Journal of a Sabbatical

June 14, 2000

hunh?

Today's Bird Sightings:
Kevin's yard
purple finch (4)
chipping sparrow (2)
black capped chickadee (4)
common grackle (4)
red breasted nuthatch(1)
white breasted nuthatch (1)
phoebe (1)
cardinal (2)
house sparrow (1)
starling (1)
red-tailed hawk (1)
Mammals:
red fox (4)
chipmunk (2)
gray squirrel (2)

Today's Reading: Summer: From the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau edited by H.G.O. Blake

Today's Starting Pitcher:
Pedro Martinez

Cats are smelly. So why do we like them? They purr. They're cute. The manipulate us into liking them.

Yetti is particularly smelly. He's fixed (we think/thought) but his pee smells like an unneutered male's. And he has peed all over the bottom of his cage. Glad I'm not the one cleaning that up. (Oh,yeah, I forgot to put names on the cat pics I took on Monday. From top to bottom they are Yetti, Caramel, Peekaboo, and Titan.)

Bob is off on a kitten trapping mission and Chris is out today, so it's a whole different Wednesday crew. Somebody I don't know is cleaning up after Yetti. Jane is in the rabies room constantly exclaiming synonyms for "what the ...". Nothing is explicable today. Me, all I can say is "hunh?"

The phone is ringing a lot. I start doing variations on my phone answering spiel (which I never actually use when I actually answer the phone): "Feline rescue, no dogs, degus, rabbits, or guinea pigs." "Feline rescue, we don't got dogs." "Feline rescue, how may you help us?" If I were prone to manic episodes I'd think I'm having one.

I sing to myself at the sink: "Oh, Lord, won't you buy me a Mercedes Benz..." in my best Janis Joplin imitation voice. I am not very good at imitating Janis Joplin. For no reason, I switch to a Cheryl Wheeler song "... I wanna be your certain silver lining, I wanna be your lullaby at night..." I am not very good at imitating Cheryl Wheeler either. I settle on Send in the Clowns in my own voice. Don't bother, they're here.

Bob returns without the kittens. His next mission is Walmart or Sam's Club. We don't get a chance to compare plover warden notes today.

I push to finish by 11:00. It is alleged by reliable sources that it will take me slightly less than an hour to drive from Salisbury to Groton so I plan to leave on the dot of 11:00 AM. The kids have a half day for the last day of school today. I am racing the school bus. Remarkably, I get there at noon.

Lizzy observes that it doesn't feel like the last day of school because it's cold. The last day of school is supposed to be hot. It's also gray and overcast and generally makes me want to sleep rather than playing basketball with Lizzy. She is now a full inch taller than me. She can't believe I am the same height I was in 6th grade. Actually, I may have shrunk a quarter of an inch since 6th grade from hunching over computer keyboards for 30 years. (It was much harder on the posture when the keyboard and monitor were all one unit - not detachable - and the terminals were one size fits all.) Anyway, she has the advantage of height and youth in our game of 21. The idea is you shoot from where you get the rebound and keep shooting as long as you make baskets until somebody has 21 baskets. I ended up shooting from the bushes next to the house a fair amount as the ball would bounce off the backboard and land just on the edge of the driveway causing it to bounce crazily. Lizzy wins 21 to 14. I'm amazed I got 14.

Andrea shows me her "writing book" from school where she has written down title, author, and a one or two sentence summary for books that she's read this year. I am surprised at how much she liked the Chronicles of Narnia. My booklist this year is not nearly so interesting. Maybe I should have Andrea summarize my books too :-)

The three of us are sitting in the purple room watching The Wild Thornberries. I love The Wild Thornberries. There's a loud knock on the front door. As I head for the door, Lizzy looks out the window and announces "It's the Groton police!" I open the door and politely greet the officer figuring maybe he is selling tickets to the Policeman's Ball or something (do they still do that?).

Officer: "Are you a relative?"
AJ: "Yes, I'm Aunt Janet."
Officer: "I'm the officer who looks after the house when he's having work done."
Officer to Lizzy: "Did school get out early today?"

The officer apparently does not realize today is the last day of school. When we get that straightened out, he asks me: "Will you be here regularly for the summer?" I leave it at a yes sir. OK, I've been coming regularly and irregularly for 5 years and this is the first time he's noticed me? Evidently he is not the same officer who has stopped me for such suspicious behavior as driving in Groton after midnight or taking the kids for a walk. When I tell Nancy about this later tonight, she suggests that I should have Kevin invite the police to the next family gathering so they can meet his large extended family and get to know us. We go back to watching TV. The Rugrats are on.

A group (a pack? a flock? a coven? what's the collective noun for foxes?) of three foxes enters the back yard as we watch from the window. The chipmunks and squirrels take cover - chipmunks in the stone wall, squirrels in the trees. The foxes disappear back into the woods. Later another fox takes the same route. Can the police check out suspicious foxes? At least they're not coyotes.