure whose most prominent feature is a tower which is reminiscent of a ship's sail. The official opening of the bridge will be on Sunday. I bet there will be fireworks! I'd like to go, but it's pretty much out of the question. It's definitely one of the things in the region that I'd most like to see, eventually.

Update: The four best pictures I've found so far of the bridge are in the gallery linked from this web page containing an earlier article from The Sacramento Bee.


Sluggo didn't want to let me post this entry, and went to sleep for an hour. Now nobody else is awake. Bugger.