Some mornings when I get up and I open my kitchen window, bathroom window, and the window facing the street, my apartment fills with this chill green-filtered light, and there's a faint scent that I never can identify and never fails to remind me of Africa.
Not that this scent smells like Africa - Ethiopia and South Africa smell different, but still distinctly African - but it reminds me of many mornings waking up in guest rooms, grabbing my clothes and taking the hottest shower I could to warm me up. I wonder if it has anything to do with trees?
I especially like looking through my street window from my desk: the street is hidden from this angle and I look straight into the branches of the large tree that sits outside, although I've never been able to figure out what kind of tree it is. Sometimes there's a squirrel clinging to a branch "chucking" angrily at me for daring to peep in what I'm sure he thinks are HIS windows.
All the street noise definitely reminds me of hotels, you never hear any street noise from my parents' house, with the occasional exception of a police or fire siren.
My kitchen window has an even better view, as it looks out over my neighbor's balcony, the street, and the Veteran's hospital across the street: also if you get right next to the window and look down you look right into a pineapple guava tree. I wish the screen weren't there so I could pick them when they're in season. The sky always looks its best through that window; bright, light blue in the morning, softer haze during the afternoon, goldeny as the sun sets, and then it transforms first to a deep dark blue, then black with the pinpricks of stars. All the lights from the hospital shine at night, and it's really a pretty building, with millions of windows, so it's quite nice to look at, if you don't think about what it's for.
I'm doing laundry and I just had to switch the clothes from washer to dryer. I stupidly included a sock in the pile of stuff I brought back to hang dry...hopefully it dries out quickly. I also stupidly thought my purple polo shirt was actually my fancy going out purple shirt so I didn't tumble dry it, since the fancy shirt is air-dry. Oh well, I'm sure not being tumble dried won't hurt the polo for a change. It could be worse, I could've tumble dried the fancy shirt!
I also realized, when sorting out my laundry, I left my second pair of jeans in Orlando which is HUGELY uncool since I really can't exist with just one pair of jeans (laugh away, I know you're all laughing!) so I'll have to ask Mom to please please please send them to me in one of those flat-rate boxes.
I have to write another email today, and run a couple errands after the laundry is done, but once again it's a pretty relaxed day for me. Maybe I'll go dress shopping this afternoon while everyone is still at work instead of tomorrow morning. It also occurred to me that I need to spend my Amazon gift certificates NOW otherwise they'll be automatically used when I order my textbooks next week...and I definitely don't want that!
No sooner do I speak of Amazon but they knock on my door - my two Pern books are here! Oh, I do love this yearlong free trial of Amazon Prime (you get a year free if you're a college student)...but I don't really use Amazon enough to justify BUYING it when this runs out. What a pity!
Enough dilly-dallying, it's time to get my errands out of the way so I can have lunch. Mmm...chow mein :)
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