Journal of a Sabbatical

August 28, 2000

OK, so errands and chores are the meaning of life

Today's Reading: Leap by Terry Tempest Williams, Thoreau's Garden by Peter Loewer

Today's Starting Pitcher: Tomo Ohka

I finally found my missing copy of The Outermost House and immediately looked up the piping plover quote I'd been thinking of:

As I walk the beach in the early summer my solitary coming disturbs it on its nest, and it flies away troubled, invisible, piping its sweet, plaintive cry. The bird I write of is the piping plover, Charadrius melodus, sometimes called the beach plover or the mourning bird. Its note is a whistled syllable, the loveliest musical note, I think, sounded by any North Atlantic bird. --- Henry Beston, The Outermost House

I tried to create a logo for my piping plover page that incorporates that quote and one of my photos , albeit not one of the best photos, but it sort of fit the mood. I'm not entirely happy with the logo and will probably revisit it.

I read almost all of Thoreau's Garden today (the parts I didn't read last night) and decided I want to plant Joe-Pye Weed and several species of milkweed in my yard. Possibly also cardoon just because. And maybe a couple of cultivars of horsetail.

My China visa arrived a few days ago, and I've got my 20 rolls of 1/2 inch masking tape, now all I need is add-on memory and a new battery for István's laptop and I'll be good to go. Oh, I suppose I should pack stuff like socks and underwear and my toothbrush ...

I renewed my car registration online at the Massachusetts RMV web site. Sure beats standing in line with hundreds of people who have bad driving records and don't speak English all waiting to be funneled through one woman who points you to the right counter. Totally painless. Oh, and I've trained myself to say RMV instead of Registry, really I have. Someday, Massachusetts will be just like everywhere else and change it to DMV. Sure, and they'll get rid of rotaries too.