Sunday. To bed before ten last night, up this morning at seven, a decent night's sleep. To breakfast and back under an overcast sky, the gas prices at the station across from the café having jumped again after two days since the twelve cent jump on Friday. Labor Day Weekend does indeed seem to be creeping up, creepily creeping up to the oil companies delight.

So I feel pretty good, good enough to get over to J-Pop anyway. Maybe a nap before I leave around eleven-thirty. I'll get there too early, but I've learned to live with that, no reason to fret. I did put up two sections of photographs of the Sistahs Steppin’ in Pride Parade taken yesterday, I just managed to squeak in enough photographs, whether that was a good idea or not I have no idea. It was, but I like to fret. Posting without fretting leads to too much sloth. A little sloth, part of my package, but too much is still too much, even in my world.

Later. I did think, returning to Oakland on BART, I might walk over to Chinatown and see if I couldn't come up with more ChinaFest photographs but thought better of it, hopped a bus and headed home. Better to feel like a human being later this evening, no reason to go too far overboard.

Still, a good outing at J-Pop. I thought it less crowded than last year, but I could be wrong. Maybe, as I'd been thinking, Saturday is a better day, maybe not, but I'm happy with the photographs and I have enough for another section on artandlife. So the day has gone well.

They didn't have a Jinny Oops performing today, although they did have what I guess were some current brought over from Japan performers, and the main stage while I was there had a fashion show competition (this is Japanese pop art after all, starting with Hello Kitty and going who in the hell knows where) and I was able to get one or two pictures of the contest that turned out reasonably well.

So good. The usual get off BART, get on the 38 Geary bus, not too crowded as it's the beginning of the route; the bus back standing room only and you're lucky if there's any of that. Today was no exception except I now know what to expect, where to get on (there are three entrance doors, these are large articulated buses) and where to exit when we get to Market. Pretty sharp for an old fart.

So, do the photographs, practice guitar and avoid going down the hill to have sushi and sake. They opened just now at 5:00 and I only have a short time before it becomes too crowded to find a seat, so I'm sitting here being good, being very good, and thinking I might even follow through with it. Maybe eat something here, get rid of this hungry feeling. Fortify myself against another ocular migraine, delaying guitar practice, not finishing up the photographs.

Evening. Sushi and sake down the hill, back to take a crack at the guitar, now to work on the J-Pop photographs. J-Pop as an idea, as a fashion fad is just fine, although I'm pretty much just interested in the photographs. A not so odd permutation of Japanese culture: a superficially extreme cuteness overlaying other, more troublesome, more interesting psychological sub-aspects. Reminds me of clowns, an odd combination of potential laughter and fear. Just like real life, but in this case filtered and sifted through an interesting culture. I'm an easy mark for filtered and sifted.

So, we'll continue (and start another paragraph with “so”). Finish the photographs? Not really necessary, there's nothing on the schedule for tomorrow. The guitar? I hope. Plenty of time tomorrow doesn't cut it, it's a day in, day out commitment. You can miss a day, go short a day, but it shouldn't be too often. Not as often as I break my promises on sushi and sake.