I saw danuv off to the airport yesterday afternoon. Through pure serendipity, the Somerville Memorial Day parade route paralleled our walk to the subway, and was being run as we walked. So we caught quite a bit of the parade — Soldiers, marching bands, pipe bands and the puzzling Shriner mini-cars.

I’ve set aside today to recover my energy. I adore having company, but it is draining.

On Saturday night we watched a documentary she’d brought with her, Sing Faster, which covers the goings-on of the vast backstage crew required to put on a recent San Francisco Opera production of Wagner’s Ring. As I’m a big fan of Ring lore, I found it to be incredibly entertaining, from the stagehands playing poker between set changes to the stage managers barking orders to each other via walkie-talkie (”Valhalla should be smoking.” *crrrrrrzk* “Valhalla is smoking.”).