The rain is falling in sheets and gusts, and I will be walking to work in it. I've got a teaching gig in the morning, and then a walk home in the rain, and then probably a drive to the house to paint and paint and paint. Tom says he's going to work too, though I know his foot is paining him.

I began the morning with a rejection letter, plus my team lost the first game of the World Series, so I am primed for improvement. I think a walk in the rain should help. Yesterday, before the wet moved in, the gusts were whipping leaves and clouds, and the squirrels and chipmunks were skittering up and down the trees. It was weather that makes you lift your head and breathe; weather that, if you're an old milkcow, makes you kick up your heels like a heifer. That is not a metaphor. Have you ever watched an old milkcow rediscover her youth? Nothing is more delightful.

I doubt I will scamper to work, but I hope to trudge cheerfully.

Yesterday, a friend took away our old woodstove, and a nice man bought the old kitchen range for 50 bucks. If you know anyone who needs a used dishwasher and/or refrigerator, let me know. It will be a relief to a have a living room without any appliances in it.

I've got the second coat of yellow on the dining room walls, and this afternoon I'll need to cut in around the trim. No matter that we don't have a kitchen: at least I'm gradually deleting the truly horrible paint jobs in this place. Baby-aspirin pink versus Band-Aid tan? Which is worse? Ugh.