To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive

Weird dream last night. Weird, weird, weird. It was Halloween, only in the dream, this meant that various animals could sneak into your house and demand food. I think it started off with a couple of mice and possibly a deer, then came a cormorant, then a dog. I remember feeding them all crackers. The cormorant and the dog were both pleasant and grateful for the food, and both of them warned me about it getting dark and darkness being "owl and the pussycat time." Apparently this was to be feared. I woke up before I could find out why.

...I don't know. Does this mean something?

Anyway, I have new pictures of Radnor Lake up here. They were actually taken at the end of last month, but I've been really lazy as far as getting them up.

In fact, I've been lazy in regards to this whole LJ thing for a few weeks. If only I had a good excuse, like I'd been writing or something, but I don't. I've just been kind of...blah. Uninspired. Completely uninterested in just about everything except sleep.

Maybe it's the time change. Or possibly the sinus issues that have resurfaced recently.

I did read a good book recently, though. It's called Not Really an Alaskan Mountain Man, by Doug Fine. I liked it because his first year in Alaska is totally what mine would be. I mean, you know, if I ever moved to Alaska, which I wouldn't, because it's far too cold there.

There's a hysterical section where he nearly cuts his head off while trying to chainsaw up some trees for firewood. Panicking, he tosses the still-running chainsaw away from him, where it lands in a pile of moose dung and spins around for a bit, scattering moose droppings hither and yon. His kindling that winter smells none too good. Assuming of course that I could actually lift the chainsaw, that would TOTALLY HAPPEN TO ME. Same with the part where he sees a frozen lake, decides to go ice skating on it, and an hour after setting off, realizes "Hmmm. I'm in the woods, galumphing through three feet of snow. Night is falling. I have NO IDEA WHERE I AM."

This would totally be me.

Speaking of Alaska, more Northern Exposure came from Netflix. I've hit the Mike Monroe episodes, which is awful. Just the sight of him fills me with BOILING HATE. I'm sure there are other fictional characters I've loathed just as much, but right now I can't think of them. Well, maybe Anne from Persuasion. But oh man, there is NOTHING redeeming about this character, and he has a storyline in half of the episodes this season. Every time I see him, I want to reach through the TV and beat him all around his balding head with a two-by-four. Every time he whines about his oh-so-quirky Multiple Chemical Sensitivity and how he has to live in a geodisic bubble, I want to duct tape his mouth shut. Every time I see him wandering around in that ridiculous space suit, I want to...well, you get the drift. And it's not just because he's a threat to my favorite 'ship and directly responsible for Maggie changing into this weird pod person, although that does factor in, but EVERY LITTLE THING annoys me so that I can't enjoy his scenes with other characters, either.

It sucks, because the other storylines of the episodes he's in are usually pretty good. Like "On Your Own," where the Flying Man returns with a new circus, and Ed, after finding a ring engraved with "F.F., con amore, Julietta," in a fish, sees his life begin to turn into an imitation of Federico Fellini's. Then he refuses a deal with the devil and gets chased down to a lake by a mob of Italian midgets, whereupon he throws the ring in the water and they vanish. (...No, I didn't make that up. Go watch the show.)

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It's 76 degrees outside right now. Yay for the South. Of course, it'll be 32 and possibly sleeting Friday night. Boo for winter finally showing up.