A Hatful of Rain

The weather was dreadful yesterday. We got 7.4 mm of rain, which is more than we've had on any other single day in months -- and though I'm thrilled to get the rain, I didn't want to be out in it! Josh the dog-walker took Bailey out in the morning and she needed a thorough toweling when she came home.

Also, nighttime temperatures have plunged into the 40s F, so that's pretty darn chilly. The trees are beginning to take on a yellowish cast and suddenly it's looking and feeling very autumnal out there.

All this is a long way of saying that I stayed inside most of the day. I had plenty to do -- more laundry, more reading. I also moved the Rhipsalis or bird's-foot cactus back indoors after giving it several weeks outside. I need to move the two remaining rubber plants back indoors as well.

In the afternoon, prompted by news of the death of Eva Marie Saint, I watched the 1957 movie "A Hatful of Rain," which I'd heard about for years but never seen. It's the story of a Korean War veteran on the Lower East Side who gets hooked on morphine, and how that affects his family. Not exactly an uplifting story, but well done, and Saint was good in it alongside Don Murray as the troubled addict and Anthony Franciosa as his brother.

Is there anything better than an old movie on a rainy afternoon? I don't think so.

Finally, after the rain stopped, I went to the doctor. I have a rough spot on my lower lip that needs attention from a dermatologist. I think it's just a keratosis, of which I have many on my head from sun exposure over the years, but they do need treatment because they can morph into skin cancer. I've never had a keratosis on my lip before so it will be interesting to see how they treat it. My dad used to get them frozen off periodically, but in the UK they prescribe a sort of slow-acting ointment that needs to be applied for weeks -- not really a workable solution for a spot on one's lip.

I also asked the doctor about my squirrel scratches, and he confirmed there's no need to do anything except make sure they don't get infected. No rabies shots for me! This summer, while on vacation in Massachusetts, my friend Sue woke up in a bedroom with a bat, and though she had no apparent scratches or bites she had to go through a course of rabies shots just in case. (Apparently close contact with a bat almost always warrants rabies shots.) I'm glad I don't have to deal with that.

Afterwards I walked Bailey and came across both the rusty metal fence in the top photo and the passionflower above.

We also found these old advertising posters flapping from a wall on Finchley Road. People go around putting up these posters in the spring and summer, mainly, and then somehow fail to ever take them down again.

After dinner, Bailey was in a very playful mood, bringing me toy after toy. She gets like that after she eats. Food seems to immediately rev up her energy levels.

Up to now she's mostly ignored Olga's old Kong toys. Bailey typically prefers toys she can pull on, like bits of rope or her dog blankets. But last night she began gnawing on one of the Kongs and seemed quite infatuated with it. Maybe this is the beginning of a beautiful relationship.