But I WANT to believe

I've read three horoscopes today and they all say that my day should be FABULOUS. I should have lots of creative energy and inspiration and money should be falling into my path. Oh and, like a twelfth of the population, I'm particularly ALLURING to the opposite sex this week (must ask my Beloved if he's noticed). Well if that's not going to motivate me to get too much work done in too little time, nothing will!

In other news, I read Mark Kurlansky's The Big Oyster the other day. This is a charming history of oysters in New York and New York gastronomy. He talks a lot about urban development in the city. It's hard to believe but until the mid nineteenth century the metropolis had meadows and farms quite close by. The oysters in New York were amazing. For a time they practically cornered the world oyster market. It took three hundred years of overharvesting and pollution to wipe them out. Sadly, he concludes that 10 million people probably can't live next door to viable oyster beds.

Kurlansky does popular science and history so well (apart from in Salt which I couldn't finish) and he has the knack of showing that he knows what he's talking about without overburdening the reader with detail. He also has a good ear for the perfect anecdote. I'll be talking about the goings on at oyster cellars for months to come!