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July 26, 2005
We're back
We got back yesterday from our fun 'n' sun beach vacation in South Carolina. It's always a bit of a letdown, coming home from vacation, particularly in this case, because the beach house had excellent air conditioning, whereas our house has, well, excellent floor fans. Not actually all that excellent, really. Although without them I would be moving into the nearest Burger King, public library, or other air-conditioned establishment.
Seriously, South Carolina was hot. Like, really hot. Like, really super hot. So the whole way back home I kept thinking to myself how nice it would be to get back to Ohio, where the weather was a little more temperate. I based this on the fact that I'd looked at a weather forecast for Columbus halfway through the week and seen a lot of high temps in the 70s and 80s.
So imagine, if you will, my reaction upon discovering that there was a heat advisory out for Monday and Tuesday in central Ohio (the Weather Service issues heat advisories when they think there is a high probability of people keeling right over from the heat) due to extremely high temperatures and accompanying humidity. Yesterday the official high was 95, although the sign at the Walgreen's next to Zeke's preschool said it was 103 when I picked him up at 1 PM. The heat index (aka "how hot it actually feels") was around 105. Today, same. I feel like I'm wrapped up inside a wet Army blanket inside a hot oven.
The heat is supposed to break later today. I'm looking forward to the cold front in much the same way that one would look forward to, say, a birthday party, or the last day of school. I feel like making a little sign out of construction paper and streamers that says "WELCOME COLD FRONT" and hanging it on the front porch.
Our house seemed to survive our week's absence with no major problems. Our pumpkin vine out front is threatening to spill its way down the front yard and into the sidewalk, and has already taken over most of our front steps, but at least it's producing pumpkins. There's a big green football-sized one coming along nicely out there, and a few smaller softball-sized ones also.
Also, while we were gone, a pigeon took the opportunity to build a nest in Zeke's window. I discovered this last night when putting Zeke to bed. I noticed a large shadowy shape behind the curtain and assumed it was a squirrel, but when I pulled the curtain back it turned out to just be a big pigeon, sitting there in its nest and staring at me complacently. Zeke's window does not currently have a screen in it (and before anyone bitches at me, yes, we installed those safety things so you can't open the window more than about 6 inches) so I backed away very slowly, not wanting to disturb the pigeon into flying madly around Zeke's room.
Then I went and got Keith. He came in and stared at the pigeon for awhile. It was still sitting there apparently unconcerned about all of this. Then Keith poked it. It flew off in a rustle of feathers and squawking, to reveal.... two tiny eggs left behind in the nest.
We closed the window, which didn't hurt the nest or the eggs at all, and Keith took a picture of the nest, because it's just the kind of thing you have to take a picture of, and then we closed the curtains and hoped Mama Pigeon would come back eventually. I was really concerned that we'd scared her off for good. But, no worries, she was back this morning, incubating her eggs and chilling out on Zeke's windowsill. So I guess before too long we'll have some baby birds out there.
I'm still working on sorting through all the pictures from vacation (I took 104 in total; God bless digital cameras) and will post some soon, although I also have a few backed-up chapters waiting for me to index, and I'm trying to get through a huge pile of clothes that have to be washed and ironed for the consignment store, and did I mention we have another week-long trip coming up at the end of August? We're visiting family in Seattle. I'm contemplating not even bothering to unpack the suitcase.
Posted at July 26, 2005 9:34 AM
Posted by: Lana at August 10, 2005 11:56 AM
How cool for Zeke to have a pigeon nesting on his windowsill!