Bits and Pieces - September 14, 2007

How can September be almost half over already?! 

I have various posts I'd like to write, but I've been too tired to organize my thoughts this week when I get on the computer (dear husband is doing a lot of traveling this week and next)(I get to see him tomorrow, though!)(Maybe even tonight if he gets home in the next 29 minutes).

We finally got much needed rain this afternoon and evening.  Most of the NC is now in a stage of extreme drought - it's the first time I remember the weather forecasters looking this longingly at tropical storms (or even hurricanes!). 

I just wish the rain  hadn't been quite so heavy on I-40 while we were driving back today.  The traffic slowed down to 30 mph (usually it's 70 to 75) just because the visibility was so bad. 

Older son volunteered at the NC Museum of Natural Sciences today, and he'll be volunteering tomorrow afternoon at the annual Bugfest.  For his entomologist's heart, Bugfest is like Christmas and his birthday all rolled into one  (By the way, here's something to keep you busy - InsectNet.com forums on many things entomological).  Sandy Feet (who made, among many other things, the wonderful chipmunk sand sculpture this year at the Festival for the Eno) makes a sand sculpture at Bugfest every year.  Past pictures here, here, here, here, and here.

While older son was volunteering, the rest of us got lunch and went to the library.  After watching the Alan Rickman/Charlie Rose video yesterday, I wanted to get Noel Coward's play, Private Lives.  It's a comedy about two people, divorced from each other and newly remarried to others, who run off with each other during their honeymoons.  I found this dialog interesting:

Amanda:   Do you realize that we're living in sin?

Elyot:  Not according to the Catholics; Catholics don't recognize divorce.  We're married as much as ever we were.

Amanda:  Yes, dear, but we're not Catholics.

Elyot:  Never mind, it's nice to think they'd sort of back us up...

(Private Lives, Act 2)

Hmmm... it sounds more interesting when it's performed.

According to this Time magazine archive article, "Private Lives" opened in New York at around the same time that "Green Grow the Lilacs" (the play from which the musical, Oklahoma, came) did - the winter of 1931.

He made it before midnight.  Goodnight.