Brief notes about things I've been seeing and doing:
~ We saw the little bobcat cub again Sunday evening, same place along the road. It was smaller than I remembered, or maybe it's another one from the same litter. I'm starting to wonder if something happened to the mother for these kittens to be wandering around in the road like this. We stopped to look around but couldn't find where it had run off to. Avia was with us this time, so she got to see it, which was amusing. Her voice went up about 9 octaves. "O it's SO CUTE!" And it really was.
~ The hearse really is getting done. I think that I hadn't believed we'd actually finish it, ever, because it just seemed so far away and unattainable. This weekend we finished putting glass in - it has all its windows and door handles and the like. And
dionysusdevoteeeven put back one of the fabric door panels! I think if we had enough money to throw at it, we could be driving it out for Halloween. I'm having fantasies about taking it out to a Graveyard Picnic party, Gothic attire encouraged of course. It's just a fantasy as I don't think it actually will be ready by this Halloween. But definitely next year. :)
~ Even a vegetarian can figure out how to make rabbit fricassee. Didja know that? I didn't. See
here for
dionysusdevotee's story. I stewed it with shallots, garlic, mushrooms, caramelized pecans, and fresh rosemary from the yard, and lots of help from "Joy of Cooking" and my trusty sidekick Avia, who was a real trooper. Had to have them cut it up for cooking though, because I wouldn't have known where to stick the knife. (How weird is that - I am more at ease cutting up animals for magickal tools than for food.) I ate a little of it, but just a little, because my stomach is not accustomed to meat. Now there is a lot of stewed rabbit in the refrigerator.
~ Parent of thirteen-year-old, part 129. We were in Peet's coffeehouse, in Livermore, and Avia spotted some older teenagers dressed in the usual alterna-teen stuff: studded belts, chains, extra piercings, lotsa black and red, short dyed hair. She turned to us and said with a quiet grin, "I think I'm going to fit in great in this town!"
~ Today I went on a field visit for work, to a nudist park by Castro Valley. I didn't know there was one there either. It was interesting, being led around by a lady of 60 years who had lived in that forest since she was ten. She resembled nothing so much as an Ent: she was tall and kind of grizzly in the hair, quiet spoken, and knew more about the native plants and ecology than any of the PhD's that I meet in the ecology intelligentsia I rub shoulders with at meetings in Oakland. She talked about all of the trees and plants there like they were her neighbors and could tell you when most of the trees were born or planted there. Made for a novel contrast with the other representative of the nudist colony, a fast-talking retired police control freak guy, who was in the habit of cutting down trees because they grow too abundantly, and who was apparently the one in charge of the place. I have an interesting job.
~ I saw this incredible photograph of
giant underground crystals that
cooper_korman posted. You should really go look at it, it's mindbending. I had three reactions. First, stunned silence. That little picture literally silenced my thoughts for about a minute and a half.
Then for some reason I found myself thinking about all the escapist fantasies about space travel and the Rapture, and I found myself thinking, "How is it that people can want to leave this planet?!? How can you not be madly, wildly in love with the Earth? Just, HOW?"
Then I went, "I'm going there!!!" Of course, it turns out that it's in some crazy mine in Mexico with 140 degree moisture-saturated air that kills you in 8 minutes if you go in without protective gear, so I guess I have to scrap that vacation idea. They probably aren't offering guided tours.