dog days

None of my blog buddies seem to be posting much these days. I keep checking and nothing new appears. C'mon, bloggers, get with it.

Here in sunny, hot Portland (on its way to breaking the record for most-90-degree-days-in-August), it's been a busy time with work stuff. Fortunately, it's going well, and, I must say, sitting in my computer dungeon knocking out code for six or seven hours (with occasional breaks to talk to the dog and - amazingly - the still-alive cat) makes for a darn satisfying lifestyle.

This morning, I built a list of about six chores in the neighborhood, and one by one, ticked them off - all before 10:30. In the great film 'My Dinner With Andre', Wallace Shawn has a lovely speech where he says that doing that - making a list of little things to do and then accomplishing them - is one of the great pleasures in life, and he asks for nothing more than that. None of them were earthshaking in importance, but there is a certain pleasure in the sense of having some control in your life.

The final activity was taking the dog for a romp in Gabriel Park, a nearby paradise of little trails, athletic fields, trees and open fields. He was thrilled and I was happy to stroll along and enjoy the walking and the quiet.

Then I came back home and Karen and I did a little weeding and planting in the yard. It's starting to really warm up - supposed to be 93 later this afternoon. I have about 5 more plants to plant, then I'll get cleaned up and bike over to the house of some friends, who are having a summer party. Karen is not feeling well - in fact, she just walked by and said she's going upstairs to lie down. We have out-of-town family with us, from this evening thru Monday, so this is a lull before a lot of activities.

We have this one sheltered alcove in our yard, under some big trees, where we have lawn chairs permanently set up. I sat there for about a half-hour, listening to the Saturday NPR shows, just looking out at our trees and yard. It was so peaceful, so green, so soothing, and there is so much food in my local Safeway.

And so much of the rest of the world is exactly the opposite.

And Greenland is melting.

But the cat still lives, quietly resting at my feet.