Pat By Moonlight

Here's Pat, our balcony spider, by the light of Thursday's full moon. You can see the concentric, shimmering rings of her web. Halloween in August, right?

I had a great day yesterday, walking about 3.5 miles from New Cross to Elephant & Castle in South London. Beautiful weather, lots of great storefronts, some unexpected street art, some good street photography "moments" -- all the ingredients were there. I stopped at an Ethiopian restaurant for lunch, a simple, one-room place called Enat Guada on Old Kent Road. No menu that I could see, just a mildly surprised-looking proprietor who promised to bring me the vegetarian selection. I hadn't had Ethiopian food in ages, and I loved tearing off little pieces of injera bread and scooping up the food with my fingers.

I got lots of work done yesterday, too. The new job is going well, but there is a constant, low level of tension that goes with working at home and being on call, and thus never really being "off." I was even checking e-mail during my walk. Maybe I need to set boundaries.

Dave and I are continuing to watch "Breaking Bad" on Netflix. We love it. For those who have seen it: Last night we just found out what that stuffed animal floating in the pool was all about. Certainly not what I expected.

And then, last night, a stroke of misfortune. I was flossing my teeth when my gold inlay popped out, clattering into the sink. I cursed, instantly imagining the hours of pain I was about to endure from a sensitive, exposed tooth -- and where does one find a dentist in London at 10 p.m. on a Friday? Fortunately, the inlay didn't slide down the drain -- that would have been a disaster -- and surprisingly there's been no pain at all. Once I got over my dismay, which took a few hours, I slept like a baby. This morning I'm even having coffee, though I'm trying to drink it using just one side of my mouth, which is a challenge. Starting at 9 a.m. I have to track down an emergency dentist through the National Health Service. Not how I imagined spending my Saturday!

Finally, at least one of you wanted to see the medieval carving of the elephant from the South Lopham church that I recently mentioned. I have a photo on Flickr here. That creature looks less like an elephant than a duck with hooves!