Summertime and the livin' is easy

What a spectacularly beautiful day we're having! For the first time, we have the attic fan turned on and most of the windows open. Yesterday we hit the garden store and brought home hanging baskets and geraniums and caladiums (caladia?). I'd love to get some hydrangea bushes and some more hostas, but the deer, rabbits, and other wildlife act like the hostas are the most delicious salads ever presented to them. Still, I love the various types of hostas, and maybe if I try, I can find a place around the house that the animals will ignore. (Yeah. And you should see how well my Roses of Sharon fared. They were HUGE last year, full of flowers. Now they are little gray sticklets poking only a few inches out of the dirt.)

Yesterday I heard birds going ballistic outside the house, so I walked out to see a black cat being pursued by birds. The black cat streaked across the yard with the birds in hot pursuit. It's likely that this cat is the critter that spends time under my porch. Just the other day, I saw a bird feather near the hole that the animal goes in and out of. Being the Holmesian sleuth that I am (Not!), I deduced that the cat has been feasting on the new hatchlings.

I love summer. Esteemed Spouse rinsed the winter crud off the rocking chairs on the front porch, and before the afternoon ends, I'm going to spend a lazy hour or two with a good book and a big glass of pink lemonade on that porch. Happiness.

I'd like to say that I love summer movies. Some of them, I know I'll enjoy, but I am so very tired of the agonizingly pukey Sex and the City crap. I watched only one or two of those shows because my female students loved it. I hated it. I hated those women. Who in her right mind would spend that much time and money on ugly uncomfortable shoes? And sorry, Sarah Jessica Parker, you are NOT "lovely." You are a horse-faced woman who should be on stage as the Wicked Witch in Bewitched. I'm sure you're a really nice person (actually, I'm sure I'd detest the real you as much as I detest the actress-you), but get off my screen. I don't want to see you on tv, in commercials, or in the movies.

On the other hand, I'm eager to see the new Will Smith adventure, Hancock. As a long-time fan of X-Files, I want to see that new movie (even though David Duchovny pretty much lost my interest in that sleazy tv show he has been in). Mostly, I don't want to watch or read anything right now that taxes my brain too much. I just want to be relaxed and indolent and lazy, lazy, lazy. After more than a decade of working on my doctorate, I deserve some "down" time. So it's off to that rocking chair for me! S.