What I’m reading: Once I was done reading financial filings, press releases and analyst reports for my Top Companies ish, I was able to kick back, relax and celebrate the July 4th weekend by re-reading Heart of Darkness!
What I’m listening to: Night Work
What I’m watching: Jaws, The Sixth Sense, a documentary about plate lunch diners in southern Louisiana, and some Yankees baseball.
What I’m drinking: No. 209 & Q-Tonic, after an aborted attempt at making a G&T out of Ransom, an Old Tom (malted) gin. Blech.
What Rufus & Otis are up to: Well, Ru didn’t have a good weekend. He’s terrified of fireworks (and thunder, but we haven’t had that in a while), so he spent much of Saturday and Sunday nights curled up in the back corner of my home office. On Sunday, a late-day walk home from a neighbor’s party left him with a little blister on a front paw-pad, so he’s limping all over the place today. I bandaged it up, but that just makes him look more pathetic. Otis, on the other hand, got to take a solo trip to the Ridgewood dog park on Friday, where he met The Big Dog. He had an okay time, but consecutive days with “chasing squeaky tennis ball” sessions left him with a little tear on his carpal pad (the paw pad further up on the “wrist”, which they use for braking). I’m just a bad dogfather, I know.
Where I’m going: Portland, OR next week for the annual meeting of the wonderfully named Controlled Release Society (get yer mind outta the gutter; there’s nothing tantric about it).
What I’m happy about: I managed to finish that July/August issue in time and managed to squeeze a 30 Rock joke into my editorial (how an earlier feature went over about as well as NBC’s Salute to Fireworks). And getting out to see my pals John & Liz for a July 3rd party. And being rewarded for a 40-minute traffic jam on the way home on the NYThruway that evening; it turned out to have been caused by a bus fire. By the time we passed it, the bus had been so thoroughly scorched that its entire skin was gone. I haven’t seen any news items on it, so it’s likely no one was hurt; that means I’m allowed to consider it awesome.
What I’m sad about: The sight of a limping dog; Sia’s decision to cover Madonna’s Oh Father instead of its Like a Prayer companion song, Dear Jessie; my 68-year-old, somewhat-invalid neighbor’s accident that left her Saturn SUV rolling down the hill in the woods behind her house on Saturday morning. (She had gotten out of the car to move her walker, but left it in drive. She wasn’t hurt, and the Saturnstopped after 25 or 30 feet when it ran into a fallen tree.)
What I’m worried about: Today’s trip to the endodontist, in which I get to cap off 6 months of heavy duty work-stress by getting assessed for a root canal. Go, me!
What I’m pondering: Whether I should let my Sports Illustrated subscription lapse. I got a few renewal forms in the last month or two, and it occurred to me that I barely get around to reading SI or the ESPN mag nowadays. I still dig sports, but I’m more likely to read New York, Monocle, or the Paris Review when I’m in my, um, favorite reading location.