news of fresh disasters

Something odd ... I just watched the mother and six baby raccoons who live in my ivy go home for the day, climbing up the sturdy vines - and then, not ten minutes later, I watched them climb down again, one after the other, and disappear into the bushes. Moving day?

Today's little battle - a neighbour from the very expensive condo's directly south of me has obviously gone away and left her dog behind. It howls on and off during the day, but at night, it really lets loose. Long sobbing howls, all night long. It's driving me mad. A little black dog, sitting by the door, crying its heart out, and I want to kill it. No, I want to kill its owner.

Someone comes once a day, I guess to walk it. I left a note yesterday informing the owner of what's going on and asking her to do something. The mail was taken in but the dog howled all last night. So today I posted a big notice on the front door, including the City of Toronto Anti-Noise Bylaw.

Wait ... I thought that was a battle?! My painter Dan is here; he just came to repair a small damp patch on the ceiling above my bed. "Very bad news," he said. Why am I not surprised? The whole ceiling of my bedroom is damp and rotten; he is up there now in a shower of plaster, pulling the ceiling down. It's a filthy mess and will be disastrously expensive. Not to mention the possibility of bugs.

But hey. I just got a letter from the Ontario Breast Screening Clinic. I do not have breast cancer this year. So what's a howling dog and a rotten ceiling, between friends?

I should move in with the raccoons.