Heat lingers outdoors even in the deepening dusk. All day, arachnids basked in it, hanging in their webs, waiting for more of the abundant prey which has already made them fat. I have seen more spiders this year than any other since I have been here. But the lepidoptera, after a promising start, have grown fewer. A while ago, one small moth lit on a curtain. It was very like one I saw a few nights ago whose outspread wings bear on them markings which closely resemble a broadened cat face- eyes, ears, nose, small mouth, all in miniature. I have no idea what moth predator would be intimidated by the vision of a tiny cat, but there it is-- another of nature's diverting phenomena.
The Sacramento Bee has recently run a few articles on a new pedestrian bridge which has been built across the Sacramento river in the small city of Redding, which is a hundred miles or so north of where I live. (I was going to go check out the pictures on the Bee's web site, but didn't get around to it, and now, despite the air conditioner being on, I think Sluggo is near his limits for the time being. The article in today's paper says that the pictures can be accessed from http://www.sacbee.com/links .) It's called the Sundial Bridge, and it is the first north American work of Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava. The pictures in the paper show a remarkably imaginative structure whose most prominent feature is a tower which is reminiscent of a ship's sail. The official opening of the bridge will be on Sunday. I bet there will be fireworks! I'd like to go, but it's pretty much out of the question. It's definitely one of the things in the region that I'd most like to see, eventually.
Update: The four best pictures I've found so far of the bridge are in the gallery linked from this web page containing an earlier article from The Sacramento Bee.
Sluggo didn't want to let me post this entry, and went to sleep for an hour. Now nobody else is awake. Bugger.
