Bits and pieces today. Now that my birthday has passed, summer begins its slow slide into fall. Not that you could tell from the weather here today, back up into the humid 90s. I postponed today's walk, but I did put in a couple of miles on the C&O Canal trail yesterday.

I'm growing a little goatee for Boyd's character, who has the soul of the aging hipster. Ira asks about my "dirty chin," and Leta just grits her teeth and suffers when I kiss her. I'm drawing on my recollections of John's intensity when I have to play the bits where Boyd blows up over the IRS and other agents of authority. Boyd also reminds me of Chip, the rebellious writer in Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections.

I started a t'ai chi class a few Saturdays ago. We're learning 37 movement Yang style, and we've just started working on Single Whip. This is the first movement in the form that looks dangerous and awkward and graceful all at the same time.

I saw the remount of Perfectly Good Airplanes at the Stage on Friday. Maybe it's because I didn't have my nose in the book, so that I could really watch what's going on, but the production looked a lot crisper, more nuanced, more natural than what we brought to Reston in June. Ted and Maura (replacing Ali) found more variations in the rhythms of the piece.

Now that Leta's received a confirmed diagnosis of celiac disease, I've started collecting bookmarks of relevant resources. (Between my management for saturated fat and cholesterol, and Leta's for gluten, we're becoming Jack and Mrs. Sprat. Yesterday we ordered two meals at Panera, and when our trays came up, we swapped food items like two kids in a grammar school cafeteria.)

I think it's interesting (and encouraging) that research has only recently implicated the gliadin family of proteins in celiac sprue. Up until then, it seems that we didn't know much more than "if you eat wheat, you get sick." The current state of research also helps explain why different authorities have different dietary recommendations. For instance, the Canadians have accepted whisky (derived from malted barley, but then distilled), while others are more conservative and proscribe it. Likewise some accept oats, so long as there's no possibility of cross-contamination.

posted: 4:05:43 PM