Rain, Rain...

It's raining today. This is pretty typical for us, a long stretch of almost-summer temperatures that reminds us just how hot it's going to get soon, and then a weeks-long dip right down to the frost level just as the tender new leaves and baby grape flowers are reaching out from the vines. Just cold enough to require the use of vineyard fans and heaters. And then we get the obligatory sprinkling of spring rain.

Thank goodness for a well-insulated house, both from the cold, and from the pre-dawn helicopter sounds of the fans. Mike is especially grateful, as he was the one who had to crawl from his warm bed in the frozen darkness to start up those fans at the other property.

I mind the rain just a little bit because I don't like to swim as much in the rain as the sun, but there are plenty of other things to do at home and at the gym. I've got some strawberry-almond-coconut granola baking in the oven right now. Smells fantastic.

I picked up a few different types of protein powder packets at Whole Foods yesterday to try to get a little more protein in the morning. This morning I tried this whey-based protein powder to add to my regular morning smoothie. The color, combined with the blueberries and strawberries that I usually add, was an unappealing greenish-gray. And oh my gosh, the flavor was VILE. The sweetener (stevia?) that they used was sweet at first taste, but the aftertaste made me grimace for minutes afterwards. Medicinal. Gross. Surprisingly, the selection of organic protein powders was very limited there. I'll try one of the two hemp-based packets (reluctantly) tomorrow. I used to pick up an organic pure soybean powder at Trader Joe's that I felt ok about since it was organic and soybeans were the only ingredient. I'll try that when I'm done with these.

In spite of the rain, and the bad taste in my mouth, today is a great day. Because today I am getting my computer back. I have been working on the "craptop"-- an old Dell Latitude (isn't that French for "the attitude"?) still running Windows 2000, while the G5 was in for upgrades and a superdrive replacement. I've remained platform bilingual throughout my career, so it's no trouble for me to pick up a pc or a Mac and just start working. But this screen is so tiny. And it doesn't really offer the portability of a laptop at this point, because the battery won't charge fully, so it just sits here on the desk. I do like the snap of the keyboard keys. The craptop is good for one thing, and that is testing PowerPoint presentations that I create on the Mac. I use it to troubleshoot so that I can deliver problem-free presentations.

On Sunday, I went with my mom and 11-year-old nephew to Berkeley, to celebrate his birthday and visit the Lawrence Hall of Science, a childhood favorite of mine. I've been wanting to go back forever. LHS has hardly changed in 30 years. This is not necessarily a good thing. It is frozen in time, and apparently in budget. A popular destination for local schoolchildren, who are led through demonstrations and math games, it was fairly deserted and spare on a Sunday afternoon. I don't want to dissuade people from going, because they clearly need the funds, but I wouldn't say that it's the most exciting place to be on a Sunday. It is a place to go with little people, where they can touch things and climb on things. If you live nearby, and need something to do, it is something to do.

I remembered being dazzled by all of the animals in the Biology Lab at nine, as our class peered into tank after tank, led by the perky lab staff, learning about and petting each and every creature. I loved reptiles and amphibians. And crustaceans. And mammals- especially the rats. They used to have a three-level ratquarium with at least a dozen rats in it that you were allowed to take out and hold. The ratquarium is still there, but the extended rat family has moved to the suburbs. Mama and Papa rat watch TV by themselves in the evening and have hobbies to keep them busy when they're not napping. The dwelling sits in a quiet corner downstairs across from the math puzzles and around the corner from the cockroach tank, inexplicably cordoned off like a precious museum bust. The crayfish tank was another highlight. I remember it as a sparkling man-made creek with glass sides, running the entire length of one wall. The crayfish lived in a naturalistic environment, pumped water creating a burbling current across shiny multicolored river rocks from one end of the tank to the other. This time, it took us a while to locate the tiny crawdads, hiding under (intentionally) broken flowerpots in a plexiglass tank full of large goldfish.

I think everything seemed so big and so cool because I was so small. Maybe everything seemed so big and so cool because there was more of it then. Or because the volunteers were a little less... bland back then than they were on Sunday. We did see a cool Bearded Dragon (I'll post a picture later when my computer is back online), an Axotl named Goldilocks, and we petted a chinchilla that was so soft you almost couldn't tell you were touching him. My nephew and I worked on a wooden puzzle together that we thought was really fun, and played a game of tossing colored sticks. He made a paper helicopter. I think we enjoyed spending the time together as much as anything else. He's a nice boy, very easy going. Next time maybe I'll take him to the comic book shop.