August 6, 2011

Insulting minim of rain yesterday afternoon. Just increased the dampness of the heat.

DJ’s cat Gracie had an adventure this evening. As I was coming up the walk, she was being mobbed at the window by a throng of birds. I heard the same throng for several evenings clustered around my chimney, but this time I saw them, attacking the cat as nearly as they dared. Gracie eventually got over-excited and hurled herself through the window, expelling the screen and landing on the ground. The birds took to the bushes. Gracie was confused about what happened, and I had to chase her around for a while, before she climbed a tree, got frightened a little way up, and allowed me to take her in my arms. Returned her and fixed the screen. Her master was gone and might know nothing of it.

There was a foam-green, five inch long mantis on the red car when the salesman took me to look at it. Gorgeous. I asked if that could be included in the package. The salesman thought I was joking.

Watched Altman’s A Wedding on DVD. Nashville redone as a B picture. But it did call to mind the evening I met Lillian Gish. She had given her presentation on the early years of cinema at Hiram, and as I left she was standing, quite alone, in the lobby of Hayden auditorium, waiting for her driver. I had her to herself until her driver came. I don’t remember what we talked about, but I remember noting how lively, witty, strikingly beautiful she was at what was even then an advanced age. I remember the sound of her voice relating anecdotes from films such as Way Down East. In a game of Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon, can get to D. W Griffith in two.