this is water, this is water, this is water...

last week, we went firefly camping in a ghost town. we saw forty elk, grazing in the darkness, twenty merganser ducklings, seven black bears, six wild turkey poults, and too many fireflies to count. it was a good week

we went swimming in cold clear river water, the spot we've been going to since before they were born. that place always resets something in me. i'm trying to hold onto it now that we're back

fallie and i hiked up jake's creek, through the gap, down panther creek, and along the middle prong, and it felt so good

as an experiment, i packed a whole party cut pizza into single serving bags for lunches. it was a nice change from sandwiches. i also premade a batch of veggie rice bowls and that worked well too. camp cooking is fun but i wanted less camp time and more woods rambling time this year

today should finally be sunny and dry enough to set up the tent in the courtyard to dry and sweep, pack away properly for next time, and that will be that

i foraged a stack of old trade magazines last week. i started processing the paper this morning

after a too dry spring, we've had inches and inches of rain the last two weeks. there are mushrooms all over the place. yesterday, i cut through the sanctuary to the owl prowl, without getting trespassed by the old lady again. the woods were so lush, the trails were dark tunnels. i finished a new mixtape and i have almost enough trimmings for a sprue

last night we ate faux-fil-a nuggies and fancy fries, drank dollar bucket nonsense, and talked about firefly camping next week

i think the camera i here is the same one i used to shoot all the polaroid jesus pictures. it's old and well used. i know the new film chemistry isn't the same. a lot of the old stuff for it isn't made, isn't safe, isn't legal anymore. the new formulas, not quite right yet. the prints don't smell right when they're developing. still, i think the old camera has the most say in how these pictures are turning out. they're getting more and more painterly. i love how they look against the dark

also happy cunty mix season for all who celebrate

we've had so much rain this week. it shutdown the highways and overwhelmed the water treatment plants and hid the horizon with fog

in the last month, boba's brought me two dead moles and one chipmunk. they're limp and lifeless but unmutilated and she trades them for just a couple of treats. she's so excited when she presents them to me, and i'm proud of her, but still sad for the little beasts

everytime she heads out, i warn her against interfering with the songbirds, but i know if she has a chance at a cardinal, she'll take it

last night, i slept well and dreamt of a life in a tall tower and dreamt of going to another room to kiss a girl and dreamt of signs with almost words dancing and shaking into the shapes of happy animals

later today, we're going to heat up a cast iron wok full of peanut oil and deep fry natural casing sabrett's and crinkle fries and i'll drink a tall boy and fall asleep watching baseball on the couch

there's a storm headed this way and i can hear the crows hollering about it

last night i dreamt i was back in the office where i worked when the towers happened. we were between the federal reserve building and one of the tallest buildings in the city, both were considered potential targets, so we weren't allowed back for almost three months. fallie was born in the middle of all that time. i dreamt that i was stuck in the elevator that was always broken and i knew i just had to wait

i dreamt the quiet man made a toy robot that looked like me and shot missiles out its fists

i'm reading the whale book i found on the free pile. when i'm done, i think i'm going to reread the other whale book again for the ninth or twelfth time

i'm trying to shake things up even if some stuff breaks in the process

on friday, i went down the mountain to visit with finn and fall. we drank dollar bucket shaboozy and talked all kinds of nonsense. i hadn't taken a picture with this old beat polaroid in a minute. i love how this one turned out. when they were kids, they called their neighborhood gang, the skullgirls, and that's what i call these pictures in my head, even if i never say it outloud

on saturday, i got a foraged double espresso from emma, and we caught up for a minute, then i walked all up and down the river until early afternoon. i saw turtles still waking up from the long nap. i watched some kids rowing in the first big race of the summer. i found broken toys and lost beads. i checked in with the bogmonster

yesterday, we had third sunday of the month lunch with my parents. the kids brought their partners, and we ate strip mall chinese at the place that tastes like how i remember east coast chinese in the nineties. i listened to baseball and fell asleep with boba on the couch. i watched an old movie just for the scenes with musicians, mostly passed now, playing a texas honkytonk in the eighties. i had a good day

i haven't been reading about the names of colors. i found a lot of fun stuff, but never what i was looking for. lately, i keep coming across old books of fables and rhymes and nonsense alphabets. i caught myself rewriting 'd is for death', over and over in my head, until finally i had to dig out some edward gorey to put an end to it

we're going firefly camping in a week. fall got us a nice spot on the quiet side of the river

i reached out to the girl. we caught up for a minute and it was good. she said it was nice, easeful even, but probably best we not catch up again for another year, so i guess that'll be that for the time being

i feel called to work in a bakery. if you know how to make that happen, i'd appreciate the help