Weather on La-A

Due to an odd configuration of icecaps and seas, we have rain which occurs predominantly at night, here. It's nice to get a warm summer rain during the day, most times people stop working and go outside.

Anyway, it's raining outside. The cat dislikes it, so he sits under the bed and surls. I love it, I open the window next to my desk and listen to the rain and feel the moist air.

There's not much that will keep me from going out in the rain, and I have spent so much time out of doors in wet that my employer has gotten me a mil-spec computer that will withstand the abuse. I like being where I can smell the aromas the water brings in from our sixteen great lakes; each lake has its own smell- Ocean smells salty. Violet smells sweet. Deepwater smells faintly of gunpowder. You can smell the direction of the wind by the lake the smell comes from. A wind from the south, brushing across the surface of lake Howard, takes with it the hydrocarbon smell of the oil deposits that bubble to it's surface.

Tonight the rain smells like a fish. Not a dead, slimy gross fish, but a clean, wriggly, freshly caught fish. Lake Hugh is thick with little fish called Greaps that look and act like alewives that taste wonderful with a mustard sauce or in soup, and they give the lake it's distinctive aroma. When I was a kid, we stood on the shores of Lake michigan in Indiana and watched the ore boats wend their way through the forests of windmills. Seeing the unbroken surface of the lakes here is much more enjoyable.

The cat, catching the smell of the greaps comes out from under the bed and asks "I can eat some feesh nao? Want feesh."

I get up and open a can of greap flavored catfood, and place it on a paper plate and carry it into the office and put it on the desk. The cat sits down and begins to delicately eat the food. I peel the tax strip off a fresh bottle of Jamesons and pour a shot.

The warmth of the whisky feels good going down and I rub the cats ears a bit. "We're going to have to get a bigger place if you keep growing." Nothing. Some cats are, apparently, great conversationalists. Mine only whines about food and makes the spare bathroom smell funny.