Counting Down

Somehow, it's a strange feeling to be in the last week of this strange summer, facing working again. It's been both good and bad, this time off, and now that it's ending I can't quite make sense of it. I looked at the calendar and it's been nine weeks--well, on Thursday it will be ten weeks since the bigwigs walked into the office and detonated their little surprise--and that's such a long time. I feel as though I ought to have accomplished more, even though rationally I know that first processing the shock and its aftershocks, and then looking for a job, took a lot of time, and left me with little energy to attack projects around the house. Still, still.

Anyway. The office is as ready as it will be, prior to starting work and seeing how things shake down. The desk is ready:

And Seymour is ready.

(He and I are thinking of Katharine Hepburn's plant in Desk Set. It's a start.

)

Meanwhile, there was the beach on Sunday, Crane's in Ipswich. The view when we arrived:

You may notice that this is a flat beach. This means there is not much obstacle to the tide coming in. We had to move back several times. The view to our left, just before 11.

And an hour later:

So a beach that was positively roomy at 10:30 was considerably closer quarters at high tide, 1:30. Not that it was super-close, but closer. It's a beautiful beach in any event, though I will admit to finding the sand too firmly packed for my tastes. It should mold itself to the human form, but it was like a too-firm mattress, not reacting very much at all. Ah well, it was still a wonderful day, and we topped it off with superlative ice cream at Down River, just over the town line in Essex. I had the Mill River Mix, and even the jimmies were extra-good. Highly recommend.

Things have been fairly quiet since then. I took Belmont to the vet today for a suspected ear infection, since I noticed her scratching more than usual. Sure enough! Ear drops for two weeks, and a return, oh joy. Even that's better than tomorrow, when I have my annual mammogram, ugh. I'll try to go swimming beforehand; I didn't feel like squeezing it in today before the vet, but while I have a few more days, I'll try.

I also did some laundry today, and started to tackle the piles'o'crap on the kitchen table. It's all excitement all the time around here.