Friday. To bed fairly late last night futzing with a broken tape in a cartridge. I haven't taken one apart before and the operation is somewhat delicate. Takes time. Once I'd fixed the thing, of course, I recorded the contents (an old live recording of Spodeeodee and Ascension done in the mid-seventies) to an MP3 file and that took some time. Hence late to bed. Nice to have the recording, though, no complaints.

Up this morning with the alarm, just the alarm noise followed by a jump (we're stretching it a bit here when we say “jump”) out of bed followed by the usual routine to get my laggard ass out the door. I was hungry, a good motivator, particularly as the weight is still a pound or so below the one-sixty line. Hup, hup.

They're saying another sunny day, a date to meet with the usual crew at four this afternoon in San Francisco for drinks and dinner. I wonder a bit, of course. The last time I had Guinness at Roy's here in Oakland I had a full bore ocular migraine come on as I was driving home, but we'll be careful in the city. We will. Get home at a decent hour. Not sure if I'll take a bus to the BART station (and then back) or take the car. Or take the bus and a cab back from the BART station later. Stuff to think about if you really want to think about such stuff. On the day before Christmas Eve.

Later. I think a little guitar practice now that I've returned from the downtown and my walk. Bundled up properly, this time, a walk around the downtown area thinking I'd go here or go there, a quick pass by the Occupy area taking but one picture, the sign saying the water they've flooded the grass area with is killing the old majestic oak in front of the City Hall. Hope that's not true, but you never know.

A cup of coffee and a pumpkin cobbler in the Rotunda building (very good actually, that pumpkin cobbler) before walking back to the apartment. A good walk, didn't really want to take the bus, one or two pictures just to take one or two pictures, home now thinking of picking up that guitar. I suspect it will happen unless I can wrangle out a nap beforehand. Hadn't thought of that particularly, but why not? A slow contemplative day the day before a Christmas Eve.

Later still. For some reason I got to looking at earlier Oakland Holiday Parade photographs and realized I had some still mixed in with the miscellaneous photographs, not enough for another section, but I also discovered a bunch of earlier digital images I'd never really processed, taken in 2004, and a bunch of negatives taken in 2000. So I put together another section. I'd say good for me if I hadn't obviously enjoyed it so much. Maybe one of these days get into of the old digital pictures and the negatives again and create another. I seem to get a lot of wattage out these small tasks, but I do and that seems to be the sum of it.

Need to head out for San Francisco in another half hour, best to get ready. Will I have time to practice the guitar when I get back? If I'm sensible I will and, although I fully intend to be sensible, I'm curious to know how it turns out.

Evening. OK, over to San Francisco to arrive at four, back now at eight-thirty, two and a half glasses of Guinness over the evening starting at Elephant & Castle before heading on to a light dinner at Kells, an Irish pub, the mouth a bit dry as I was arriving home, the head I realized rapidly becoming scrambled, but starting only as I was entering the apartment building, the head dropping suddenly into the Lake of the Twisted Dreams and bobbing about for an hour. Reasonably clear headed again by nine. Just like that. Drugs without the drugs, trips without a ticket.

OK. A good evening certainly, but a half an hour to an hour of ocular disconnect just as I got home. Is this the future when I go out for a Guinness on the town? I'm writing this at nine-ten. Too much excitement for a simple trip into the city, we'll have to think about this more in the morning.