Heat Wave

This dark picture is Jacob looking out the front door, watching for Mama and Dada this morning. We had lots of fun last night--he watched a video some, but we played, looked at pictures, read books, and he played his special game of "make Juju think I'm going to do something I'm not supposed to" which he does with the devil in his eyes and a big smile on his face. But this morning, he woke, crying, at 6:30 (he usually is quiet until at least 7:30). He wanted Mama. For the next three hours he was alternately joking and being funny and crying for Mama.

After they left I did my one grocery trip. Today's prediction was 105 but tonight I think the news report said it was only 101. Tomorrow is supposed to be 107 (a record! oh, good!) and I'm glad I don't have to set foot out of the house except to water plants and feed the dog, who spends most of the day inside. I opened the door today at noon to give him a treat (with a pill hidden in it) and he bolted inside. Nor does he want to go out after naptime--he knows its the hottest part of the day. The trouble with this heat is that it makes you feel trapped--inside your house, inside your air-conditioned car, wherever you are. And it's sort of never off your mind. And don't even talk to me about the heat index--those are numbers I simply don't want to hear. Knowing about them makes it worse.

I fixed an exotic tuna salad tonight, from a recipe out of Gourmet. A layer of grilled eggplant salad with garlic, vinegar, parsley added to it, then chunked tuna, then tonnato sauce (I love that--a tuna/anchovie/caper sauce), then grape tomatoes, sliced in half and tossed with mint, salt and pepper. It was really great--but it was too many intense flavors. After a few bites, I ws sort of done. I ate almost all of it and then had to break my diet and have a small chocolate sundae to change the flavors in my mouth.

Now down to work. This afternoon I edited the first 90 pages of a novel I'm wildly enthusiastic about, and tonight I'm going to finish the sixth chapter of the new novel and then go back over the first one, Dead Space, with the idea in mind that characters must grow and change.

My web page is up--except I don't know how to find it, and the girl who designed it has left town for a week. I'll call domain.com Monday, because I really want to post a link here. I'll have a new email and everything. It's like anything else digital, electronic, or whatever--getting it up and running is a royal pain, always with complications, but once you do that, you're in business and using the system comes automatically. I'm waiting for that day.