magid

90+ degrees yesterday, ugh. that's just too hot for april. actually, too hot for anytime, but especially too hot for april. why do so many people seem so pleased when it gets that hot?

at least it cooled down later in the day, making it nicer outside tha n the still overwarm inside. i went out to a playground, climbed on the jungle gym, swung on the swings. both of these are much easier with 2 hands... (i couldn't get very high on the swings one-handed :-( ). and i scored some pots for plants on the walk home (trash pickup is this morning), which didn't get me out of my mood, but helped a little.

did anyone else wake up for the thunderstorm? there was a long roll of thunder around 2:40 am, enough to wake me up and remind me i'd left the skylight open.... jump out of bed, get the close-the-skylight tool, close it before the downpour. there was some spectacular lightning, too, bright even with my eyes closed... followed a fraction of a second later with a huge boom of thunder.
things are definitely cooler :-)

i took buses to work today, walking to harvard, then taking the 71 to the 59 to the end of the street i work on. it took about one and a half hours, including walking, but at least i had plenty of time to do hand exercises.... oh, and i found out that they now have bus to bus transfers, so the trip cost half of what i'd expected (75 cents).

mood: virtuous public transportation consumer.
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(is anyone else having difficulties with odd characters showing up in their entries (um, that would be things-that-are-related-to-but-aren't-letters, not that man in purple with a chicken on his head over there in the corner....)? i've tried deleting the null set above, but nothing works. does this have something to do with now having other alphabets available?)

it's mostly cloudy now; it doesn't look like there could've been any sort of dawn other than the slow creeping of grey light allowing the browns and greys of winter to be distinguished.

but this morning i woke up early. and i could see at the edge of the dark blue-gray cloud blanket, the brightening in the east to bright light yellow.
and as i drove to work, there were other rents in the clouds, showing brightening blue above, more yellow in the east. i got in ridiculously early, logged on to the work machine, then looked out the window to find the underside of all those heavy, colonial blue clouds garishly bright pink, almost red, with the rising sun. it lasted only 15-20 minutes, but was incredibly beautiful. i need to get up early more often. there's something about the quietness of a dawn seen by so few that's special.

driving to the diesel last night, i notice there are still frozen waterfalls on the (slight) cliffs facing north on rte 2. yes, it was in the 50s yesterday (and warm on monday, too), but they were still there. i'm always fascinated by them; they look like action caught abruptly, rather than a slow winding down. and i thought of other fun forms of ice, the thin crackly kind that forms on top of small puddles when the temperature drops quickly and is wonderful to shatter as i walk along; the thicker kind at the edge of the street that is part ice and part compressed snow that is usually an overhang over the side of the road that takes much effort and occasional jumping up and down to break the edge off of, like a calving iceberg; the smoothness of ice on a pond, not the perfect groomed sheen of a rink, but still solid enough to skate on, the metallic whisper of skates on ice in the cold air without machines or music booming.

to say nothing of the different kinds of snow...

must've woken up on the lyrical side of the bed...