§ It is that brief part of the summer where all of the cicadas and katydids have emerged from the soil to spend long evenings desperately calling for each other. Where, if you’re outside on a warm night, you almost need to speak up to be heard over the buzzing cacophony. In a week or two you won’t notice their calls anymore. Maybe because the cicadas and the katydids all met their matches and found peace or because the constant trill has faded into your subconscious from overexposure.
§ My wife and I spent a sunny weekend staining all of the outdoor wooden furniture we’ve made over the past four years at our house. The picnic table, the pergola, the lattice fence, the raised beds, the greenhouse-turned-quail-hutch. Everything looks much better.
§ During rainy reprieves from staining, we picked up Tears of the Kingdom again after a year-long hiatus.
Breath of the Wild remains one of my favorite video games period. Tears of the Kingdom is, if nothing else, BOTW but more. So why have we held off playing it for so long? I think it must be a subconscious response to guard against finishing it too quickly. The wait from BOTW to TOTK was six years. We very well might have to make this game last until 2029.
§ At the farmers’ market I bought some ramp salt from a friendly father and son duo. They broke the news that I unfortunately missed our nearby ramp festival in late April. I’ll go next year—it’s already in my calendar.
They may have also convinced me to try to grow ramps. I have a shady little wooded area in my yard that is covered in trout lilys each spring it seems like that could be an great environment for a ramp colony.
§ I finished reading Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. What a wonderful, strange, immersive book. I found the first third the most compelling. I loved reading about the day-to-day activities of Piranesi as he explored the House, mapping distant corridors, embarking on various projects. The central conflict introduced later in the book is almost unnecessary and predictable in comparison. It is a book I’m going to be thinking about for a while, certainly.
§ As promised, I tried a beautiful Standard Ebooks copy of Moby-Dick but bounced off of it after a handful of chapters. I finally settled back into Peace Like a River by Leif Enger. The world’s Enger writes seem to rhyme with Clarke’s. Grounded but magical; gritty and innocent. With protagonists that share a unique wonder for the world.
