We are setting out for Iowa this morning with cooler and drinks and all our assorted charger cords; it seems as if technology accouterments have taken the place of diaper bags, toys to keep a kid interested (yeah, right), play pens, juice boxes and all that paraphernalia. Sigh. I don’t want to even think about the stuff I’ll have to back in the next stage of my life. Defibrillator, soft foods, hearing aids . . . ah, it depends. (Yes, groan, I am.)

Der Bingle’s nephew is getting married on Saturday. And we are staying in a hotel with an indoor pool, so I will be spending some time slinking into the pool area covered with a towel and then mostly submerging myself. Not the wedding and seeing folks isn’t important. Good thing I have decided to let my hair grow out – the chlorine effect, dontcha know? Oh, am I back talking about the pool and me again? Sorry, it’s such a habit.

Taking cameras (and chargers) and since Der Bingle is doing most of the driving, I’ll be snapping shots out the window. Damn! Wish we had a sunroof. Better not to visualize it.

It is 89 outside and feels like 90 something. Yes, the humidity is high. I went out to the garage and it felt as if I were in a sauna. I suppose I should go out, sit in the shade, read and drink iced tea.

I had forgotten how awful still, humid air can be and I feel really bad about Der Bingle’s days in the apartment with (count them – okay, I will) 1,2 windows and a sliding glass door out to the balcony, which he has taken to calling the porch.

Well, shucks, I wrote the best sentences I have ever written and when I pressed Save Draft, they disappeared. (cough, cough)

He is in Fairborn, Ohio at the Ohio Redoubt of The West Facing Cave and he will probably have no power for the next couple of days. The storm that went through snapped about 125 steel and wooden poles along Kauffman Road  . . .

The first night with no power he listened to people coming home to their apartments during the night. Everything was pitch dark and at one point he heard a male voice say, “Just follow behind me.” Then a female voice replied, “What? You just ran into a wall, idiot.”