Windchimes

Weighing in before breakfast,

but not before coffee. Very little comes before coffee. One pill that must be taken on an empty stomach, the water to swallow it, the coffee-making process and a cigarette while I wait for at least a mug full to drip into the carafe. As little as I can get away with.

My oldest daughter has a new grammar pet-peeve, and would scold me for ending that last sentence with a preposition. She can't seem to let a conversation stay on track if someone lets such grammatical errors fly, no matter whose mouths they come from. Last night, she informed me that someone whose writing we've all enjoyed in the various publications of our university is now an English teacher. I said, "where at?" She nearly had a conniption. "Where at, mother? Where AT?" I took her disbelieving tone as a signal I should know where at, and made an educated guess. She continued to make an issue of the daggone dangling preposition. Makes for a boring conversation, doesn't it? I repeated someone's (Churchill, I think) famous response to such corrections (that is the type of nonsense up with which I will not put) and she laughed like she'd never heard that before. Oh well, at least it's a change from her usual pouncing on someone who uses "good" as an adverb.

The poetry writing class starts tonight, and I've got to read a couple of short stories before tomorrow's 9:30a.m. lit class. Better go buy the book. Better wake up earlier tomorrow than I did yesterday, too. I didn't give myself time to drink enough coffee before leaving yesterday.

On the pet parade front, the old-timer around here (Alex the Tabby) creeps closer and closer to the visiting, five times his size, dog, hissing less and less often. It seems he's ceded the back half of the living room to the enemy and is slowly realizing there's nothing he can do if the beast wants to take more territory. Funny thing, though (and counter-evidence as far as the theory that cats are smarter than dogs, in my opinion); the moment Alex arches his back and hisses, this huge canine backs off. You'd think the cat would figure out that the dog's not about to come after him. Joseph, who's still on semester break and visiting us this week before returning to Tennessee, absolutely adores the golden retriever. They went running together yesterday. We're still waiting for signs of acceptance from the other cat who came to visit. He was spotted out from under a bed or in a closet and in the hallway at one point yesterday, and licked at a kitty-treat in Constance's palm.

Okay, better shower (yes, Cliff makes a fairly decent plumber) and see what dents I can make in homework assignments. Only one swallow of coffee left in the second mugful here.

J.H. Larrew
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