hot, "Hyperfocus", E.B. day five.

It's hot today - 29 degrees, people out in tank tops and shorts, the last gasp of glory before the ice begins to encroach. The trees are turning but have barely begun to lose their leaves. It's a good day for me to clean out the grubby shed at the end of the yard; the renovation will cause me to lose my storage room in the basement, so I will need the shed more than ever. DECLUTTER.

Just got a book out of the library: "Hyperfocus: How to be more productive in a world of distraction," by Chris Bailey. The question is, will I have enough focus to read it?

And at Shopper's, glanced at the magazine rack and saw this:

If you'd told Paul and John in 1960, as the band took off, that their faces would still be appearing on magazine covers nearly sixty years later, what do you suppose they'd have said? Gerroutofit, to fits of laughter. Yet there they are.

Here, for today's pleasure in the hot sun, is our friend E.B., his poetic side:

April 1939

Saturday. A full moon tonight, which made the dogs uneasy. First a neighbor’s dog, a quarter of a mile away, felt the moon – he began shortly after dark, a persistent complaint, half longing. Then our big dog, whose supper had not sat well, took up the moonsong. I shut him in the barn where his bed is, but he kept up the barking, with an odd howl now and again; and I could hear him roaming round in there, answering the neighbor’s dog and stirring up Fred, our dachshund and superintendent, who suddenly, from a deep sleep, roused up and pulled on his executive frown (as a man, waking, might hastily pull on a pair of trousers) and dashed out into the hall as though the moon were a jewel robber. The light lay in watery pools on lawn and drive. The house seemed unable to settle down for the night, and I felt like moaning myself, for there is something about a moon disturbing to man and dog alike.

June 1940

Today joined a society called Friends of the Land, as at my time of life a man should belong to a club so that he will have somewhere to sit in the afternoon. I am going to put an old chair out by my compost heap and shall go there whenever I feel sociable and friendly toward the land. Membership cost me five dollars, which is the first time my high regard for earth has ever cost me a nickel; but these are expensive times.

Am writing this on the fourth day of the Battle of France, as the announcer calls it, so there will probably be no continuous thought from one paragraph to the next. I am not able to write on a single harmonious theme while jumping up frequently to hear whether freedom is still alive. I don’t think I would lose my nerve if I were directly engaged in war, but this radio warfare makes me edgy. I suspect I joined my club only because I was rattled. When I am composed I feel no need of affiliating myself with anybody. There is a lot of the cat in me, and cats are not joiners.

P.S.
Couldn't help sharing this with you - the wide, warm, lovely, genuine, relaxed smile of our former Prime Minister, who has just, yes it's true, written a book about the wonders of conservatism and his own great contributions thereto. Good work, Steve. You are so missed. 

LOL.