Friday. An uneven, but long enough, night's sleep, awakening at six-forty to get up and get ready to head out to breakfast while listening to the last third of Democracy Now, as usual. Out the door at seven, light enough with enough apartment house construction site workers and people on their way to and from the fitness club to not be concerned carrying the camera. Actually, the paranoia has been steadily diminishing with the passage of time, probably a good sign.

I'll still always (probably shouldn't say “always” or “never” lest we seem the idiot) carry the camera or cameras from now on in a backpack both to and from a shooting site when there's any degree of walking in problematic areas involved, but the head seems to have gotten more comfortable after our little incident.

A photograph or two of the sunrise while walking. Thought about letting the foreground go to total black, just emphasize the sky, but either way they turned out OK. A proper photographer would walk to wherever it was necessary to put the lake or something equally interesting in the foreground, but then, well, we're on our way to breakfast and know too well our priority.

So, Friday, the attitude good, the sky clearing as it approaches noon. The Oakland Museum is holding their Dia de los Muertos opening on Sunday, so we'll get some pictures there. Fruitvale holds its event the Sunday following, both signs winter is in the wings.

Later. The eleven o'clock bus to Latham Square, the camera again in the backpack, a set of photographs taking the usual route and then crossing Broadway to catch the bus back to take another set of apartment house photographs. The tasks of the morning are done.

The dry mouth thing started as I was catching the bus home (been a since that's happened), but it didn't evolve into anything more. I'd had a hamburger patty, eggs, country potatoes, toast, mixed fruit and coffee (whew!) for breakfast and I wondered, at the time, if it would remind me later why I don't eat like that anymore.

But good, the work of the day (other than the photo processing) is out of the way, time to lie down with this dry mouth now gone and attempt a nap. “Why do I continue with these stupid construction site photographs?” was the thought that kept whispering in my ears.

Later still. Processing the photographs, once I got started, went relatively quickly and so spent the rest of the afternoon futzing on the computer and reading in bed. Looks like we'll finish the Maigret we've been working on. We're still seeing if we can trick reading back into a habit.

Simenon's Maigret books tend to be fairly short. How long have you been working on this one?

We are taking this one step at a time. Like our approach to the guitar.

Evening. A New Tricks at seven. I realized in the last scenes that I'd seen this one before although, after having waded through its muddy plot, not remembering was probably a sensible plan. How long will it take for me not to remember it again?

We're starting to wander here.

Ah, well. Watched both episodes of the Dalziel and Pasco that followed. Interesting enough to keep me involved, even though all of the principal women characters seemed to have ended up either dead or guilty of the various crimes. Too much angst, not enough uplifting “ride off into the sunset” schmaltz for my tastes, I guess. Not sure I want to publicly admit to wanting schmaltz in my police procedurals.

Some time (but not enough time) playing along as I was watching on the guitar. Not sure what's happening there, we're not playing enough to say we're keeping up, let alone playing, but it seems to call out for me to pick it up now and again and I do. Maybe that too will change for the better, who knows?