Monday. Up at six with the alarm feeling pretty good. Off to breakfast and the papers and back, home now at eight. Ominous looking clouds, but no rain. They're saying rain is coming. My sister is on Highway 5 at the moment heading for our cousin's in San Rafael hoping there's some decent weather for the three days she'll be here. Well, such is life. Pictures in the rain.

Later. A bus downtown to pick up two prescriptions, learning in the process the mail order pharmacy charges significantly less for a 90 day supply than the local Rite Aid. We will not make the mistake of buying from Rite Aid except in an emergency again. On the bus I passed the Oaksterdam University (grow your own grass) building and noticed they were painting a mural on their wall. Not a great looking mural, but they're now in the land of above board tax paying commercial companies, teaching you how to grow good grass or not, and anything they may choose as a mural subject needs to be politically correct, thoughts of artistry and innovation coming in a very second place. Still, not horrible. I made it a point to walk back and take a picture once I had the prescriptions in hand.

Walking by one of the fresh water stream outlets on Lake Merritt I wondered what the green stuff does to the birds. Duck their bills into it. Algae, not a problem? Probably. Then again, from the looks of it, I was as close as I wanted to get. Gives you an idea what it takes to keep the lake in decent shape.

Ended up walking all the way home buying an ice cream cone along the way. Another ice cream cone lunch. We'll not volunteer this to any of the doctors. I seem to see more doctors lately. No reason to confuse them or make them upset.

So it's now afternoon. I've been listening to a new (for me) Sirius XM station over the weekend that's been playing music from the Austin South by Southwest Festival and finding much that I like. So there is indeed music out there of interest. I can look at the Rolling Stone top 100 list and recognize some of the names, but that's about it. I don't think these folks are on a commercial top 100 list, but I suspect they might be in another several months. Or years. Or have we lost our moorings here?

Much of the music I listened to in the late sixties through the mid-late seventies didn't necessarily make the charts, although much of it did. Maybe it's just the age thing, but then again, maybe I'll chase some of it down and listen to see if I'm really hearing right.

Later still. Thinking I was hungry, not totally unusual anymore, I walked over to The Old Place, a local Chinese dim sum restaurant, and ordered their Mu Shu pork and fried calamari takeout, thinking as they were appetizers they'd be small. Not all that expensive, but what I think of as an appetite anymore isn't what they're cooking for. I got through not quite half of the Mu Shu pork, ate one piece of calamari and put them both in the refrigerator. I suspect they'll last a while. The cost of one meal has now covered the cost of three.

Got a call from my sister, she's arrived at our cousin's place in good shape, happy with the sun we've had today while she was driving down. Let's hope there's some around here tomorrow. There's an empty apartment in the building so she'll have a reliable parking space to park her car in the morning when we’re out photographing Oakland. Yes she will.