Finished reading The Dragon Waiting by John Ford. I loved it; it felt like a mix of Tim Powers and Neal Stephenson … but sometimes with the attention span of Douglas Adams, or quite possibly I mistook oblique allusions for dropped threads. The book changed directions several times, and briefly became a murder mystery, but even when I wasn’t sure where it was going (or even that Ford was sure), I was happy to be along for the ride.

Finished reading The Blacktongue Thief by Christopher Buehlman, my first fantasy novel in a while. If you can get past an excessive amount of swearing — I can put up with a lot, but this was a lot — it has a surprising amount of heart; I eventually decided it felt a little bit like The Lies of Locke Lamora (but without a con game or heist).

The kids got their second vaccine doses.

Finished reading Last One at the Party by Bethany Clift, a post-COVID “everybody in the world but the protagonist dies from a plague” story. I have mixed feelings about this one: It wasn’t what I expected, the protagonist did not start out at all sympathetic, and there were some gruesome descriptions of the recently-dead. That said, it was compelling, I found myself rooting for the protagonist by the end, and the end itself was satisfying.

Finished reading The Elusive Shift by Jon Peterson, about how a wargame hack (D&D) came to be understood as a “role-playing game”, and what that meant to early players and theorists. I can’t recommend this book to you; only you know if you would find this interesting. I thoroughly enjoyed it, of course.

Had family over yesterday for a picnic gathering. It was so nice.

Woke up feeling great.

Fuzzy-headed and slow today after the second dose, as I expected. Feeling a little better this evening, though I’ve got the hint of a very mild headache.

Finished rereading Post Captain by Patrick O’Brian. Master & Commander was good, but this book is where O’Brian really started to figure out what he was doing.

Got my second vaccine dose.

Tonight’s kitchen victory: lapin à la bourguignonne (rabbit Burgundy), two loaves of country bread with Breton butter, and choux à la crème (cream puffs).

Tonight’s kitchen failure: While steaming potatoes, I let the water boil away, and scorched the pot (incidentally ruining the potatoes).

We saw the fledgling robin stumbling around in the front yard a couple days ago. No sign since.

Finished rereading Master & Commander by Patrick O’Brian. It’s a little longer than most of the other 19 (!) books in the series, a little less tightly-focused, but still very enjoyable.

This afternoon on our way to Tom and Mari’s, we saw a red-tailed hawk carrying an unidentifiable animal part, and an osprey carrying a fish.