Dear Marion,

My apologies for a very skimpy letter. The days have
passed rapidly, consumed with housekeeping and preparation
for the hearing of the Nantucket case on June 16. Today,
a trip to the grocery store 15 miles across the mountin,
then drafting and redrafting the memorandum with which
I will try to define the course of the litigation.
Of course Judge Macdonald probably won't go along with
me, but then there's the Appeals Court which doesn't
necessarily go along with him. The strategy I'm working
on is to obtain discovery by requests for documents, 
interrogatories, requests for admissions, and especially
depositions on oral examination, - all of which is likely
to encounter much resistance from the Nantucketers and
their lawyers and may quite possibly be squelched by the
judge. The judge's rulings will then be the subject of 
appeal. It goes on and on. 

This afternoon, after I had brought the legal work to some
reasonable conclusion, I spent two hours traipsing behind
our 12 year-old barely self-propelled lawnmower, somewhat 
improving the appearance of about half of the lawn. Tomorrow,
if there's no rain, I'll mow the other half.

I've deliberately interrupted work on chapter 46. The fantasy
would be excessively distracting in the few remaining days,
three to be exact, before our return trip to Belmont. Another
potential distraction is this computer, which on two occasions
has refused to boot, on the pretext of having lost data on the
so-called "rom bios", the chip which contains the code for 
starting the machine. There may be somewhere on the motherboard
a small battery, old and tired like myself, which is slowly
giving up the ghost. If I don't resolve the problem before
we leave, the eight video cameras which I have just installed
may sit idle until we return in July; a reminder than nothing
in life is perfect.

I hope you continue to be well, and will write to me some time.
Jochen