Today is a perfectly lovely day. The sun is bright, the air is clear and it’s only 69˚. The forecasted high for today is 71˚. The forecasted low is 59˚, yup, fifty nine degrees. I have to go out because I can’t waste this weather which will stay the same the whole long weekend. Blissful is my mood of the moment.

I am the victim of a plague, not one of the Biblical plagues of note but my own plague, a fly plague. Yesterday I had to go out for the first time since Friday. When I opened the car door, flies attacked me. Well, not so much attacked me but more like ran into me as I was just standing in the way of their freedom. I didn’t go into the car. There were too many of them. I did manage to get all the windows opened. The flies were small, maybe baby flies. my first baby flies. I waited outside the car and watched the swarm leave. The sky darkened, and the only sound was the fluttering of wings. Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit here, but I’m telling you it took a while before all of the flies left for sunnier climes. Flies are dumb bugs. A lot of them crawled under the opened window so I had to shoo them out. I figured they just had to come from the trunk, from where the trash bags were. Today I will open the trunk and duck.

Nala continues her felonious ways, and I don’t know where she is finding the paper to shred. The only place I can think of is the recycle bin of papers and magazines. Nala has also become a naturalist. Yesterday she brought in a small branch filled with dead leaves. They ended up on the floor by the door and Nala, with some help from Henry, the abetter, chewed away the branch. When I was on the deck earlier, I saw a dog food can in the yard. I didn’t see any legs. It didn’t walk there.

When I walk to the kitchen, tumbleweeds fly in front of me. They rise slightly in the air then fall back down to the floor. They are never completely eliminated. I’d need bald dogs before that happened.

My slipper is still missing. This morning I went to get my papers. I was barefooted. I ended up having to step on pathway stones to get the papers. They hurt. I should have worn shoes. I really miss my slipper.

When we woke up this morning or rather closer to this afternoon, it was cloudy and cold, 64˚ cold, and the day won’t get any better. It will stay cloudy and dark and cold with a low of 60˚and a high of 69˚. A strong wind is swaying the pine tree branches. A flood watch is in effect. It is an ugly day.

Yesterday was an odd, as in unusual, sort of day. It started in the morning when a vase fell over after the flowers shifted. The water from the vase fell all over the kitchen floor under and over cans and bottles of food. I started picking up the wet stuff including a bag of dog food which had been folded over the top to keep Nala from snacking. I failed fold. The dog food fell out of the bag all over the wet floor. Nala thought she was in heaven when she saw the food. I thought I was in hell. The cleanup took a while.

Rain started slowly yesterday in the early evening. I could hear the drops on the leaves from the open window behind me. Not long after, the deluge began. The thunder came first. It was so loud Nala raised her head each time. Henry slept through. A couple of lightning bolts were next. They lit up my den window. The rain kept falling. At one point there was a lull, and I thought the storm was over despite the weather predictions. I was wrong. The most rain fell after ten. There were tornado warnings for Barnstable county. I watched the tracks of those tornados on TV. The first warning was until 12:45 then it was changed to 1:45. The rain was still falling as heavily as it had been. Around three there was a lull in the rain. I let both dogs out for the last time before we went to bed. The amount of rain which soaked us was around 3 or 4 inches but not enough to get us out of drought conditions.

My laundry has made it to this floor. The two bags are stacked in the hall. One bag was so heavy it fell down the stairs and sent Nala scurrying. I need to do a few household chores including changing my bed. Despite the damp, I did run over the kitchen floor with a wet mop. I know they’ll be tons of new paw prints today, but I couldn’t take the dirty floor anymore. I’d have to close my eyes every time I went into the kitchen.

I do need to go out today. I wish I didn’t. Nothing about today makes me want to be out and about. I’ll need a sweatshirt.

Today is cloudy, hot and humid. It will be in the mid 80’s but will drop to the 60’s tonight. The rain, a remnant from Ida, will be here on Thursday. The winds could gust up to 40 mph, and the storm could drop 3 inches or 4 inches of rain. That’s another reason (think excuse) not to wash the kitchen floor: more dog paw prints from the upcoming rain. I’m glad I grocery shopped yesterday.

Today I have a malaise. My stomach is bitterly complaining about something. It can’t be dinner as I actually had a salad. Last night was an unquiet sleep, a portend of this morning. I’m wearing track shoes (symbolism here) so I can sprint to the bathroom. The dogs watch me from the hall. That too is unsettling.

On the shoe/slipper front, I didn’t find it, but I haven’t yet checked through the brush in the backyard. I’m really missing my slipper.

I did go to the dump yesterday as I didn’t want the trash to sit in my car until Thursday, the next time the dump is open. A nice man helped me lug the heavy litter bags from the car to the big receptacle.

Nala chewed on my back scratcher. The five teeth have become three with spaces between them where there were no spaces. The scratcher was in one of the baskets under the den table top. Nala finds the three baskets under the table a rich hunting ground.

When I was a kid, Duke, our boxer, chewed a few things during his puppy days. Those few things included the upholstery over the windows of my father’s car and a roast beef though my brother and I managed to save it, and nobody noticed the teeth marks. Nala has no preference and no standards for stolen goods. Paper, cans, newspapers and so many more strange items are among the missing. I know she’s taken something when she rushes out the dog door and ignores my call.

My plans for today are simple: sit around, watch a little TV, read a bit and nap.

The morning started out sunny. The clouds took over for a bit then the sun returned but disappeared quickly. I think that will be the pattern though cloudy is the forecast. It is warm and humid. It is 83˚, but a wind is keeping it from being oppressive.

My slipper, the one with the hole, has disappeared. It was on the floor by my bed last night. I doubt it left voluntarily. I checked under the bed and in the yard. I didn’t find it. Later I’ll do a more comprehensive hunt.

Lately I have been a bit bored. Nothing holds my interest too long. I jump from activity to activity. The laundry pile is getting tall enough for mountain status. The kitchen floor is filled with paw prints. The dust in this room is thick, Miss Havisham type dust. The plants cry out for water when I walk by them. My sheets are ready to walk themselves to the cellar. I need to get motivated.

My dump run is slated for today as it is closed Tuesday and Wednesday. The only trash bags waiting to be hauled to the car are filled with used cat litter, heavy used cat litter. I need a Sherpa.

When I was growing up, we lived in a project. We even called it the project. Each house was a duplex, one side the mirror image of the other. We never thought of project as a pejorative word. It was just our house. The five rooms were sort of small. In the kitchen we all couldn’t sit at the table, squeezed against the wall, at the same time, just the four of us kids ate together. That was okay as my mother aways ate at the counter, and my father got home late. The living room was where we spent most of the time. The TV was there, in the corner of the room, mostly across from the couch. The living room had a picture window. Upstairs were the three bedrooms and the bath. My room overlooked the back and side yards. The double bed I shared with my sister took up a good deal of space. The rest was taken up with a desk and a bureau. I never used my desk much. My mother and father brought it down to me here. It is in the cellar piled with boxes. I haven’t any space. We had a huge cellar where my mother did her washing and where we sometimes played when it rained. The Christmas boxes and some toys and games were also stored in the cellar. The house I live in by myself is bigger than the house where the six of us lived for a long while, before we moved here to the cape.

Everything is quiet. I can hear only the rustling of leaves from the backyard when the tree branches twist in the wind. The dogs are having their morning naps. Even pesky Nala is quiet and probably dreaming about chewing slippers.

The sky is cloudy, and the air is perfectly still. The morning is a bit noisy. From the street behind mine, I can hear a lawnmower. The operator of said lawnmower does not realize he is breaking Sunday protocol. Lawns are mowed on Saturday. It is a long tradition.

It is only 72˚ right now, and the temperature won’t get much higher, maybe a degree or two. The high humidity makes the air feel a bit chilly. The clouds are staying around all day.

I haven’t yet decided what to do today. I have been loading trash into the car but am saving the dump for tomorrow. I need something to look forward to, and I still need to change the cat litter.

Alexa and I had another useless conversation this morning. She told me it was time to reorder cat litter, the blue crystals I tried a while back. Did I want it on my shopping list? No, I said. No, what, Alexa asked. I said do not add the blue crystals to my shopping list. She said I had no shopping list. Did I want to start a shopping list? I told her to shut up. She did.

When I was a kid, just about every kid I knew had a bike and a sled. Bikes were mostly regular size. Little two wheelers with training wheels weren’t around. It didn’t make much sense to go from a tricycle to a bike with four wheels. I learned to ride on the street in front of my house. My mother taught me. I don’t remember falling, but I suspect I might have. I didn’t have elbow pads or a helmet. Scrapes were part of the learning curve. I always thought a little blood was an incentive to learn to ride quickly.

Nala and I play catch down the hall She starts by bringing me her round, fluffy pink ball with a face and ears. I throw it. She runs then returns it. The game doesn’t usually last too long. Nala gets distracted easily. Usually Henry is the reason.

Speaking of Henry, he came in the dog door today. It fit his purpose to run to the front door and bark at the woman walking her dog. He went out again, and in a bit, he banged the door for me to let him in. I did. Without an emergency, Henry will stay outside that door waiting. I did try to wait him out the other day. It didn’t work. I felt guilty after a half hour.

Today is a delight. The humidity is gone, waiting in the wings until Monday, and it is only 74˚, the high for the day. I haven’t any need to go out, but I will just to savor the day.

I woke up early because of the lawn mower. The grass was getting cut, and the deck was being blown clean just outside my bedroom window. The dogs wanted out so I went downstairs, let them out and waited for Henry to come back to the door. I let him in and went back to bed. Nala joined me. I slept two more hours. Henry went out while I was sleeping. He was still outside waiting at the door for me when I went downstairs. The poor boy!

The flowers, the clematis, covering the fence in the front yard have begun to bloom. This morning I stood to admire the white blossoms when I heard a buzzing sound. Strangely enough an Emily Dickinson poem jumped into my head. I heard a Fly buzz is the title of the poem, a title drawn from the first line of her poem as Emily didn’t title anything. Okay, back on topic, sorry for the tangent, enough with the random trivia. Anyway, the buzzing was from bees, not flies. The flowers draw bees. When all of the flowers have bloomed and covered the fence, I avoid the fence and gate because bees are everywhere though a couple of times I did risk my life and go through gate as sort of a self dare. The bees buzzed louder and a few took to flight. I ran to the house, got inside and exhaled deeply, happy I was safe.

When I was a kid, I would have roamed all day on a day like today. I’d have wrestled my bike from the cellar, made a lunch and been gone. My route changed from Saturday to Saturday, and I’d hit all my favorite spots. At the golf course, I’d hunt for errant balls, the victims of slices and hooks. I usually found one or two. I liked to stop at the train station in the next town over. I’d often sit on a bench, eat my lunch and hope to see a train. Sometimes I did. After lunch, I’d choose the rest of my route and explore.

I usually lasted until late afternoon before I headed home.

Today is pretty but already hot. It is 86˚ and humid. I’m not going anywhere. I doubt I’ll even get dressed. Today is a good day to stay in the cool house and maybe read or watch a movie. I have cheese, and I have crackers. I have ice cream. I’m content.

Both dogs came back inside panting heavily. It took a while for Nala to settle down for her morning nap. Henry is barking. It could be because a car went by, a walker walked by, my neighbor checked his yard or someone slammed a car door. Henry is the dog that cries wolf.

Both dogs have well dog visits together later in September. Henry needs a variety of shots. Nala needs to be seen. I have all her vet records to give them. I hope having Nala in the car with him will help Henry enjoy the ride more.

I have jumped into the plot of Charlotte’s Web. I know where all the baby spiders are, my house. They are threading their webs from plant to plant on the windowsills and on chairs leg to leg. The webs are small as are the spiders. They haven’t woven me a message yet, but I keep looking.

I have become a vampire. The nurse called from the doctor’s office to give me the results of my pre-physical blood tests, but I already knew. She said my vitamin D is in the dumps, a medical term I hadn’t heard used before in quite the same way. I am now taking a heavy regimen of vitamin D. I suppose I could sit in the sun for a while, but it is just too hot.

When I was a kid, I had two pairs of shoes, school shoes and play shoes. The school shoes doubled as church shoes. I never wore my school shoes outside when I played. I had ingrained in me that school shoes and playtime should never meet. I always changed out of school clothes as soon as I got home.

I have winter shoes and summer shoes, a pair of each. I have many more shoes than that, but I don’t wear them much. Mostly I still wear my wool clogs thus mixing summer and winter, but their future is bleak. My big toe has pushed through. Where’s the duct tape?

Today is hot. The temperature is 89˚, but the humidity makes it feel ever hotter, closer to 97˚. Earlier, I had to bring a box to the trunk anticipating a dump run later. The box was so heavy I had to turn it end to end to get it to the car. I have yet to develop a strategy to lift it into the car.

Having run out of excuses to delay the inevitable, I am going to wash the kitchen floor today. I have one appointment after which I’m free to don my house dress, grab the bucket and mop and wash and clean. I’ll sing a happy tune. No I won’t. There’s nothing happy about it, and I have no bluebirds.

Yesterday I cleaned the yard. Nala had stolen the newspapers while they were still in the plastic sleeve so I went to retrieve them. The Globe was spread out page after page. The Cape Times was intact but had teeth marks. Happily, I was able to reassemble the Globe to read it. This morning I watched her steal crumbled brown packing paper from the recycle bag. I let her have it. Chasing her would have been a lost cause. I’ll clean it up later.

When I was a kid, I loved this time of year. It was still warm, even hot, in the mornings for my walk to school. I remember Pomeworth Street, the long street I walked from top to bottom on my way to school. It had wonderfully big, old houses close to the sidewalks. Some had porches. All had yards. I walked over the tracks and by the train manager’s house. I loved those tracks. I had walked them many times but one thing bothered me. I didn’t know where the other end went. We never walked that far. I still don’t know.

I usually walked down the first sort of driveway into the school yard then into the school and my classroom where I was stuck for most of the day. At the end of school, after I’d changed out of my school clothes, I’d play outside until the street lights came on. I argued for more time using simple logic. The lights came on early because the day was shorter. I didn’t explain it as succinctly to my mother but the gist was there. My mother said no.

In September and October, my father and all the other men in the neighborhood were out every weekend, rakes in hand. I still remember the sounds of those rakes gathering and piling the leaves. I can still see my father in my mind’s eye standing by the pile holding his rake. I remember the flames from the burning piles, but I most remember the smell, the aroma, of leaves burning. Those Saturdays of the fathers raking leaves and then supervising the controlled burn were some of my favorite reasons for loving this time of year.

I’m going to end here leaving you in suspense. I said,”…some of my favorite reasons…” Are there more? Is this a serial? I’m shrugging my shoulders in response.

Some time last night it rained. The sides of the streets were still wet when I woke up. The air will be heavy with moisture today. 80˚will be the high. It was 70˚ just a little bit ago, but now is already 73˚. The heat is moving in fast.

Last night I heard a banging sound but no breaking sound so I ignored the bang. Later, on my way to the kitchen, I glanced into the living room and saw Nala chewing on a branch about three feet long. Around her were pieces of the branch she had already chewed off the big one. Henry was watching. The bang was the limb hitting the floor from the dog door. That was what amazed me. Nala had figured out how to bring a stick, a long stick, through the dog door. I threw the stick out but not far enough. I was in the kitchen when I saw the end of that branch appear through the dog door. I got to see Nala maneuver her branch through the door. She is a smart girl, annoying but smart. I wish she could learn to vacuum.

When I was a kid, my mother got a huge vacuum cleaner which was never easily moved. It caught on rugs, especially scatter rugs. The vacuum sucked up the tops and sides of the scatter rugs thus rendering itself immobile. My mother was determined to free her vacuum. She’d yank the vacuum cord while simultaneously stepping on the scatter rug until finally the vacuum was freed.

Much later, in a different house, my mother had a vacuum system installed. One of the main vacuum holes was in the living room. My mother was dog sitting Shauna, my first boxer. She decided to vacuum. Shauna hated vacuums. She always attacked mine. She’d whack it with her paws and try to eat it. My mother didn’t know. When Shauna went vacuum crazy, my mother tried to vacuum anyway. Shauna caught the vacuum cleaner. In retaliation, it ate Shauna’s tongue. My mother scrambled to turn off the machine and free Shauna’s tongue. At first, once freed, the tongue sort of just laid there. My mother checked it. The tongue appeared unharmed. Shauna was fine. My mother didn’t tell me for a long time.

Henri decided to go elsewhere and bypassed the Cape. We had wind but nothing extraordinary. We had a few minutes of rain. This morning it rained for another five minutes. Now we have a beautiful sunny day. The humidity is nearly gone. The breeze is refreshing.

I need to trash pick my yard today. When I went out on the deck, I could see evidence in the backyard of petty theft. Pieces of plastic, flattened boxes, the remnants of my bagels and some unidentifiable pieces of paper are strewn about the yard just below the deck. I brought in one pile of already collected trash and bagged it.

I vacuumed while the coffee was brewing. The rugs and floors have bits of pine branches all over. As soon as I throw one branch, Nala brings in another. I’ve given branch mess some thought. I could shut the door and eliminate access to the dog door, but Nala and Henry both go out that door. Do I really want to get up every time Nala wants out or in? Nope, the door stays accessible. I have no answer. I’m just going to have to quit complaining and keep the vacuum at hand.

Last night it was the voices of people staying next door and the sound of water falling into a pot which open my memory drawer. Nights in Ghana were never really quiet. Early on, when I went to town in the evenings, I could hear voices, the muted voices of women chatting in FraFra and selling mostly food on the sides of the street and the deep male voices coming from the tables outside the bar in the middle of town, from outside the Super Service Inn. I don’t know how well I can describe how neat these evenings were. After dark, lanterns twinkled up and down the street. Behind each lantern was a woman selling something. They’d call to entice us to stop. We often did and often bought plantain and yam chips and whatever meat concoction we’d find. We’d buy small groundnuts to have as snacks with the Cokes we bought every couple of days from the DPW, yup, the Department of Public Works. It had a small store around the corner from my school.

On school grounds, in the early mornings, I could hear sweeping sounds. Students swept the grounds and the classrooms every day. The loudest sound was tap water flowing into the empty metal buckets the students were filling for their morning baths after chores. The students’ voices were always part of the morning.

These wonderful memories come easily prompted by a sound or a smell or a feeling.

I need to trash pick my yard today. When I went out on the deck, I could see evidence in the backyard of petty theft. Pieces of plastic, flattened boxes, the remnants of my bagels and some unidentifiable pieces of paper are strewn about the yard just below the deck. I brought in one pile of already collected trash and bagged it.

I vacuumed while the coffee was brewing. The rugs and floors have bits of pine branches all over. As soon as I throw one branch, Nala brings in another. I’ve given branch mess some thought. I could shut the door and eliminate access to the dog door, but Nala and Henry both go out that door. Do I really want to get up every time Nala wants out or in. Nope, the door stays accessible. I have no answer. I’m just going to have to quit complaining and keep the vacuum at hand.

I have no energy left today. I emptied baskets and bags and put them in the car and hauled in a package from Chewy, 24 cans of dog food. That was more than enough exertion for today, that one box. I’m taking a shower later and then I’m headed to Hyannis for my uke concert. It’s Beatles Night. “I wanna hold your hand.”