Ya-a-awn!

I didn't get a lot of sleep last night. I don't know whether it was the distant sound of fireworks or a kink in his mood-cycle, but Ben was thoroughly pesty all night. He'd get up on his hassock and thump the bed with a foreleg, demanding to be petted. Then he'd climb partway onto the bed and thump me with a foreleg. I'd growl and push him back onto the hassock; then he'd hop over me and lean heavily against me, still wanting petting. I'd pet him for a bit; after I stopped, he'd jump off the bed, circle back to the hassock, and begin the whole cycle again.

Somehow I finally got through to him that this wasn't acceptable behavior, and I got a little sleep. Now, though, he's sulking in the corner. I've tried making up to him, and he submitted to being petted for a while, but he still won't come out of the corner.

It's going to be a long day.

Pleasures

neonnurse asks for a list of sensory pleasures. Mine's a mix of repeatable pleasures and one-shots, I guess.

Sight: Coming around a corner of a museum in - was it Rome? - and seeing Raphael's "Assumption", which had just been restored. Late afternoon August sunlight on the southern walls of the University of Chicago. Elizabeth Rohm's eyes. Mt. Rainier in the distance. A roe buck, from a distance of a few yards, on a trail in the Sierra; hydras and waterstriders, from a distance of a few inches, in a pool of water in the Sierra. Monet's "Waterlilies". The way the appearance of the cathedral in Milan changes in the course of the day. Otters, meerkats, and prairie dogs.

Hearing: Mockingbird song. Claudia Black's voice. Thunderstorms. Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, especially the second and last movements. Ben and Murphy, when I provoke them into howling.

Touch: "Happiness is a warm puppy" - even a twelve-year-old arthritic puppy with bad teeth and cataracts. A warm and indolent bath. Comfortable and soft clothing.

Taste: There is, or was, a small restaurant in Hyde Park, near the University of Chicago, called the Medici Coffeehouse. They had a dessert called "Vaguely Reminiscent" that just evaporated on the tongue - was it the taste of coffee? caramel? vanilla? I could never tell... Dulce de Leche ice cream. Pistachios. Pad thai. My mother's teriyaki chicken, and her sweet'n'sour. Ripe peaches. Fresh shortbread.

Smell: Coffee. (The promise always exceeds the reality...) [Hmmm. I can't seem to come up with much in this category; but then, my sense of smell has been on the fritz for years.]

Not Such a Long Day After All...

It may have been an aftereffect of Ben's rambunctiousness last night; it may have been the fact that I forgot to have a cup of coffee this morning, triggering caffeine withdrawal. Whatever the cause, around 3:00 I developed a throbbing headache. I dosed myself with aspirin, turned out the lights in my office and tried to nap, to no avail, and at about 4:00 I conceded defeat, told the office workers that I was cancelling my evening class, and went home. Once home, I broke out in a cold sweat and the headache worsened, but some combination of more aspirin, a cup of coffee, and a lo-o-ong hot shower brought whatever-it-was to heel by about 7:00. A distinctly unpleasant few hours there.

Ben had forgiven me by the time I left for work.

The rest of my latest Amazon order arrived today: DVDs of season 5 of Angel and season 1 of Everwood, plus the third of the Jani Kilian books by Kristine Smith, John Crowley's Little, Big, and Arthur Herman's To Rule the Waves, a history of the British Navy. The books are still going to have to wait a while; I'm about halfway through Little Women and the Dampier biography, and barely started on A Deepness in the Sky. There are a couple of first-season episodes of Everwood that I haven't seen, and there are a few episodes of fifth-season Angel that I want to rewatch, even out of continuity: "Smile Time", "The Cautionary Tale of Numero Cinco", "You're Welcome", perhaps "Not Fade Away".