Ha. I've just now finished the first coat of paint on my bedroom walls. I've been wanting to get rid of the peachy-pink color and the ribbony border in there, and I finally got around to painting it this week. I'm doing it pale blue ("astral", if you want to know) with a deeper blue ("shipside") over it so you can sort of see both colors. I was trying to explain this to my friend Hampton at a party last night. "Ah, you mean sponging," he said happily. "Very fashionable just now, according to Southern Living."

I laughed and explained, "Not really sponging, because you do it with a plastic bag."

"So, bagging," Hampton decided. "Except that sounds like something you do at the grocery store." At this point Greg, who works at Target, began complaining that someone asked him the other day if she could get a paper bag instead of a plastic one to take her clothes home in. The whole thing was a good time - it was a going-away party for the drama teacher at my school. She finally got sick of the stupid administration and decided to move to Boston, so Lizzy had a bunch of drama people (and anybody connected with the spring play, really) over to her house. We mostly played board games, admired Lizzy's horse and two donkeys, and argued over the pronunciation of "tortilla." Greg and Derrick got a game of 90-degree ping pong going, which is to say they played ping pong sideways on the table while Lizzy and Kate played the normal way. This rather annoyed Kate and Lizzy, but I thought it was funny. (Then again, as somebody pointed out at the time, I think a lot of things are funny.)

And so I've been painting for the past two afternoons. The rest of the family is at the beach, but I'm taking gym over the summer to get it out of the way, and am thus staying here with a friend of Dad's. It's been fun, really. I go to gym in the mornings and play tennis or whatever for a few hours, then come home and paint until dinnertime, when Kim comes home from work and I drive over to her house. She lives by herself, but she adores her friends' children, so we've been having a good time. She's a terrific cook, and I want to try her pasta maker at some point.

I've been listening to a CD of salsa music Dad gave me while I paint, which is why it's a good thing no one else is home. If they were, they would surely be puzzled at the sounds eminating from my room: a song in Spanish and a girl's voice chattering above it. When I'm listening to Spanish, I have a tendency to translate it aloud, so I'm constantly muttering things about "Bandit woman, why do you have a heart of stone? I run through the streets asking everybody if they have seen you. You have robbed me of my heart." Then it's "Ay, que estupido!" as I realize I've got a smear of blue paint on the ceiling. "Bandit woman, you have made me crazy . . . "

I think someone should compile a dictionary of Spanish music terms. I'm certain anybody could get the gist of most salsa songs with a knowledge of the basics, because all the songs talk about exactly the same things. Corazón, the word for "heart" features prominantly, as do variants on bailar, the verb for "to dance". Also bandolera, the feminine of "bandit", and robar, "to rob." (I wouldn't have expected those, but they show up a lot on the CD.) Espina (thorn) is another popular one, especially in conjunction with rosa (rose, of course.) My favorite song is about a guy who can't figure out what he's doing wrong. "I send you flowers, but you won't take them. I come to your house, but you won't open the door. Your friends don't like me because I'm not rich. What can I do to become your lover?" It doesn't sound quite that odd in Spanish, but it's still funny.

June 26
July 5