[from 24 April 2011.]

Tonight we bought a goat. For dinner, goat two ways. I wanted to be cooler about this. The bug-killing is an issue I’ve got to get over – malaria, scorpions, big spiders that don’t necessarily wish but can do me much harm. There was a spider scurrying away from the bucket(-shower)-stall in the beam of my headlamp earlier. Neither dry nor clothed, I had a wee bit of a flip. The scurry made him look like a scorpion, and I stomped him even as I apologized for sending him on to the next life. Buddhism! Under the bloody skin! And then he turns out to just be a big spider, and one who was running *away* from me at that. Poor form, Christine Murphy.

I put down four pieces of goat. Verb choice intended. Noel, who cooked, ate next to nothing. The problem of cooking, everyone agreed. Why? I asked. The smell….

My happy-animal philosophy drives smack up against real life in South Sudan. How do you slaughter a spooked goat humanely? Goats aren’t even supposed to be smart. Sigh. Thoughts, and a renewed appreciation that many of my vegetarian or lower-meat friends made their decisions based on the direct experience of what it takes to make meat.

Things I have used my Leatherman for since arriving:

Pliers: twisting out the beehive of heavy wire that once enclosed one of the bungee rigs of my army tent.

File: taking off the vicious curls of metal produced by same.

Knife: Mango, scored into a bitable checkerboard.

Wire clippers: For J, for securing my tent’s sides.

Serrated knife: cutting curtains out of my sheets, which led to my making a . Do, a deer, a female deer…

In other notes, all my dry red patches, on wrists, in elbows, crooked in the collarbone, are gone. Thank you, borehole water of South Sudan. Or is it the sweat? Dance yrself clean, Christine Murphy. La! Empiricism, how I miss the luxury of time you require.

[Since this night, I have killed my first scorpion, stamping with vigorous horror. Had to do it again only an hour later. Scorpions, you work in pairs! Mebbe you'll meet up for company on the long walk through the bardo.]