Visiting in Champaign

Daniel, Lucy and I have been enjoying our visit to Champaign. We've spent much of the days in the library using the private study rooms to write. I've started writing a new story and worked a bit on an older one. We haven't done as much Esperanto as we'd planned to, but Daniel has done the first few lessons at Lernu and Phil and I have worked on a translation.

Last night, we escaped the heat by going to a movie. We saw Toy Story 3 in 3D. It was fine, although the franchise seems a bit tired to me. It didn't really break any new ground.

This morning, we took a tree walk down a street with an interpretative booklet to identify all the trees. Some I knew, many I had once known, but had forgotten, and some were entirely new. On a hackberry, we found two cicadas emerging as adults. One was already mostly done and the other just emerging from its exoskeleton. We watched for half an hour while it drew itself out and unfurled its wings.

Later today, we plan to go to a water park (if the weather cooperates) and then we are scheduled to have dinner with Barbara. We're keeping busy while maintaining a relaxed pace.