Thanks for all your interesting comments over the last few days. I�m going to take a breather from academic rants for today, so we can all breath a sigh of relif.

It is perfect fall weather. AJ spent much of yesterday running around the yard trying to catch falling leaves before they hit the ground and charging across the lawn into piles of leaves raked waist high for his personal entertainment. Today AJ and the husband are out watching a little game in which the son of a friend is playing. They took one of AJ�s bats and some balls along for the ride. I am left to my own devices in the house, which means I�m working.

I�m taking a break from the diss by doing some cramming for a transcription exam I have to take this week, if I can get the person who�s in charge of it to return my email and let me know what I�m supposed to be doing to make it happen. Since I�ll be transcribing Irish music, I�ve been playing fiddle all afternoon to get my fingers around the ornaments. I�m feeling very rusty and my strings are so tarnished from lack of use that my fingers are black, but it�s coming back to me. It�s pretty hard to play reels and jigs without being in a good frame of mind. You have to have a light touch and be dancing in your head in order for it to work. My office, clearly once somebody else�s home gym, has floor to ceiling mirrors on one side. Every now and then I catch sight of myself as I practice and I�m almost always smiling. This is rare for me in any other kind of performance unless I�m concentrating on smiling. Usually I just have a look of concentration.

Tomorrow my husband and I are ditching AJ with some relatives and going on an extended canoe trip down the Fox River west of Chicago. It�s something we�ve been wanting to do for some time, ever since canoeing in Lake Massawippi (in elgan�s neck of the woods) on our honeymoon. I�m slightly nervous about it because my husband doesn�t know how to swim. But life jackets will be worn by all, and hopefully I won�t need to call on my lifeguard training that is now in the very distant past.

And now I am off to listen to Irish music and read Virginia Woolf. Not a bad afternoon�s work.

[Today's title is the conflation of titles of two of my favorite reels, one traditional, one by my former teacher Liz Carroll]

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