Sunset tints the steam cloud and throws the lava dome into shadow.

From the Mt. St. Helens cam.

OK… I admit it. I don’t loath children, but I’m not necessarily a fan, either. I don’t treat them harshly, or anything. And lord knows I love my own to death. But I don’t look for excuses to borrow a few. When the other women pass the babies around, I usually prefer to enjoy them from a distance. And, yes, I do think kids are cute and there are times when I enjoy them a great deal.

But not in the middle of what is, for all intents and purposes, an adult party.

OK. It wasn’t really an adults-only party, and it was at Hometown Buffet, where there are plenty of kids. But when I arrived at the party, the only choices were to sit at a different table or take the only available seat next to birthday-boy’s niece. She is a precocious child of 10 who started in telling me the most gross doings of every single kid in her school and ended up regaling me with demonstrations of how she can look just like a squirrel, and a bunny rabbit, and a dog, and a… well, you get the idea. She was the only child there besides birthday-boy’s grand daughter, about 6 months old, who was good as gold and never made a peep. (you know, I’d love to hold her, but I have this cold… )

Birthday-boy has been my friend for ages and I don’t see him or his family that often. I sat at the end of one side of the table, and Niece From Hell sat between birthday-boy and I. So I was a captive audience. Any time I turned towards birthday-boy to talk to him, what I heard instead was and I can look just like a horsie, too! Watch! And do you know what Jimmy ate? I’ll show you what it looked like! All delivered in a rapid-fire staccato that killed any other possible conversation. The only way I could turn her off was to focus my attention on the person across the table from me, who I’ve also known for a long time and who has one of the most annoying voices I’ve ever heard — rather like fingernails on a chalk board.

Turn to left… And then Susie threw up right in the crayons. And I can be a puppy dog! Turn straight ahead… screeeeeeeeeeeeeccccchhhhh And what have you been up to? screeeeeeeccccchhhh

It was not the most enjoyable party I’ve ever been to. It was better after Niece From Hell left. Maybe it was just my cold that made me feel so curmudgeonly. Or maybe I’m just getting old.

Nah… that can’t be it…

“Superman” actor Christopher Reeve, who turned personal tragedy into a public crusade and from his wheelchair became the nation’s most recognizable spokesman for spinal cord research, has died. He was 52.

Reeve went into cardiac arrest Saturday while at his Pound Ridge home, then fell into a coma and died Sunday at a hospital surrounded by his family, his publicist said. He was 52.

Fairwell, Christopher. Rest in peace.

One of my cats, Moo Cow, just can’t figure out why she no longer fits places she could go when she was tiny.

When she was little kitten, she liked to sleep at night curled up in my shoulder with her head tucked under my ear. It was cute, so I let her do it even though it pissed the other cats off. Phoebe thinks she owns the bed. Moo knows she owns the house. They coexist under an armed truce. Captain Kidd wants the window sill, but since he is #3 on the Becker cat hierarchy he gives in gracefully to whoever argues with him about it.

So tiny Moo, queen of the house, slept on my shoulder and was cute. After a few weeks, I noticed that my arm was damn near paralyzed when I woke up. Moo was growing. Quickly. It was about to the point where Moo was going to get kicked off the bed whether she liked it or not when Moo decided that she was really #1 Son’s cat and moved in with him. My shoulder was spared.

Moo grew up to be a big girl. She weighs 15lbs, and she’s not fat.

After we got back from vacation, Moo decided that for some unknown queenly reason #1 Son was no longer the apple of her eye. She still likes him, mind you, but she demands attention from me too now.

The other night I woke up, and Moo was on the bed trying to figure out how she used to curl up on my shoulder. She circled around one way a few times and plopped down. Didn’t fit. Circled the other way and plopped down. Didn’t fit. Came at it from the headboard. Didn’t fit. Tried sneaking up from my feet. Didn’t fit.

Rather than being annoyed at being woken up, I had to laugh, because I could just hear her thinking, “I know I used to do this. How did I used to do this?”

I called a halt when she tried tucking her head under my ear while draping herself across my neck. 15lbs of cat on my neck? uh… no.

The New York Times reports today on the hue and cry in the blogosphere regarding the mysterious bulge in Bush’s jacket during the first debate.

First they [campaign and White House officials] said that pictures showing the bulge might have been doctored. But then, when the bulge turned out to be clearly visible in the television footage of the evening, they offered a different explanation.

And Bush accuses Kerry of being wishy-washy!

“There was nothing under his suit jacket,” said Nicolle Devenish, a campaign spokeswoman.

“It was most likely a rumpling of that portion of his suit jacket, or a wrinkle in the fabric.”

Ms. Devenish could not say why the “rumpling” was rectangular.

Nor was the bulge from a bulletproof vest, according to campaign and White House officials; they said Mr. Bush was not wearing one.

So the question remains… Was there a bit of Milli-Vanilli action going on during the first debate? Or not? And if not, what was that bulge?

KEX radio just interviewed the Salem-Keizer School District Superintendent Kay Baker. Baker has posted an open letter to Salem-Keizer parents on the district web site. Part of her letter follows:

As you may be aware, a recent news story regarding information found in Iraq on U.S. schools mentioned Salem, Oregon. I want to take a moment to share further details about this situation. First of all, there was no threat made against our district or schools. We have not received any information that directly said or even implied that there was a threat against our local schools.

Salem-Keizer reviewed all of their security and emergency plans, something that they do every fall.

KEX further reported that information from Homeland Security now indicates that there was no connection between the owner of the laptop found and either Iraqi insurgents or al Qaeda operatives.