Some news:

First the good. Bela Tarr's seemingly doomed production of his latest film, The Man From London, is back on track. Better late than never, I say.

Now the bad. Polish science fiction author Stanislaw Lem has passed beyond the horizon at age 84. His legacy still lives, of course. Authors do achieve a kind of immortality, don't they?

My work week was a flurry of rain and mud, with a cold and a stomach bug giving me minor grief along the way. Highlights included finding a tarantula and a scorpion under the same rock, and a generally good group of kids. That said, it is sobering to occasionally discover that some of the kids don't retain a single thing I say to them. One girl couldn't articulate to me a single thing she'd learned during the week. Hmmm.

Last night, I met up with an old friend who I hadn't seen in eleven years . She's living in the guest house at her aunt's place. The house was beautiful, nestled up in the hills and with plenty of wood paneled floors. It was great to see my friend too, and we tried our best to fill in eleven years of history for each other. We've both gone through a number of changes, although she's basically the same person I remember from way back when - full of energy and interesting anecdotes. It was good to reconnect. When we used to hang out we were teenagers and young twenty-somethings. Now forty is waiting to ambush us. There's a distinct sense of unreality about it all.
It's a good thing I ran across her when I did though, because she's moving to the desert. Of course she invited all of us to go stay out there if we're ever in the mood for a desert adventure.