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Journal of a Sabbatical |
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July 3, 2001 |
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random musings |
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Yesterday's
Bird Sightings: Today's Reading: Unbeaten Tracks in Japan by Isabella Bird, A Flora of Essex County by Stuart K. Harris, Return of the Osprey by David Gessner Today's
Starting Pitcher: 2001
Book List |
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Meanwhile, I've been trying to think of a new name for the journal, assuming I'm going to keep doing it. I think I've settled on Memoria Technica (artificial memory), which is an old fashioned expression for mnemonic. Awhile back I was going to change the name to Kingbird Days but decided that really only applied to summer and I'd have to have three other seasonal names. Another contender is Just Like Power Supplies, which is an in-joke that might lose something with explanation. The other contender is stercos, which is a typo for stercus, which is Latin for dung. Awhile back I created a blog - before blogger became unable to handle Netscape 4.7 on the Mac - that I wanted to call stercus but somehow typed stercos instead and liked that so much I kept it. It seems a shame to leave such a great name moldering in a blog I can't update but I'm not sure that's the right name for the gainful employment incarnation of the journal. Decisions, decisions. And Kevin pointed out to me that I have to finish the China journal before I close out the sabbatical too. I don't know why I keep putting off writing about the trip to Lake Nam-tso. Some experiences just have to marinate a bit before I write about them and the paper journal for that part of the trip consists of the name of a monastery, a brief description of a bird (Himalayan griffin), and something incomprehensible, which I think is George's spelling of the mountain Nyenchen Tangla (which I've probably just mangled too - no two sources spell it alike). So maybe there's some excuse for procrastinating on that one, but there is absolutely none for procrastinating on the final entry about hiking up Incense Burner Peak to the White Bark Pine Pavilion on my next to last day in China and then my departure. None whatsoever. Unless I have this idea that if I never post the journal entries I will somehow never have left China... In other news, I finally finished the last 30 pages of Unbeaten Tracks in Japan. Talk about taking a long time! Most of that part of the book is a detailed description of Ainu culture and of the volcanic landscape of Hokkaido and I found myself rereading each sentence in order to take it all in. I am amazed that a Victorian lady with a bad back could get to the places Isabella Bird got to. I mean we're talking 19th century Japan here - no trains, planes, or automobiles. No shinkansen! Makes my pitiful attempt to take a local train (as opposed to the express) across Hokkaido look like child's play. Hmm, that reminds me I have to find the missing notebook and finish typing in the 1997 Hokkaido trip journal too. We must have a complete work here for Andrea to "go back in time" by reading my journal. Spellchecker funnies: the spell checker suggest "Walden" as the correct spelling for "willet" and even funnier suggests "Starbucks" for "stercus". Computers provide no end of amusement. Subject for another rant some time is how Eudora's mood watch feature gives political messages from the Freedom to Marry Coalition two chili peppers yet gives no chili peppers at all to what are obviously spam advertisements for offensive sites. I know I could just shut the darn thing off, but I find the ironies just too entertaining. Help, stop me before I get even more random! |
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Copyright © 2001, Janet I. Egan |
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The
picture and the bird list are from yesterday. I birded 'til
I dropped yesterday and did mostly a whole lot of nothing
today. I'm fraying at the seams, unraveling, whatever... I
fell asleep listening to the Red Sox lose to the Cleveland
Indians tonight. I woke up about 9:40 PM with the score
something like 9 to 1 and the finale of a local fireworks
display exploding outside like thunder. Now I have to figure
out how to get back to sleep in a timely manner so I can get
up in a timely manner to go clean litter boxes tomorrow
morning.