Saturday. Yesterday was indeed a good day, the good feelings extending right through the evening. I thought of having sushi for dinner, I hadn't had much to eat that day, but talked myself into going to the Grand Lake theater and watching Hanna instead. Which was OK. I'd read the reviews, something about a scene at the beginning of the movie where the heroine shoots and kills a deer with a bow and arrow (fortunately not nearly as graphic as the one review I'd read suggested), but figured it was better than the other offerings and headed over to see it on foot.

The out of focus background circling camera technique seemed overly done, the plot line was both predictable and less than believable, but overall it was relatively good. A Bourne-like movie, but different enough to stand on its own. I liked the Bourne series by the way, not great but certainly good.

Otherwise, as said, a good day yesterday, some two hours plus spent on the guitar (the fingertips attest to this), to bed at eleven, up at six-thirty, to breakfast and back by eight. It's overcast out there, gas prices at my local station have increased over yesterday's prices by two cents a gallon and, well, I was thinking of photographing a local group of volunteers who are cleaning up around the lake today in the Earth Day effort. They had an Earth Day gathering in front of City Hall on Thursday, but I somehow missed it. That was the day of feeling funky, maybe getting out and photographing might have helped. Maybe not.

Some bills to pay, the taxes to pay, many things of similar unpleasantness to do today through the weekend. Nothing much more to be said.

Later. A nap. OK, I needed a nap, getting up at six or six-thirty evidently doesn't cut it, although getting to bed early doesn't seem to cut it either as falling asleep seems to happen around eleven or later no matter how tired I seem to be turning in. I suspect I need to be a little harder on myself with the schedule, but it's easier to say, well, I'm getting older, that's just the way it is. A night's sleep, not quite long enough. A nice nap in the early afternoon. Q.E.D.

A walk over to the Farmer's Market this morning to take a picture or two, a walk then to have a light lunch at my usual restaurant. Fine, a nice ambling sort of a walk, one or two pictures walking through the market, a stop at the book store to see what new might be there I'm not going to buy, a walk home then with a stop by the lake to take a picture I've taken a thousand times in the past. My only excuse is I was carrying the D2X with the smaller sensor, mounted with a full frame 24-70 f 2.8 zoom and wanted to see how they turned out.

What's the difference between the D2 series and the D3 series in bright light? I'm afraid the D3's are much sharper for starters, but we'll work with that a little more. The 70-200 f 2.8 zoom seems sharp and nice on a D2X, but I'm not really sure I've been careful enough in the comparison.

The Cherry Blossom Parade tomorrow starting at noon in San Francisco. I'll be there unless the sky falls. No excuses. I may even ask someone in charge for the name of the contest they hold before the parade starts where everyone dresses up as a comic book character, Star Wars character, Grimm's Fairy Tale or similar character and what I've been calling the Cherry Blossom Parade on artandlife. They're not part of the parade, they don't march. I don't think. Time, maybe, to change the artandlife description, get the damned thing straight. It's only been something like ten years.

Otherwise more guitar. I stopped myself playing yesterday because, indeed, the fingertips had started to really get sore, figured stopping and playing today would forgo any problems that might delay my practice. Seems to have worked.

I practiced a good tight half hour this morning, we'll do more this afternoon, but the fingertips are better. Live and learn. I'd like to practice two hours a day, that's always seemed like a reasonable goal, seemed doable for someone who's retired. (Hup! Hup!) We need to get to the point I can rip between chords in a beat and play actual music. You know? The reason you start playing in the first place? Help it along? Hup? Hup?

Enough of that.

I suspect it's never enough. One of life's little lessons.

Later still. Well yes, evening. These things happen. More time spent now on the guitar, much less time on the taxes and the scrambled medical bills. My health insurance company has screwed things up and is dragging its feet in fixing it. I'm lucky to have company insurance, most leaving the company since I left no longer get it, and the HR department has leverage in straightening these things out. Taxes, well, they'll be done tomorrow.

We'll do more guitar as the evening progresses, we'll watch whatever may be on TV, we'll get to bed early and we won't go down the street for sushi and sake. No we won't.

I read an interview today in the new Rolling Stone with Bill Maher and he mentioned he had to severely limit himself to a few drinks a week now that he was older. Confirmation age has something to do with it. Of course he augments his week then with grass. I'm not sure I want to smoke any more grass, at least routinely. I smoked my share when I was younger, not so sure now that I'm older. Not so with friends from back then I've learned, so I guess you never know. Ho! Ho! I guess there's something meaningful in there somewhere.