File Under "Time Flies"

Regular readers know that we love us some documentaries in this house. I happen to be especially partial to those that cover the history of my own life. As such? The CNN series that documented the 60s one summer, 70s the next, and 80s the following year was a big hit. But honestly guys?

When did the 90s become historic?

Go-to Philosophers

We had a lunch today with a friend and former colleague. Chris has been gone from our school for three years now, and as we chatted about this person and that, it became clear to me that, as usual, Calvin & Hobbes had it right.

What You Pay For

My friend Mary and I took some time out of our summer to write a little curriculum today. (Oh! Don't worry! We were well compensated for a time, as teachers always are.)

Our school happens to be a part of an international organization, one you may have heard of, and as such, the majority of our teaching is to be documented in a prescribed format. And so it was we found ourselves at 10:30 on a Monday in July anxiously scanning and rescanning our laptop screens, desperately trying to make sense of the comments on the work we had already done.

"I don't understand a word of this!" I said in disgust. "It's gibberish!" And I read a few sentences to emphasize my point.

"I know what you mean," Mary answered. "Every word is in English, but I have no clue what it is trying to say."

Still, we persisted.

Prodigals

There are a couple of young squirrels who have taken to lounging on our little deck whenever nobody's out there. They relax on the railing and even go so far as to nap on the Adirondack chairs. In fact, they act like they were born there, which I'm beginning to suspect they were. Welcome home, little squirrels-- don't wreck anything!

The Heart of It

We were shopping the farmers market this morning when a sign at a meat vendor drew my eye: they were selling beef heart for 4.99 a pound. It seemed just the thing to add to our pets' raw food diets, and so it was that I found myself butchering the two pound aorta of a beast who lived a happy and dignified life, they assured me at the market. It was muscular, but not tough, and had no sign of fat or other disease. It was a pure heart, and Penelope and Lucy will doubtless appreciate the sacrifice.

Obliging

Heidi can not stand having Lucy spend the night in a crate when she might be snuggling with her. Well, snuggling might be the most accurate of terms, especially since my wife has been known to send a beloved pet flying across the room in the middle of the night for the smallest of transitions. Still, they adore her, but from a distance on the bed.

That means that our pets wind up sleeping on my side, because it turns out that I am a very compliant sleepmate. On any given night you can find me in a variety of yoga-like poses clinging to sleep while trying to accommodate the dog or the cat. But Lucy has introduced a new wrinkle into our nocturnal activity. Last night she licked my feet clean for at least 10 minutes.

In that twilight state between wake and rest, my complaints were feeble; I think I may have groaned and wiggled my toes in protest. What she got out of it I have no clue, but tonight?

My feet are going under cover.

Fresh Produce

We saw Spiderman: Homecoming today, and while it was definitely a big explosiony summer confection, it was made it even sweeter by an extraordinarily low body count for such a movie. One. Just one single character died in the whole 121 minutes.

Oh, and Michael Keaton as the disenchanted blue-collar joe turned villain Vulture wasn't too bad as , either.