Derik Badman's Journal

The baby dove spent a long time on our porch table yesterday, for awhile hidden on one of the chairs under the table (for shade maybe while the sun was still low enough to get onto the porch). His mom spent some time with him huddled next to him as if protecting him, though she always took time to visit the other baby still up in the nest.

Later yesterday afternoon, I was watching the two babies without their mom around. They seemed to almost be syncing to each other. The one would stretch his wings, then the other would. The one would scratch his head with his foot, then the other would. The one on the table almost fell off the one time he tried to scratch.

Then the mom appeared on the railing and the little guy on the table got very excited. He took a very short hop flight from one side of the table to the other, then another over to the rail. For a split second it looked like he had landed okay, then he teetered forward, and fell. He briefly landed on the edge of the porch floor and then went over the edge. The mom quickly flew down after him.

He was not back last night and isn't this morning. When I went out earlier to fill up the bird feeder, I took a look from a distance but didn't see him down at the edge of the porch. I hope he shows up later safe and sound.

███ and I made more progress on our end table project yesterday. Mostly we were sanding, a little wood filling, more sanding. We also figured out where to cut out for the outlet on Lianne's side of the bed and made that cut. The box/shelf/tables are actually starting to look okay now that they are sanded. I'm becoming less skeptical this won't be a total disaster.

Started reading Marlon James' A Brief History of Seven Killings the other day. I so enjoyed his recent fantasy novel, that I picked this previous novel up while in Massachusetts. It centers around Kingston, Jamaica in 1976 and the assassination attempt against Bob Marley (about which I know nothing). It's written as a series of monologues from various characters which gives the whole thing a collage feeling. James is excellent at providing varying language to the characters: some are local not well educated gangsters, and educated ones, an American journalists, a CIA station chief. The shifting chapters help keep things fresh and cause the reader to have to continuously evaluate both the broader plot events and one's knowledge of the characters, as you see what the characters say of themselves, but also what others say about them. My only concern so far is that at 700 pages (I'm about 100 in) it might get a little tedious.

Was supposed to play some RPGs with the group this weekend. ████ is teaching a class about RPGs this fall and wanted to test out some rules light games he wants the class to try. He recruited the other three to each run a different game. I volunteered myself to play, as I am super curious to see what the others are like running a game, as none of them have before. Alas, I thought it was supposed to happen on Sunday, but it was yesterday and I was already at work with ███ on our project. I felt bad about that. I'm not usually one to mess up dates and times.

Need to do yardwork today, probably my least favorite chore. Always tempted to hire someone to do it, but we already pay someone to clean the house, which itself feels like a luxury, so adding in the yardwork too seems like too much. In the end we just have a yard that is a large portion completely overgrown with plants that were there when we moved in and copious weeds that grew since.

But first to ███'s Diner for ramen and fried egg breakfast. Never tried it before, but ███ was eating it yesterday and it looked good.