Later. A walk down by the lake, by the farmers market and then on to Walden Pond Books to buy Devil's Tango: How I Learned the Fukushima Step by Step by Cecile Pineda, a book that's had some interesting reviews recently in the press. I learned, standing there at their front door at nine o'clock, that Walden Pond doesn't open 'til ten. OK.

I was carrying the new camera and lens, thinking I'd look for the ducklings and goslings, see if I could substitute hardware for effort and get one or two better shots, finding the usual suspects grazing where I'd found them before near the pergola white columns. OK, I took photographs with one or two turning out better than some of the others I've managed over this last week. Good. I walked by the farmers market without a shot, but nothing unusual there. Farmers markets are another place where you have to roll up your sleeves and make a real effort.

So, back at the apartment, I ran the photographs through Lightroom and Photoshop before setting out again (I did want that book) along the lake and by the market to find Walden open, but the book listed on their computer as out of print (published in March, out of print in May). OK. Probably why Amazon took my order and then two days later canceled it.

A walk back by the pergola on the lake again where they'd been setting up a small stage and putting up Elect Barbara Lee signs when I'd passed earlier, to find Congresswoman Lee had now arrived along with Jean Quan, our Oakland mayor and Lori Hancock, our local State Senate representative. Not all that many people there to cheer them on, but I was there with the camera (with that 300mm lens) so I took pictures. Closeups. Not a lot you can do except closeups. Have I mentioned I'm into candid portraits? I have? Then you understand I'm OK with a 300mm lens, no matter where I am.

Tired now that it's the mid-afternoon. It's time to pick up the guitar with the news droning on in the background (how many times have I said “with the news droning on in the background?”) if I want to duplicate yesterday's practice time, the excitement we've had in the morning more than enough excitement for a day, I'd say. A nap? Just, you know, go in and lie down, see if I can't pull it off, leave the guitar for later when I'm conscious?

Later still. Watched Beck at six after the nap, which I find interesting. That I would watch it. The characters that can be maddening, but then are called in the story line on the aspects that make them maddening; plots that are, well, more on the bizarre, not quite to be believed side, than not. But still, I watch.

Scandinavian, is it not? Are you seeing familiar strains passed down through your own family lines, Danes and Icelanders, with a couple of Brits and Germans thrown in to confuse the mix?

Let's maybe not go there. Nothing in these characters that won't be familiar and equally uncomfortable to everyone. I don't think.

A good session on the guitar through all this. The fingertips sting, the release bend as well as the other bends put quite a bit of pressure on the middle and ring fingers and (I hate to admit) all of the fingers are reacting and stinging to some degree, which probably means I haven't been practicing enough in the recent past. Still, a couple of hours yesterday, a couple of hours today, we're doing OK I'd say.

That's to the good, is it not? Even with the overly used, inconsistent and ill-advised editorial “we”?

Yup.