I just love having time away from work. Just this morning, I got up at a reasonable hour and decided to poke my nose out the door. Went to the front, nice weather; went to the back, nice garden. Went upstairs, looked out the 2nd story window and noticed a chubby-looking cat ambling along the top of the fence. I watched for a few seconds, curious to know where she was going. Then, I realized she had a stripped tail. Kept watching and saw she had a black band across her eyes. Hmmm . . . a raccoon. She easily traversed the small gap between the fence and the roof of the run-down garage next door, balanced along the arm supporting the satelite dish, and bounced onto a neighboring tree, disappearing behind the fence. It's so nice to see the city critters, but I guess I should tell my friend that she might want to call the city to relocate the raccoon to a more suitable environment. Later, I found a lovely Italian bakery. It was a good place to work on my social network analysis / transcript analysis project. As I entered the neighborhood, there was a sign saying "Excusa da messe." (The roads and sidewalks were being ripped up by backhoes.) I took a picture and got my coffee. As I started walking back to my friend's house, a truck pulled out of the firestation and a young-looking fireman started walking around the truck busily doing whatever firemen do during the day . . . when I noticed a couple of firemen atop the roof furtively looking over the side. I stopped for a moment to see what they were doing. Maybe they were going to test out the ladder or something interesting like that. That's when I saw them approach the edge with a couple buckets of water. Hmmm . . . they ducked out of sight and returned. Then, SPLOSH! I saw the younger man emerge from the hidden side of the truck soaking wet. The two on the roof had quietly disappeared. Gosh, I love having days like this.