Little Darwin's Natcher Journal

The day I bought Samantha's journal (see "Lost Journal", below), I picked up another abandoned notebook. This one is hardback with drawings of tortises and penguins and lizards on the cover, and it says "Galapagos Islands." I don't imagine the kid who owned the diary has ever been to the Galapagos, though. Only ten or so pages have entries. Here's part of the first one:
"Natcher is very prity, So many trees and plants. Adding is nice butt it is also nice plane. Thar are a lot of sounes. Alot of produks come from natcher like sope, food, and seeds. I love natcher. Nather is everywhar! At night the tmoon shins."

Poor kid. Probably either dyslexic...or maybe just not fond of spelling. There's no name in the journal, so let's call the author of the journal Little Darwin. Little Darwin's sentiments about natcher, though hackneyed, seem sincere. Maybe someday I'll post segemtns of *my* old journal entries...I'm certain that Little Darwin's sentiments will seem refreshing when compared to my youthful screeds of mishmosh. I was a very romantic kid.

Anyhoo...I write a music column every other week for a paper called the North Bay Bohemian. I have a charged relationship with my column, but I guess that's okay--I'd rather have unstable relationships with things than with people. This week's column was about the abundant joys of Christmas music. I just now figured out how to make this link thing work, so here you go:
http://www.metroactive.com/papers/sonoma/12.15.04/xmasmusic-0451.html