Our daughter Dee is visiting from New York, and we have a busy week planned: Four plays in 3 days at the Theater at Monmouth; a movie—Beasts of the Southern Wild—at Railroad Square Cinema; a gathering of friends on the weekend; meals on the patio; homemade chocolate chip cookies; and homemade ice cream pie. With its blend of the rural and the cultural, central Maine is a great place to be in August, when the days are usually hot but dry and the nights are cool.

Anyway, I’ll more or less be on vacation until next Monday.