A few whirlwind days later, I'm back, safely ensconced in my own quiet apartment, enjoying the company of an inquisitive white cat who, like my own dear Emily, finds my activities in front of the computer of perpetual interest. Fortunately this one (who answers to "Kitty") has not yet become actively jealous of my close relationship with my laptop, though clearly she too thinks it a shame that such an object should so monopolize a perfectly comfortable lap. She's only with me for a couple weeks while her owner travels out of the country. Hopefully the competition between cat and computer will not grow too fierce in so short a time.

My trip to the capital was mostly good-- at least the majority of my time there was spent pleasantly. The meeting I attended was nightmarish, but I've come to expect little else. Despite my impression of busy-ness during those two days, looking back on them I feel as though I'd wasted a good deal of time. I saw very few people I needed to visit and accomplished none of the errands I had planned. Probably I'll have to go again soon.

The stupendously-stupid-Sarah moment of late: last night I stuck a marshmellow on a fork and roasted it over a gas flame. Nothing unusual about that. I did that during college. This time, however, I had more than the usual trouble removing the hot toasted marshmellow from the fork, and in my struggles I inadvertantly clamped my mouth down around the fork itself. Was the metal still hot? Let's just say this: from the blister patterns on my upper and lower lips one could quite easily deduce that the roasting utensil in question was four-tined.

The cat has decided to compromise rather than fight-- at the moment she has curled herself up in the narrow space left open in front of the computer. And has quite promptly gone to sleep with the front half of her body draped over my left forearm. I expect that hand will soon go to sleep.