Saturday Waffling

(For more of my political posts, check out American Street (in the links on the right) today)

I've been so focused on the hurricane unrescue efforts that I haven't had time to write rubbish at all, and I really miss it. Rubbish writing, I mean. Reading it may not be so fun, but writing it is a blast. But disasters make this very hard to do. Still, if I quit now I might never get back in the saddle.

It is a lovely autumn morning here, the sun seeping down between the dark green leaves in rays of pale gold, and it is once again possible to smell the earth and not just its flowers and leaves. I have an autumn switch which seems to have turned on, and suddenly I'm a ball of energy, cleaning and planning and just enjoying the feeling of ripening all around me. I go out and buy the fruit and the vegetables just for their colors and shapes and the kitchen looks glorious. Earthmotherly. This is as close as I ever get to being earthmotherly.

The snakes aren't especially affected by autumn but the dogs are. They get all edgy and even more eager to run, and then they change from spring shedding to fall shedding. Slightly different type of hair can now be found in the corners of the Snakepit Inc.. This morning Hank jumped into the stream and got stuck quite deep in the mud. I had to pull her out (with a slurp sound), and then we were both smelly and brown. Don't give me any wise-cracks here! It wasn't fun to walk back past the popular local soccer game, but luckily Henrietta was as clean and noble-looking as usual, to show that the smelly browniness didn't extend to all of the household.

I'm thinking of painting all the walls brown. This would save on cleaning time. What could I use to cover the pungent smell of boggy water in the mud?