Thursday, August 4th, 1977: In which a lot of reading takes place, Pete gets sun burnt, and Nancy takes solace in the mental health struggle of a friend

I've been on a reading binge lately-read Noon Ballon to Rangoon, but it wasn't as funny as Erasmus With Freckles.  Then I read two Winston Grahams; Take My Life and Woman In The Mirror-both very suspenseful with unexpected outcomes.  His plots have nice countertwists.  In the second the man who grips our sympathies turns out to be a double murderer, and in the first we know the villain from the beginning-only his apprehension is in doubt.  Then I read The Grand Duke And Mr. Pimm, the confrontation of clutch of fortune hunters (good guys) with another (bad guys)-fairly lighthearted with lots of instant romances.  Finally I read Hainings' anthology of archaic Scots' horror stories.  Clans of Darkness.  Some of them were pretty good at raising the (indecipherable-PL), so I'll try his Irish anthology next, tho I must admit some of the Scots stories put a strain on my vocabulary. 

Thelma called this morning at 9:00am and woke me.  She was on her way to the hospital for blood work.  She brought Tommy over to play with Pete while she was there and had a cup of coffee with me before she went up.  Tommy broke Pete's golf club but I found the missing piece and fixed it.  Thye played inside and out and Tommy painted a picture.  Thelma invited us to her house for lunch but I had to wait for the lady with the WIC coupons (she didn't come, unless she came while I was napping) and didn't go.  Peter went so I vacuumed the kitchen and some of the living room, scrubbed and mopped the bathroom, swept and mopped the bedroom, and partially mopped the playroom (too many toys on the floor to do a very good job-oh for some shelves!). 

Petey had fried chicken for lunch and had a temper tantrum at Thelma's because the kids were watching one program and he wanted "Sesame Street".  They told him it wasn't on yet, then showed him it wasn't on-but still he cried.  He told me he wanted to come home but not to talk about the bad part, the crying part.  He got painfully sun burnt at Thelma's.  I'd let him wear a tank top and they were out a lot.  He watched his favorite programs at home-went to sleep in the brown leather chair between "Electric Company" and Zoom".  I moved him and he got up again.  We played airplanes outside and Maria insisted we use her lawn chairs because sitting the damp grass is unhealthy-very nice of her.  We played "Batman and Robin" inside with the little cars, but we've lost Pete's "Batman" book-hunted every where for it.  We had cube steak for dinner and I gave Pete a bath with baking soda and rubbed a lot of Nivea (I need to buy more) on his burns.  He also caught the corner of his eye on the kitchen counter today-barely missed the eye itself.  We were both cross tonight (hot, no nap for Pete) but by time I'd read "What Time Is It Jeanne-Marie?" and Lobel's The Man Who Took The Inside Out, and we'd pretended our hands were stuck together with kisses and wished each other "sweet dreams and a "good night's sleep" we were friends again. 

Had a letter from Noreen today.  She had a nervous breakdown too.  Now I don't feel so alone.  She's still teaching, too.