countdown

The day after Canada Day, into July now; we dock in Miami on July 8 and I fly to Toronto later that afternoon. So the countdown begins. I woke this morning with terribly domestic thoughts and even checked my grocery flyers although I'm not ready to buy food yet.  But we still have too much to do to worry about that.

Tomorrow we transit the Panama Canal. Tomorrow.

Today has been a Sea Day and I have written stuff and people and made lists, and talked to fellow travellers and went to another wine-tasting, this time Wine-Pairings.  I always learn something; this time I was given a revelation about Reisling.

Yesterday was fabulous; we went on  a Mangrove River Cruise.  I love boats and rides and bridges and trains and all kinds of conveyances.  (Not heights though.) In spite of another HOT day (98 degrees F.) there was a little breeze as we moved along the river gazing at the mangroves, liking the little blue herons, whistling at the macaws (saw two of them), howling at the howling monkeys,that is, our guide howled, and also whistled.  Anyway, the creatures responded, and we saw them. At least, most of us saw them.   I gaze and gaze and gaze and sometimes I see something.

I keep thinking of James Thurber and his poor eyesight.  He wrote about his university days and his inability to see through a microscope.  He almost failed Biology because of that.  Try as he would, he couldn't see a specimen under the microscope lens.  Finally, after frustrating efforts, he managed to pull up an image and called his teacher.

"I see something," he said in triumph.  The Professor came over to look, and turned away in despair.  "No, no," he said.

Thurber had managed to focus on his own eyeball. 

Well, that's what I do and he's who I think of when I gaze into a mangrove forest searching for a howling monkey.  I heard them, though.

I'm happy.