Yesterday was cool and grim and rain-threatening, without rain. It was a disappointment. What we need is a two-day downpour--the ground is dry, dry, dry--but the forecast shows only sun. My car continues to squeal threateningly and must be hospitalized. Tom and I went to the Goodwill and bought two books (Alice Munro and Anita Brookner), a pack of Dixon Ticonderoga Number 2 pencils, and a checked shirt. Then we took a walk around Mackworth Island and discovered some fine graffiti:

Birds are not real.

In the afternoon I made this pie: fig and pear in a puff shell. Decoratively imperfect but I'm improving, and the flavor was excellent.

I read most of the Brookner novel (Hotel du Lac), lost spectacularly at cribbage, walked to the meat market and bought pork chops, revised a poem, and did nothing at all housework-wise (other than cook extravagantly), which was stupid, given that we have overnight company arriving today. Still, it was extremely pleasant to spend the day making a pointless yet lovely pie and devouring a novel.