today was my nephew's birthday and kendall's birthday. i mailed adam's card last week, and today kendall and i went to eat at a local restaurant on waverly, a seafood place. we shared a fish stew and lobster roll, and kendall was surprised to find that she knew the owner/chef whose child goes to school with aurélien. i wrapped up an episode of sparrows by rumer godden which i had purchased in london and enjoyed reading. i think she'll like it too.
we also shared a key lime pie and a treat sent by her friend: a chocolate pudding with whipped cream and caramel sauce.
chanda volunteered at the hatchery her cousin works at and helped haul growing baby scallops to the bay where they're submerged in flats in the water. scallops can hop around in the water through opening and closing their shells with their muscles - which are the "lumps" that many people like to eat.
the bay scallops have beautiful blue eyes that help them to see different small objects. i was reading in an immense world, by ed yong, that these are actually quite complex and each one sits at the end of a mobile tentacle and each has a little pupil:
"light passes through the pupil and hits the back of the scallop's eye, where it is reflected by a curved mirror. the mirror is a precisely tiled array of square crystals that collectively focus light onto the scallop's retinas. that's retinas, plural. there are two per eye, and they are about as different as two animal retinas could be. between them they have thousands of photoreceptors, which gives them enough spatial resolution to detect small objects."
from page 65 in an immense world, by ed yong
so amazing, and they're kind of cute hopping around in the bucket.
