HEAT

I don't take well to the heat, these days.  We left Los Angeles in the high nineties yesterday, and found it pretty much the same in Laguna Beach--where it's usually at least ten degrees cooler.  I find it oppressive, equally depleting of energy in both body and mind.  I did manage to find the energy to take George up for his run in the park, but otherwise lay low.  Even the evening, which usually brings in a cool ocean breeze, was sweltering.  We chose to watch a movie.

Well, actually, re-watch.  Ellie has been hankering to see Julie and Julia again.  I find it overrated.  It's entertaining enough, but I tend to nod off in the slow parts.  Meryl Streep's Julia Child is really over the top--a bravura performance that may be, well, just too bravura. If you've not seen the movie, it's about this young woman, Julie, who decides to devote a year to making every recipe in Child's famous book--and to blog about it along the way.  I liked the idea of the cooking and the blogging more than I liked the movie about the cooking and the blogging.  Nora Ephron's script and direction seemed somehow arch, a bit pleased with itself, kind of "Hollywood."  Perhaps I'm being ungenerous...

We went to bed in stultifying heat, then woke at four in the morning feeling blessedly cold.  I had to get up and replace the duvet we had thrown off at bedtime.  This morning is still cool as yet, but my iPhone warns me that we'll be hitting 99 degrees before the day is out.