Later today we'll drive an hour to Gary Mattingly and Patty Peters' house east of the bay for some Independence Day barbeque and fireworks. We were invited to bring Dixie, but she'll stay home. She is frightened of fireworks, even inside the house. This is because she was shot at, quite accurately, while she was a stray puppy (we got her from the Humane Society). Her xrays show a constellation of bird shot, far too much to remove. She still heads home instantly if a car backfires nearby while we're on a walk, or if someone lets off firecrackers.

So she'll stay safe at home, and we'll mingle with our friends and watch Gary's amazing pyrotechnical display when it's dark enough. I love fireworks. Fire is good. Fire is beautiful. I'll put up with the loud noises just to see the lovely fire and sparkling lights. I'm ready for a really good party. I've had an absolutely hellish week due to a monumental mistake at work which was entirely my fault, and I'm just about ready to be nice to myself again.

I won't go into details, but I will say that even though I consider myself a good travel agent I occasionally make mistakes that affect my clients. The last time I screwed up badly was 1994, for pete's sake, but I'm hard on myself, harder than I would dream of being on anyone else, and this just got to me. As a matter of fact I've been losing sleep over the situation. It's over, though, so I'm trying to move on. Being surrounded by friends will help.

Having four days off will help as well. I've already begun my holiday by sleeping in until 10:30, three hours later than normal. I test drove some new coffee, Guatamalan Atitlan, guaranteed to be songbird friendly (grown under shade trees the migratory songbirds rely on rather than in a clear-cut plantation). It was medium-bodied, only slightly acidic, and delicious. I drink double lattes five days a week, so on the weekends I like a lighter coffee, one that I can drink black. Which reminds me, I should descale my coffeemaker today. Holidays are perfect for doing all those things you meant to do when you had the time. Somehow, a weekend is not enough time, but the prospect of extra time off means I feel energetic and not inclined to simply loaf. Descale! Vaccuum! Grass Hog!

Columbine has a Grass Hog, too, and we are united in our love of the tool's name. It simply begs you to say it aloud over and over, or imitate its angry weed-eating noise: RIZZZZ! Actually, that should probably be RIZZZZACKACKACKKKKPPTTTTTKKKKRIZZZZZ! which is the sound of weeds being eaten.

In the interest of domestic harmony I dropped off Natasha at Pet World to be brushed out. Her long hair gets matted quickly in the wind up here, and I'm a huge sissy about grooming her when she gets too tangled. She hates it, and squalls alarmingly, and she's not careful with her claws when she's scrambling to get away from the Big Scary Comb. So the professionals are doing it, and I'll be rid of this incredible guilt for having let her fur get matted in a mere two months time. At least they don't have to shave it off, as has happened in the past. The worst is keeping her tummy groomed. Trust me, you don't want to try to comb out a cat's belly fur if the cat doesn't want you to touch her belly.

Last night I mooched around Kepler's bookstore after having dessert at Borrone's with Michael, Bill, and Julie. I found a biography of Gerald Durrell, one of my favorite writers. Bill had never heard of him, which surprised me as I thought Durrell was quite well known. He is the founder of the Jersey Zoo, went all over the world collecting animals, and wrote a dozen or so hysterically funny books about his collecting experiences. My favorite of his books is My Family And Other Animals as it is an autobiography of his boyhood on Corfu in the 30's. His eldest brother Lawrence is probably more famous, but I'm not a fan of his novels, which I find pretentious and turgid, and vastly prefer Gerald's hilarious stories about being a zoologist. I'm looking forward to tackling the biography.

The books from Amazon arrived earlier this week, and I've already ploughed through two of the three. I heartily recommend P.C. Doherty to you mystery readers who don't know him. The Egyptian mystery, The Mask of Ra was so good I'm immediately ordering more of his books. He's better known as a medieval mystery writer, but I think there's at least one more set in Egypt. I'm thrilled to find a new writer who's already written several books. I seem to spend my life waiting for my favorite writers to hurry up and write another in whatever series I'm following, not to mention going into deep mourning when they die (like Kate Ross) and I find out there will never, ever be another Julian Kestrel mystery.

Alas, the fantasy novel by my Nashville acquaintence is thoroughly dire. It started out well, despite a naming scheme that I found annoying (not enough consistence - is it supposed to be vaguely Celtic, vaguely Eastern European, or entirely fictitious?). Unfortunately, it soon became so larded with unnecessary capitalization and so lacking in tension that the plot meandered and I lost my interest in the characters. Also, there is a flashback sex scene that made me laugh rather than worry for the protagonist's virtue (like Galahad, his purity is a necessity in order for him to become the greatest whatchamacallit of all time, in this case a wizard). In fact, there are entirely too many flashbacks of critical scenes which is why the tension is so flaccid. We already know the worst didn't happen. I can't recommend this first novel at all.

I am looking forward to the new Harry Potter book, though. Now that's fantasy I truly enjoy.

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