Notes:

--tried a new type of cupcake to-day, with zero success -- I think I gauged the size wrong (upgraded them from a mini to a full-size, and they were too dense). Oh, well.
--however, amused by the way I can discover a need for any liqueur and my parents will have it. Hello, eighty-year-old bottle of kirsch hiding under the counter.
--the eggs keep having little embryo chickens in them, despite the fact that we have no rooster. If this is a message from God, I wish He'd make it less obscure/gross.
--got my July schedule in the post to-day, it is awful. I'm working every weekend this month plus the Fourth of July. Blehhh. I know I was whining last month about not getting enough shifts, but now I am taking it back, for the love of little kittens, eesh.
--I will have to tell them I can't do the eleventh, because for some ungodly reason I am going to the ~spa~, thank you Mama's best friend. I don't know what exactly they do to you at the spa, but apparently it takes all day, so. I will have to see if I can get the invisible Mandi (I have never met her, I just know she works the client on the days I'm not there) to cover for me.

So! Two different ladies at the pet store told me that probably the reason Perci died was because of his sponge--that they no longer recommend using sponges in hermit crab tanks because sponges make it too moist and as a result bad bacteria grows. So after deep-cleaning the tank with chlorox, running all the stones and shells through the dishwasher, and baking the sand and wood in the oven for fifteen minutes at 400 degrees, I have put everything back together and installed Mark II, or Twoy, the new crab.

He is adorable--he's about a fifth Perci's size and has a spiky shell, and absolutely tears all over the place. He's a different type, too; whereas Perci was an Ecuadorian, he's a Purple Pincher. I'm hoping he proves a little hardier. I also think he's younger, because he's so much smaller.

Also bought food for the fishies, which means they've gotten extremely affectionate. Any time I sit by the pond they come over in droves to suck on my feet. I love my fish. ♥

Otherwise, I found the kittens (there are only six now), but the mother moved them again this morning so I have to go on the prowl again. I am going to borrow a Have-a-Heart trap from my crazy cat lady aunt to try and catch the mama. Larry moved into the main turkey shed this morning, and he loathes it.

Also, tulipmonster, I made you a giant paper collage squid but he may be too big to fit into a mailing envelope. Or at least too big to go without costing the rest of my college education. It depends! I am going to ask at the post office to-morrow.

My second day doing capoeira. I'm learning in a group, which as it turns out is a really good way for me to learn. There's also a degree of humility involved--besides the fact that you get knocked over a lot, I was doing jenga with Gabby and I kept hitting her because she wouldn't hit me, and I stopped and told her just to go ahead, I wouldn't mind if she hit me, just do it, and Charlie leaned over from where he was doing it with Liz and slapped me in the face. Which I deserved, because I left myself open, and I was getting over-confident because Gabby wouldn't hit me.

After that we did a lot better. She kicked me and I kicked her and we both got really good at dodging each other and at falling back into the jenga after we'd kicked. I felt like we were really finding a rhythm in it. Which felt wonderful.

Also, I'm learning to stand on my head! Maybe someday I will even get to be any good at it.

The copy of Port Eternity I bought as a gift to myself came to-day! I will get to it as soon as I finish the reading for my historiographic report. Or maybe I will give up on having time for it until I'm home. Still, I'm going to read it within the next month. That is my vow.

For my report, I am reading Helen Waddel's translations of Beasts and Saints and her teeny little book Poetry in the Dark Ages. I've only started the former so far, but it's awfully fun. Basically they are tiny, tiny little fables of saints doing stuff with animals, often with a little moral, but sometimes not, sometimes just kind of "oh look how awesome these saints were, look what they could do!"

My favourite so far is The Unsociable Lion, which I will reproduce for you here in full.

There was a certain old man, a solitary, who lived near the river Jordan: and going into a cave because of the heat he found there a lion: and the lion began to gnash his teeth and to roar. To whom the old man said, "What is annoying thee? There is room enough here to hold both me and thee. And if thou likest it not, arise and go hence." But the lion, not taking it well, left and went outside.

Most of them are in this vein. Best. Project. Evar.