The Burrow

I went shopping this afternoon.  I was in a neighborhood with stores containing interesting clothes (there aren't that many) and I had time and energy.  I wasn't hungry or thirsty and I didn't need a bathroom.  No one was waiting for me.  I had no excuses nor reasons to avoid the temptation.  The seasons are changing and my wardrobe needs refurbishing. Let me clear - needs is a relative term.  I, like most of you, could get through the rest of my life without buying anything but replacement underwear.  I have sweaters and t-shirts and long sleeve shirts in a variety of fabrics and styles.  There are corduroy pants and jeans and one remaining pair of black wool slacks where the button and the button hole are actually able to get up-close and personal.  My changing shape has led to an interesting and immediate sense of the power of gravity; my weight is within 5 pounds of where it always is but the sizes have shifted. Oh, my, have they shift...

The end of summer announces itself in a variety of ways here in Tucson.  Cars are driven with the windows lowered instead of with the air conditioning on high.  The gambel quail babies are now big enough to be seen foraging on their own, without their parents fore and aft, monitoring their brood.  School buses are everywhere, starting at 6:45 in the morning and stopping traffic until 5 or so in the evening.  Electioneering posters are crowded on every street corner, exhorting passersby to STOP something or RE-ELECT someone.  And phone books are delivered.  Lots and lots of phone books. We got 5 of them at our house.  Tucson Pages and DEX and Yellow Book (but not the Yellow Pages) and two others whose titles I've forgotten.  They are dropped off underneath the mail box or in the middle of the driveway or propped against my little courtyard's even littler front gate, wrapped in their plastic bags to protect them from the elements.  There's ...