I've had way, way too much work to do lately...

Summer is here. Today I had to close the back door to keep the heat out. It was nearly 100 outside, but the temperature in the house was comfortable. If you didn't want to do anything, you could have sat on the back porch. It was very warm, but there was a breeze-- a cold drink with lots of ice would have been in order.

The air became comfortable after sundown, so I opened the door again. Then I walked over to Ma's (I was returning her clean laundry). On the way I admired Venus, brilliant in the northwest sky-- Saturday night Venus was so bright it was playing tricks in the clouds. My cousin Peter called me to go out and have a look. One minute it looked like a laser light burning through the clouds; the next it seemed to be the landing lights of an airplane; the next it flickered and pulsed as if it must be a extraterrestrial craft. Very impressive.-- On and near the ground tonight the fireflies put on their own light show: bright green now-you-see-em-now-you-don't sparks everywhere... I'm still hoping to see those blue ones again...

The hot weather is supposed to break tomorrow, so, on Wednesday I'll put in the rest of the bedding plants. I have some sea holly, some blue lobelia that Joyce brought with her last weekend when she came to visit; she didn't have a place for them-- some violas and forget-me-nots for which I haven't yet chosen spots, and the odd petunias & pansies that were left over from planting the box on the front porch railing, and a white geranium. I think I'll keep the geranium in a pot on the back porch with my other geraniums. I like to have them to bring into the house come winter. Last winter I had blooms in January...

Out by the front wall there are violets and ground phlox and the Iceland poppies I planted two years ago which seem to have "taken." If I'm lucky, by next year there will be a nice perennial display with the violas and sea holly and forget-me-nots...

I'm very tired. I think it's because I had the night off. I know I wouldn't be tired if I had worked until nine at the stand as I have been doing. Somehow, it's less tiring to work constantly, than it is to potter aimlessly around the house...

There are things I ought to be doing now, of course. Work. But I'm very tired of staring at the computer screen, and I'm not feeling the least bit creative, so I know from experience that I shouldn't even attempt any design or layout work now-- nevermind trying to write! Instead, I'll try to recharge the mental batteries by reading a book. Here's what I have by the bed to choose from:

Invisible World, a first novel by a guy who has a lot to learn about writing; The Nine Gates, Essays on Poetry by some woman who is an excellent writer and essayist and I promise I'll remember her name next time; Little Green Men by Christopher Buckley (I highly recommend his Thank Your for Smoking); Consilience, something about the unity of knowledge (memes? momes?); Rainbow Mars by Larry Niven who gave us Kzin and Bandersnatch-- and the concept of thumb-runners years before anyone thought there would be a black market for human organs; Dreams and Wishes, Essays on Writing for Children, by Cooper; Fly Fishing, A Life in Midstream by some guy with a name like a character in an Edgar Rice Burrough or a Talbot Mundy story-- Turhan...Turhan...

Turhan Tirana. Recollections and Essays. I stumbled across this slim book on sale at Walden last week and bought it because it reminded me of my old friend Bru and how we used to go fishing for trout... I miss that...

One of the essays in the book is about "Dame Juliana Berners, a 15th century prioress who wrote the classic treatise on fly-fishing." Bru once wrote a story about the first fly fisher. It was a good story...

I think I'll go read about Dame Juliana and remember some good times wading the streams, stalking beautiful, wiley, laughing trout...

I'd better shut the back door before I go up to bed. Tomorrow's weather is supposed to be a repeat of today's until the cold front moves in, and then we may get some thunderstorms. I hope.

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