Dear Everyone
The regime of hot weather is (finally) fading; it’s only
about 72 today. And all of the local public schools have been operating for at least
a week. The seasons are changing. Of
course, this never happens without some weather violence, which we had a lot of
about ten days ago, with giant lightning storms with copious rainfall. One
morning we found that our monitor could not detect video data – was it a lemon (it
was less than a year old) or just coincident to a power surge? After a couple of hours of troubleshooting,
Cindy determined it was the monitor (I was sure it was the graphics card). We went to Costco that afternoon and bought a
new one for under $150, as well as a big bag of beef jerky, just in case the
end was upon us.
A week ago Friday, we went to the Brookfield Zoo in the late
afternoon for a donor appreciation picnic.
Since it was late in the day, normal visitors were scarce. We had plenty of time to visit the new Bramsen Tropical
Forest - - a several acre big outdoor exhibit for primates attached to the
older Tropic World exhibit. We saw
squirrel monkeys, two gorilla troupes, and colobus monkeys. Inside we saw orangutans and gibbons. It was a nice rehab, and the keepers told us
that the animals really seem to enjoy their new outdoor space. Afterwards there was picnic food including
hotdogs, hamburgers, and ice cream.
The day after, instead of working out with Jami as usual, we
(with Carolyn) walked down the hill from his house to the Sagawau
nature preserve (about ½ mile away) where they have an annual hummingbird
festival. They were supposed to be
banding hummingbirds, but sadly, there weren’t any at the feeders when we were
there. I think the banders had gotten
all the early birds (they started at 8), and there were none left to marvel at.
Ruby-throateds only weigh about as much as a penny. We took a small hike to see the limestone ‘canyon’,
and then went into the learning center where they had some exhibits on hummers,
and a permanent one on the geology and history of Sagawau.
Later that afternoon, Jasper and Vivian came over, and we
went to a restaurant called Ancho and Agave.
It had a good review in one of the local periodicals, highlighting the 14 different
tacos, but I found it a bit disappointing.
They did have a lot of different kind of tacos, but I guess we did not
take full advantage of the menu (we could have ordered a taco board, which was
one of each taco - - but how can you share that?) The service was also pretty slow. Maybe worth one more visit to try some of the
more exotic flavors.
Yesterday we drove up to Evanston to celebrate Enoch’s going
away party. Of course, Aaron, Ariana and
Cyrus were there, but also Jeff Brown, Andy, Gail, and Vivian and Jasper, along
with a host of Enoch’s school friends, parents, etc. The Alis had bought all sorts of interesting
homemade sausages from a butcher in North Chicago, and a lot of people brought
chips, salads, watermelon, desserts, sodas, etc. The kids all ran around burning up energy,
and the adults overate (at least, I did), and exercised our gabbing muscles.
We had planned to go see The Naked Gun remake
with Andy and Gail, but we ere having too much fun at the picnic to
bother. I can’t say that we are watching
anything spectacular on tv lately.
Good books lately include Breath of the
Dragon, the first of a several part wuxia series by Shannon Lee and
Fonda Lee; The
Man Who Saw Seconds, a near future thriller with some interesting
philosophy and neuroscience thrown in, even if the ending was ludicrous.
Love, H.
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