I baked a loaf of French bread for tomorrow's Communion. (August is our month.) Then I suggested we go to the Magnolia Farmers' Market. What I had in mind was that the sugar gliders are out of snap peas.

Magnolia is a neighborhood I am not familiar with at all. I vaguely remember driving a bus or two through there. It's not on the way to anywhere for us, and it's not a destination, so we just never go there. I found the market without too much trouble. The "Farmers' Market this way" signs helped a lot. Phillip had never heard the Magnolia joke. ("Is it true that Seattle's senior citizens live in Magnolia?" "No, they live in Ballard. It's their parents who live in Magnolia.") Magnolia is a pretty neighborhood - lots of expensive-looking, but not overstated, houses with amazingly well-maintained yards.

Magnolia has a nice Farmers' Market - not as good as the University District's, but better than Woodinville's. Seattle's Mayor Nickels happened to be there today.

Together, we bought snap peas (I put what I guessed would be a pound of them in a bag. It turned out to be 0.995 lbs!), an enormous Walla Walla sweet onion, a couple of lemon cucumbers (which look like skinless oranges), some locally produced salad dressing, four peaches, and two bunches of organically grown carrots (beautifully lumpy and blemished carrots, with not a speck of uniformity).

The carrots went right into my juicer, along with some of the carrot greens. (It was Phillip's idea to add the greens, oddly enough. Of course, he wasn't the one drinking it. He doesn't like either carrot or green juice.) The rest of the carrot greens will be a special treat for Gladden and Squeak.

I don't know what it is about carrots, but I love them. I love them raw, and also cooked. I love carrot juice. I love carrot cake and carrot bread.

Neither Phillip nor I have figured out what to do with the leftover pulp from the juice I make. I've stopped throwing it out, and have started freezing it, until we find a use.

I chose the longest of my three explored commutes home today, just so I could plow through as much of Two Wheels North before it's due back. I finished the book just as the 60 bus approached Thomas Street, one block before my stop.

That was a terrific book. The story was amazing, the writing was natural, and the document of history is fascinating. Why isn't this book more well-known?

Taking the 9 home is less than five minutes faster than walking, but only if I leave work right on time, and encounter no delays. If I miss that 9 bus, waiting for the next 9 gets me home at about the same time as the 60 would. Walking is fun, but it isn't very conducive to reading.

After reading through some old posts, I'm now thinking about Connie. I'm wondering how and what she's doing. We both left so suddenly. She always seemed somehow wrong for that job - I don't mean she didn't do a good job. It's just that it was easier to picture her at a dig in Egypt than behind a desk.

This heat is taking its toll on me. I didn't sleep well at all last night. I kept half-waking up from crazy dreams. One I remember was something about being in a meeting, and me worrying that I hadn't told anyone that I'd be late for work. It was a meeting at work, however, and we were discussing a patient that would be arriving soon: my friend Don.

Now, this evening, I am exhausted. I started reading more of Two Wheels North, and couldn't stay awake. I couldn't stay asleep either. The boys have crossed into Washington, which has been a state for 20 years, and are on their way to Chehalis, and things are not going well for their journey.

I got an email this morning from the Seattle Public Library that Two Wheels North is due back on Monday. I wasn't nearly done with it. I'm finding that having such a short commute is cutting into my reading. I tried to renew the book online this afternoon, but couldn't because someone has it reserved.

I am so tired that I don't know if I'm making any sense at all. It's too bad that spell checkers can't detect coherence. I'll have to rely on my faithful readers. This should be interesting reading later on.

I walked home from work again today.

I finally did it today. I walked home from work. According to Yahoo! Maps, it's a mile and a half. It was a nice walk, too, despite the heat wave. There weren't many inclines or declines, and I had a wide variety of routes to choose from.

I saw two squirrels on my walk home. The first was in front of Harborview, and was busy getting fed by someone. The second was close to that big Catholic church (St. James?), under those amazing trees decorated with bells. The second squirrel waited patiently for me to retrieve my bag of peanuts from the bottom of my briefcase. I gave her two peanuts for her patience.

Squeak, baby, why are you so vocal these days?

We humans don't understand what that barking/hissing sound means. We can't tell if it's a happy sound or otherwise. We can't see what's prompting it.

You sure get Gladden's attention when you start sounding off that way - but why? Why does he come running, and then just look at you? What are you telling him?

What are you saying to us?

I'm realizing, now, that there was a selfish paradigm involved in my decision to install Opera. As I saw myself losing the battle against the adware, I thought: If Phillip's Internet Explorer gets worse, instead of better, we'd be losing access to web sites unavailable to my Netscape. (I'd have to use the telephone for Flexcar reservations and Tracfone redemptions!) Things did get worse, and I suggested to Phillip that he use my Opera to play Neopets.

Then Phillip asked about the possibility of him using Opera from now on. Ever since he and I started sharing a computer, eight years ago or so, we've always used separate web browsers. Now I've put my Bookmarks into a folder named "Paul's Bookmarks" and I've imported Phillip's Favorites into a folder named "Phillip's Bookmarks." There will be some adjustments to our internet habits. Keeping our email separate won't be a problem, since Phillip uses Eudora - a stand-alone program. We're having to get used to logging into our start pages (My Yahoo! for both of us), instead of having it start conveniently with our preferences in place. But, there's nothing we can't live with.

Phillip's asked about the possibility of removing Internet Explorer altogether. I don't know yet. What I've read so far tells me that once Internet Explorer is installed into Windows, it's pretty difficult to unistall.

Now, all I have to do is track down whatever's slowing our computer down, and maybe we won't need to buy a new computer quite so soon.

First, however, I'll have to unclog the kitchen sink.

When I started to take my shower this morning, I suddenly remembered a dream I had last night or this morning. In the dream, I was starting to take a shower, but when I pulled the shower curtain open, a white towel which had been hanging on the inside of the shower fell into the standing water inside the tub. In the dream, it was quite a tragedy.

After my shower, I was still thinking about that short dream, and I remembered the damp towel Phillip placed on me last night to help me fall asleep in this heat wave. It worked very well. Then I realized that when the alarm woke me up this morning, the damp towel was gone. Phillip must have removed it.

I spent most of yesterday afternoon writing a pen-and-paper letter to Kelly. I told her how my new job is going. (It's going very nicely.)

On Saturday, Dad had surprised me by picking up the check at Catfish Corner - even though that's exactly the sort of thing he does. After we got home, I suggested to Phillip that we use the money I'd planned on using for lunch and go out to dinner. It seemed like a good idea to him, at first, but then changed his mind because he wasn't feeling up to it (a result of this heat wave). Yesterday evening, Phillip reminded me of my offer for dinner, but he added a twist: How about a picnic instead of a restaurant? It was up to me to choose the picnic spot.

We picked up some food at Jack In The Box, and then I took us to that teeny tiny park at the end of Lynn Street, down the hill from The Eastlake Zoo, on the shore of Lake Union, next to the houseboats. That was nice - much better than a restaurant would have been. We were joined by a goose and several ducks, a Sanyo blimp that flew directly over us, several people passing by who stopped to admire the view, and a lazy drunk in a rubber boat who made his girlfriend do all the work.