The father of a good friend passed away. Self scans her FB page and realizes that her friend’s mother passed away only about a year ago. That’s harsh.
California is experiencing a drought. A severe drought.
At least, it was warm out. Self took pictures of birds at the feeder.
Self is racing through the rest of In the Shadow of Man. Gaaah, the way Goodall writes about a poliomyelitis breakout in her community of chimpanzees is so heartbreaking and tragic! Self never knew that illnesses could jump between apes and man. But why not? Didn’t the bird flu virus start with chickens?
Anyhoo, one of the chimps has an enormous growth in his neck that looks exactly like a goiter. Interestingly enough, that region has many people afflicted with same.
In one brilliantly written chapter, we follow the excruciating death of a grand, old chimpanzee named Mr. McGregor. This mighty and stolid creature was felled by the loss of function of both his legs. He crawled back to the camp, and the scientists had to do a mercy killing. Goodall sums up the last 10 days of Mr. McGregor! Gah! Nightmarish. They fed him breakfast first, and while he was jubilantly examining two hard-boiled eggs, they delivered him unto oblivion. At least he died happy.
Self’s rate of reading picked up with Goodall’s book. Let’s just hope she can keep this up, for the next book on her reading list is — as self has remarked on before — the 1,000-page Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Rebecca West’s account of her tour of the Balkans.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.
Kanlaon 