Summer Comes Late
"Many record high temperatures were equaled or topped Friday. Here in
Madison, we equaled our record high at 85 degrees for Oct. 3, and
Wisconsin records were set in Milwaukee, Wausau and La Crosse.
Almost every major reporting station in Iowa set records with the
warmest being 95 degrees at Mason City and Waterloo. For Rochester,
Minn., the high of 93 not only set a record for Oct., it was also
warmer than any day this past summer!"
- Meteorologist Jane Pyeatt, in the Wisconsin State Journal, 5 October 1997 |
As you might guess from the quote above, we had a very hot weekend, with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-80s here in Madison. Today was especially hot, or maybe it was because I spent part of it outside sawing to build another bookcase! Nah, I also spent time driving around, and it was hot then, too.
This seemed especially incongruous with the colored trees, drying leaves on the ground, and high morning winds. I almost wonder if Earth's axis is un-tilting!
Afterwards, I followed Dick Russell back to his home to visit my friend Karen, who is now a tenant in his house. (He rents out two of the upstairs rooms to tenants.) Karen is still trying to unpack and to deal with the general clutter and dustiness of Dick's house. I think it will work out, but it's a lot of work right now. We went out to eat and drove around looking for stuff she needed. I bought Fleetwood Mac's self-titled album (the one that made their fortune) along the way.
And then I spent most of the rest of the day building a second bookcase, and rearranging some furniture to make space for it. Each case is about 8 inches wider and 14 inches higher than the cases they're replacing, and I estimate that they each hold more than 3 times as many books. This will give me plenty of room to grow, while only taking up slightly more wall space (and that wall space wasn't being used, anyway). A good investment of time, money and effort, says I!
(Actually, I didn't quite finish the second one; I mis-measured two boards and had to saw less than a quarter-inch length off them, and then it was getting pretty late and the person downstairs started hammering on the ceiling when I hammered on the case. So I stopped. But tomorrow it should get done...)
The Indians staged a dramatic rally to win Game 4 by a 3-2 score, forcing a deciding game against the hated Yankees tomorrow night. Hopefully the Tribe can win. Wouldn't it be ironic if this year's Indians team won the World Series, although it is unquestionably not as good as the last two years' incarnations?
|
|
|
|
