I should be sleeping. But I thought I'd slip in a post first. I finally finished evaluating some essays for my class and I intend to (pretty much) take the weekend off. Only pretty much because I am doing my volunteering at the museum tomorrow, and so I guess I will review the week's reading as I sit there, waiting for the one or two visitors to drop by. I write from Samsonville. We are closing the pool; we didn't want to miss out on any swimming this month, which turned out to be rather warm overall for upstate New York, but it does mean there will be a lot of pine needles and leaves to deal with, and a chilly swim, before putting the cover on.

The morning was unpleasant. We went to the Indigo Girls concert last night. It was great, but it made for a late night, and we have been doing a lot of going out the past couple of weeks, so I am very burnt out. I am reminded of Elwyn, an old timer I knew as a kid, and how he always celebrated not just his birthday, but his birthday month. Not a bad idea, I guess, but even at twice my current age Elwyn must have had more stamina than I do or something.

Anyway, I dragged myself downstairs to the newspaper and my daily cup of re-warmed in the microwave coffee topped off with skim milk. I managed to throw in a load of laundry, and was feeling proud of myself for that - knowing we would be going to Samsonville in the evening, I wanted to get a couple of important chores done. Considering the stack of essays calling to me from my office, there was not a lot of time for laundry, or the paper, or even stale coffee. I heard "squeak, squeak, squeak," and didn't think much of it. The washer was on its last legs six years ago, when Bob was in grad school, and my father fixed it for us. But this has been borrowed time, and for several months it has been developing an ominous squeak. Every time I transfer yet another load of wet clothes to the dryer I give that old washing machine a little pat of thanks.

The squeaking continued, intermittently, and it was somewhat faint. Suddenly Edna captured my attention, she was being playful, near my feet. I wonder what that is, I thought, not really giving it much of a look. Then I realized she had a cute little mouse, and this was the source of the squeak. The tepid coffee seemed even less palatable than usual. I wondered what to do. Make her stop? The mouse was not dead, but was surely wounded. What would I do with it? Kill it myself? Throw it outside, in the rain of Isidore, to be dealt with later? And even if it had not been wounded, I decided I really don't want mice in the kitchen. I decided not to intervene. Edna was pleased that I noticed. She was proud of her accomplishment. She kept up playing, torturing it really. Cats can be mean, maybe unintentionally. The dogs watched warily from the stairs; between the two they may be a hound and a half, but whatever instinct was passed on by their ancestors has been long overtaken by warm wooly blankets, dentabone chew toys, and Freihoffer's cookies (a Capital Distict staple). Ripping up plush squeaky toys are about as close as either gets to prey.

Finally, mercifully, she ate it. Ugh. I am having a hard time erasing the image from my mind. Microwaved breakfast coffee will never be quite the same. Then she rubbed my legs and purred. That's her second rodent in two weeks, although she didn't consume the last one. Lately, I thought she was too old for such antics, but now I am feeling guilty, suspicious that her lethargy stemmed from matted hair and not aging. After her injury in the spring, she became very matted, and protested my efforts at removing the tangles. I finally gave up trying to brush them out and instead cut them out of her fur. She looks a little choppy, but it has given her a new lease on life, with the opposite result for the mice. Way to go Edna.