After three weeks into 2023 the gush of New Year’s Eve is now safely considered historical. We’re about the middle of January and the middle of the week. A noticeable lull has come over the island. The early morning traffic when I went for my mani/pedi was more contained than usual; the southern drivers with few exceptions seemed more subdued. My manicurist Sun from Vietnam informed me that this coming Sunday is the Asian new year, what appears on my iPhone calendar as the Lunar New Year. The animal for the lunar year is the Rabbit. It’s all a bunch of hocus-pocus in my opinion but Sun became animated to the extent of determining that based upon my year of birth my zodiac animal is the rat which purportedly foretells that I am ingenious but unadventurous. She made other general observations about the lunar year including the use of the zodiac to predict a successful marriage.

These 12 astrological signs form a celestial coordinate system, or more specifically an ecliptic coordinate system, which takes the ecliptic as the origin of latitude and the Sun’s position at vernal equinox as the origin of longitude.

The sky today is once again a cloudless azure blue.  My Tom Ford Christian glasses have apparently become drenched with lotions of one description or another because when I looked at the sky this morning without wearing the frames my vision was clearer than with them; that is, the sky was bluer without the specs.  I subsequently changed frames to my gold-rimmed granny glasses and strangely saw more brightly than with the others. I avowed to give the Tom Ford lenses a good soap bath later this afternoon to see what improvement if any transpires.

I spent the remainder of the morning and early afternoon lounging by the pool in the blazing sunshine, alternating sides of exposure and swimming. By late afternoon people had begun to arrive at the oasis, assembling to chat and sunbathe. I ended engaging with a visitor from Kansas in a broad-ranging conversation. She was unwittingly a source of my literary ambition earlier this week when I was riveted by her “walking” in the pool.

Meanwhile I’m recovering from an assault of Key Lime pie. Tonight it’s back to Panera soup, salad with Cannellini white kidney beans and fruit compôte for dessert. Last night following two large pieces of Key Lime pie I swore never again! It is a narcotic indulgence of mine which I discovered years ago on Key West. Its allure has never escaped me. Already I am contemplating the vehicle or manner by which I shall surreptitiously renew the imperative.

So here I am in the middle of the month in the middle of the week – listening to the schmaltz of Norman Geller & His Orchestra – having just received a mournful email about the death of a long-time friend in Florida last evening. My correspondent echoed my erstwhile heartiness for enjoying the moment. Overall today has proven to have been oddly tempered.