An hour and a half for breakfast, the time needed to go through the papers, a decent breakfast after what I admit was probably not a full night's sleep last night. Or maybe it was. I can remember half dozing off, awakening to look at the clock - later and later - not getting to sleep until, well, when? Maybe that period counts as sleep, maybe I'm wrong in not getting a good night's rest. I feel pretty good, the head clear, the body and attitude ready for whatever may arise the rest of the day. Is it just a matter of “do I feel rested?” and if the answer is yes, well, then you've had enough rest so forget what may or may not have happened the night before? Dozing off counts? Maybe. We'll let the question rest, at least. For now. Until tomorrow.

Progress on getting the image files backed up yesterday. The new CD printer seems to work just fine. It doesn't print quite as clear and bright a color image on a printable CD/DVD as the older, now thoroughly jamming, Epson, but that's OK. For my own files I don't really need more than a label, but I choose to include a color picture from the backed up files. For clients, if I ever have clients again, the color is adequate and I'm up for adequate if the printer is reliable. Now to populate these DVD binders I've bought. Lots of room for images. Progress in this is more satisfying than you'd imagine, the coming together of something that's been put off and then put off again, the apartment starting to straighten up, the life moving into (dare I say?) a faster lane.

Did you see the newspaper story this morning about the eighty-nine year old guy who's traveled to both the North and the South poles, keeping active in his later years?

I read about people leaving a perfectly good airplane at two thousand feet wearing a parachute. Crazy isn't something you need to cultivate at my age. When you're younger, yes, crazy is part of the plan, teaches you things you need to know, cleans the trash out of your system. The North fucking Pole? Do you have any idea how cold it is at the North fucking Pole? In January?

Later. A decent walk, although I was dragging ass a bit, I must admit. Still, well over two miles, a walk downtown with a stop for a cup of coffee and a cookie, another stop for a small bowl of chili, a bus ride back to the apartment. A bit of rain, here and there, a stop under an awning and once at a bus kiosk to protect the camera. Nothing much in the way of pictures, a close up of a tree on Grand near Perkins, a photograph of a door (not sure why, although I suspect the design was considered slick when it was first built) with its perspective all out of whack because of the wide angle lens. Oh, and, of course, the obligatory picture or two of the tree across from my bus stop on Lake Merritt. We many be afflicted with these for some time is my thought.

One of the local stories here is the disappearance of the Sea Lions who've hung out at Pier 39 now in San Francisco for these last many years. They just decided not to show up last month and the count dropped from 1,700 on October 23, 2009 to 20 after Thanksgiving, last week it was down to half a dozen. It seems they've shown up at the Sea Lion Caves in Oregon where I stopped to take some pictures on the way up to Portland. Evidently there were San Francisco Bay Sea Lions down there, some two thousand more than they've seen in the recent past. Only about five hundred of them will fit in the caves from what they're saying, but interesting to compare the pictures I took to the picture they ran in the Chronicle. I'm not sure the Chronicle picture wasn't better for the contrast, if not the detail, but they were close, so I'll award myself a cigar. Or something similar. We don't smoke cigars anymore with these lungs behaving the way they are.

So, listening to the news feeling rather tired. The lungs ache a bit, the head aches a bit, although that seems to be easing off now that I've taken my afternoon meds, one of which is a pain management pill. We would have been somewhat disturbed to think we'd be taking a pain management pill at this age when we were younger, but you warm to the things when you see what they do. Of course, I've been taking them now for some time and I'm not really sure they work, but I'll accept a placebo effect if it turns out no other effects are in the offing. Pain management pills. Don't get your jaw operated on, folks, unless you absolutely have to and then warn them away from your sinuses. Believe me.

Some thought to see Avatar later this afternoon, although I'm sure I'll crap out. I've done some laundry, printed many more of the DVD's on the new printer, had my walk and now I'm listening to the news, a movie seems a bit over the top for a Friday. Another one of those things you thought you'd never see when you were younger: comparing going to a movie to doing the laundry. What have we come to? What indeed.