Jabberwocky for 2004 January 10

Tonks is too fat. Way too fat. He's having trouble getting through the kitty door; he has to squirm. What a knothead.

I am reading The Blind Watchmaker. An interesting part is the chapter on bat echolocation, where Dawkins says that a human perceivs a bat's face as a grotesque mask, while actually what it is is an ideal instrument for sending and receiving sonar.I think all humans need to cultivate the ability to view the world without screening it through our own chauvenistic prejudices. Probably the bats think we are ugly too.

I pruned the catmint (which none of the cats seem to like) and the Mexican sage and that was all I had energy for. Fortunately that filled the green bin, so I had an excuse to quit. I hadn't realized just to what an extent that bout with the flu had taken the starch out of me, and I'm starting today on a little program to rebuild strength.

As I was trimming the salvia I found a preying mantis egg case on one of the branches, to my consternation AFTER I had cut said branch off. I trimmed it up and stuck the stick upright in the dirt by one of the granite boulders. I hope the little guys find that condition satisfactory for finishing their incubation.

Yippee! Madonna has endorsed Clark! I really like her letter. I tried to link to Madonna's website, but couldn't figure it out so here is the text of her letter from Fox News /a>

I'm trying to determine a way to doctor up Mr. Campbell's tomato soup. I thought of Angostura bitters, Tabasco, lemon juice, cooking sherry.... tried the former, but it didn't make enough of a flavor difference to be worth it. I wish I could remember how Dorothy Hall did it, and Aunt Jeuney isn't here so I can ask her!

A recipe search on the Web reveals some rather strange things, including Tomato-Oatmeal Soup (???) and a recipe that makes two gallons of the stuff.