I have confessed before that I am a sucker for gadgets. Not everything that comes along (my father had a fair number of gadgets at his house when I worked on his estate - I know this is passed down genetically), but the ones that seem to have a chance of actually working. I looked this little thing up - it looks like Walmart has carried it and Amazon has the same thing with a different brand on it. It's a little AA-powered fan-operated desk vacuum. And it works. I was at DSW (because I was nearby and sometimes I just stop in for a little recreational browsing) and this was in the clearance section. With the red tag and a $5 credit, it cost me all of $1.61. The dust that builds up on my desk is usually food crumbs, occasional dog hair, and the usual dander that accumulates on a workspace. It's an attractive little black box with an on/off switch on front and it sits off to the side beyond the phone charger. (A search on "mini desk vacuum" comes up with a variety of incredibly cute shapes as vacuums).

The dishwasher is running, the washer is set to run in the morning (it has a timer, which is a good thing to use in a place where the power grid doesn't need heavy draw devices running during daytime hours. It's set to run at 5am.) The kitchen is cleared of extra pots and canning devices, but tomorrow evening I'll likely have some of them out. Or maybe on Friday.

The garden is always a source of drama, sometimes slow moving, but today I set a Hav-a-heart trap with a piece of watermelon attached to the bait tray with a twist tie and nailed a rat that has been taking wanton bites out of my tomatoes. Some on the ground, some reached by climbing the vines and biting on top. I use that trap so if I nail a lizard or toad I can let them go, but rats go, trap and all, into a tall bucket of water. Chances are that where there is one rat there are other rats, so the trap is again set, with more watermelon, on the side of the garden. I'm a lot more forgiving of huge caterpillars than I am of rats.
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I'm listening to MSNBC talk about trying to get translators out of Afghanistan. This is a mess, and is totally uncalled for. They could have done this before, even in the Biden administration. #Fail