My hall is empty. The basket of laundry is only a memory. I finally bit the bullet and washed it yesterday. I didn't realize how long it had been until I found my Christmas pajamas and socks on the bottom. It took two trips to carry it back upstairs.

When I was a kid, we didn't even have a fan. My mother used to pull all the shades down to keep the house cool. I remember the living room was dark all summer. Upstairs, the bedrooms were hot, but I never had a problem falling asleep. I was usually exhausted from playing or bike riding all day.

Today is a bit cooler than it has been, 81˚. A breeze is coming from the window behind me keeping the den cool. Yesterday I lived in a closed house with the AC blasting.

I have no reason to be out and about today. My plans include a bit of cleaning, mostly upstairs, a bit of reading and maybe a disaster movie or two. The one I am watching now is just awful. It is called 40 Days and 40 Nights, with the title giving away the whole plot. The movie opened in the Sahara which wasn't the Sahara. A jeep, a red jeep, was doing wheelies. There was underbrush but very little sand. The two couples in the jeep saw the storm coming over the mountains, yup mountains, and decided to do more wheelies in the same spot and in the exact same way. I guess the director didn't think we'd notice. All of a sudden a flood came over the mountains and the jeep went under, no more wheelies. The plot is Biblical.

Every night I move the cat's gate to my doorway to keep Nala inside with me. She had been going downstairs while I was asleep and using the dining room floor as her port-a-potty. It worked except for Henry. He won't come inside my room. He suspects something. In his roaming, Henry realize my bedroom was inaccessible but the cats' dishes were fair game with no gate for protection. The last two mornings the cats' bowls were clean. I thought of a couple of solutions but discarded them. I can't force Henry. That would scare him. I could entice him with food but he'd take the biscuit and run. My best solution is I could put the cats's dishes on one of the beds until I buy a new gate.

I went out with the dogs this morning. They chased each other a little bit until Nala grabbed the tiniest branch which had couple of oak leaves on it. She ran with the branch in her mouth as proud as she could be. Nala had caught something.