It certainly sounds like a squirrel is stuck in my wall. Or ceiling. That, or the masons refacing my building are dragging a delicate pick across the bricks. Actually, no: I am decided that it is a squirrel.

Montreal was excellent! I'd forgotten what it's like to be in a city (a real city), and I did all those things that are impossibilities in rural suburbia: rode the Metro, had leisurely meals in sidewalk cafes, perused the erotic cinemas, and so on. Yes, erotic cinemas and peep shows are everywhere in Montreal, as is coleslaw. Go figure. I ate more coleslaw this weekend than I have during the past two summers, or three.

Returning to Massachusetts, we stopped for lunch in Burlington at a place called Henry's Diner. This was a late lunch - 3:30 or so - and the place was packed with students in sweatpants, hoodies, and flip flops. They ordered breakfast foods with great enthusiasm, and I thought, "Weird! It's like, mid-afternoon." Then it hit me: Sunday mid-afternoons = hangover time! I could not quite believe that I'd forgotten those college Sundays when I stayed in bed until 1:00, and then got up only to purchase a Dasani, a diet ginger ale, and a Powerade from the machines in the basement, but I remembered fast. And chuckled.

Sadly and predictably, I returned to a pile of work. It's the last week of the semester and I'm working both jobs (old and new), scrapping to finish my screenplay and my independent study. It was raining this morning, but the cloudcover just broke. Lilacs are in bloom; I wish I could wrap myself in a comforter and read Richard Hugo.