You may say what's all the fuss and that's a reasonable question. The lamps look nice, they work, some slight adjustments in their positions are in order, but the bang for the buck here is in the start of a process that will lead to (hang on here, we're talking progress on a project that should have been started ten years ago): ORDER IN THE LIVING ROOM!!

Order in the living room?

Yes, well, we're not a neatness freak, never been accused of that, but we do like living in places with little unnecessary clutter. I have this feeling for example, if you're going to have tripods, giant soft boxes, strobe lights and such scattered about, they should only be scattered about when you're using them or they're set up in a dedicated room used as a studio. Same with storage boxes filled with stuff and such. They shouldn't be lined up along one of the living room walls. And that old NEC CRT monitor, the nice graphics model, what in the hell is it still doing sitting on the floor? It's was a very nice monitor in its day, but it's obsolete next to the flat panel I'm using now, get it out the door! (Emphasis added to make my point!)

So the attitude is good, the head is relatively clear, the papers are read, the lungs feel good and I'm ready for a sunny day because they're saying rain tomorrow. Get thee out with thy camera, pilgrim, but also get that table in gear. Get it assembled, get it in place and then kick back and gloat straight through the coming evening like a cat curled up on the rug next to a fire. (Hup! Hup! Hup!)

OK, high spirits, we'll leave it at that. Spring is on the way, rain tomorrow or no.

I believe it's allowed to rain in the spring, bringing forth flowers and such, summer is when the rains cease around here.

That's in Kansas, this is California in a city that sits across the bay from the city that sits at the end of the rainbow. Their Chamber of Commerce tells us so.

Later. The table went about ninety percent together in the flick of a screwdriver, quite a bit easier than I was thinking it might, and I was thinking it wouldn't be all that much trouble. Still, being careless, I did manage to raise just the slightest blister on the palm of my right hand (not really a blister, I didn't feel it happening, just the top layer of skin peeling off, a little disinfectant and a band aid) so I decided to set out on a walk in the local area starting at the lake.

Naturally I took a picture of the usual tree, a bit up closer than my usual stance, a couple of pictures of the clouds because the clouds were looking nice after the rain, and talking briefly with two people who were scooping turtles out of the lake with a small net attached to a long pole. Evidently they're fresh water turtles who've been washed by the rain from their homes in fresh water streams feeding the lake and the salt water will eventually kill them, so they're walking the perimeter in an attempt to save them. You learn something every day. Fresh water turtles flushed into the salt water (inundated through its connection to the bay) by rain. OK. But, turtles in trouble in the city by the city at the end of the rainbow? Surely that can't be.

A walk farther along, running across a young woman doing stretching exercises. Naturally I couldn't pass up a picture, so I walked over not far away and took a throw away picture of the people still gathered around the turtles to gain position, although I don't think that was really necessary. Whatever the exercises she's obviously done them before and, I suspect, doesn't really care whether some old coot takes a series of pictures or not as long as they're not, you know, unflattering.

This, in street photographers’ land, is considered a gift from the gods and taken as a sign the day is going gold. So I walked on, more for exercise than anything else, doing a loop around Noah's without stopping and then heading over to my morning restaurant for tea out on the patio. Evidently the power had gone off for two hours soon after I'd left this morning and it had just come back on as I arrived. Not good to lose your power during breakfast. OK, sit, drink the tea, take it easy, take a picture. Or two.

Later still. And the table? At four in the afternoon it's done. Not against the wall to the right, where it's headed later today, but assembled and ready. I like it. It was $199.00, easy to build and looks OK. I'm not sure I'd like it as a dining room table, but as a work table next to a wall in my funky apartment? Golden. Well, birch veneer. We need to be accurate here.