Starry-Eyed and Vaguely Discontented

Another fiendishly spring-like day today in Gliwice. Having slept longer than usual and then rolled over and slept some more, I didn't get around to going outside until after twelve, and when I did, I briefly savored the delusion of having slept all winter and awoken in early April.

The holiday celebrated November 30 in Poland is St. Andrew's Night, or better, The Feast of St. Andrew, not St. Andrew's Eve, and I apologize for the error. Yesterday for the first time I got to take part in some traditional Andrzejki revels. The most interesting ritual is fortune-telling with wax, water and key. You melt some hot wax, then pour it through the hole in an old-fashioned key (where the hole is quite big) into a bowl of cold water, then let it form into some shape or shapes which you remove from the water and "read."

My lump of wax was variously interpreted as a butterfly, a chick bursting forth from the egg, a snail or turtle poking its head out of its shell, a sea-horse, or: human intestines or other internal organs.