Purple Crows

I looked out the back door at a "murder of crows," actually only four, pecking around in the wet grass. Among bows and flows of gray and white clouds, the sun suddenly blazed out and shone on the crows, turning their flat black plumage to a rainbow of peacock colors as if they had been dipped in an oil spill. Then they all rose and flew away, the hues converging to deep purple as long as they were in the sun.

The Book Club meeting was well attended and very noisy. All three Ramey sisters were there: Susan didn't go to Atlanta, Pat decided to stop by there after all, and I didn't sleep quite all morning. The highlight of Nell's table was an apple spice cake with good thick caramel icing, which I understood her husband Bill made. Mary Anne told all about her two weeks in Greece, making me wish I could at least go to Italy and take that Adriatic cruise among the islands. Betty White mentioned that one of the possible side effects of the cholesterol medications could be memory loss. Alopecia and absentmindedness, dang! I'm cutting that flat rose-madder tablet out of my pill diet until I see the doctor next month, at which time I may just blister some of the black porcupine quills off his head, if I feel like talking or if he says "O-KAY?" one too many times.

Mary Undeutsch and Barbara were also at the meeting, and the elegant Jean Mock came late and left early. Neither Jean, Pat nor Barbara had read the book (My Sister's Keeper), so the rest of us talked about everything but the ending, so as not to spoil it for them when they read it.

When I came home, after resting and changing clothes, I had to go to CVS for cat food, and then I finished reading Havana Bay by Martin Cruz Smith. I was tempted to give it four stars, but it really wasn't as good as Gorky Park. Mighty good book, though. It tied up a couple of loose ends from the other books, i.e., Irina (she and Arkady had been reunited somehow after their sudden traumatic parting, had been together, maybe married for a time, until Irina was accidentally killed by a nurse); and the fate of Sergei Pribluda.

Note above: I think the cruise I was looking at while we were in England was around/among the Aegean islands, instead of the Adriatic. The Aegean sea is the one between Greece and Turkey, I think.