I’m still feeling snuffly and a bit cotton-headed, so I’m going to give you three more beautiful things as I mull over other things I’m supposed to be working on and sip my tea:

1. As I walk into the coffee shop by the office, their radio starts to play a song and I immediately think of Grey Kitten. At first I think it’s a song from Aladdin, but then I realize it’s “Somewhere Out There,” which is from An American Tale. Now that we live 2,693 miles apart (give or take), we don’t get to see movies together very often, but when we were both teenagers we used to see them regularly — sometimes every week — so I have a number of songs that make me think of him.

2. I am alone for lunch today, so I go down to the corner park and sit at an outside table with my iPod and my knitting. A fluffy little sparrow, hoping for a handout, perches on the chair opposite mine and eyes my lunch greedily, and I contemplate for a moment asking him to dine with me. Instead, the woman at the table flirts with him by throwing him bread crumbs.

3. Because I’ve been knitting only socks and baby items recently, I’ve been used to plodding along on US2 or 3 needles. My current (secret) project is worked on US8s and I find that it is flying off the needles. In the heat, I don’t want a big project that will sit on my lap, but this week has been cooler so I don’t have to resort to tiny objects. When the temperatures soar towards 100 on Saturday, I won’t be working on the big project, but it’s nice to think it’s waiting here for me as September comes around the corner.

Three beautiful things from the past week:

1. On our walk home from the farmers’ market this Sunday we passed a bulldog on a leash. He had to have been the happiest bulldog I’ve ever seen, with a jaunty step and and a smile on his face (really!). He buh-dum-buh-dum’ed past us on the sidewalk, delighted at a lovely morning walk.

2. I was showing Mum and Dad the garden plot on Saturday when the community pool opened next door. There was a dash by 30 or so people to the deck chairs lined up on the shallow side of the pool and it sort of felt like a bit of a feeding frenzy.

3. My pillow grows warm very quickly and I am feverish. I flip the pillow over and the second side is refreshingly cool against my head.