Anyway, up at the usual time, breakfast reading the usual papers at the usual place, the sky overcast and the air cool outside, but it's starting to break up now and the day ahead will undoubtedly be warm without being overly warm here on the coast. Please? OK? Seems rather late in the year to be pleading for cooler temperatures, now that October is but two days away, but such is life, evidently, in this new, much warmer universe.

I do follow the scientific press on global warming and recent results are, indeed, as you occasionally read in the mainstream press, pretty alarming, but I have no hope anyone in power will do anything about it. There are still massive amounts of money being spent to make people believe it's all a farce, nothing to worry about. My guess is I, at my age, will experience some discomfort due to this warming business but that younger members of my family, my nephew, for example, will have to at some point substantially alter their lives to avoid its consequences. Odd to think about, but we're only here for a short time and things we consider pretty solid and lasting during that short existence aren't. Solid. Predictable. Lasting.

But I have little interest right now in talking about global warming. It's interesting to read about as I find it interesting to read about various advances in science. There was a time I considered becoming an engineer. Best that I didn't, but as a youngster I had little trouble getting A's in all the various science and mathematics classes until I got to college and became, well, distracted. It's easy to become distracted in your late teens and early twenties. You too may have noticed.

The head feels pretty good, by the way, not sure if that means I'll do something with the day other than futz around here in the apartment. I have things to accomplish now that the end of the month is upon us. The very end of next month, by the way, marks the beginning of my twelfth year keeping this journal. Twelve years makes me certifiable. I said the same at ten. Everyone else, with some few exceptions, found meaningful employment in their lives beyond their blogs while I seem to have gotten stuck. Perhaps I should do something to mark it, a redesign of some kind, nothing too energetic, but.... We shall leave it at that. Leaving I do well.

Later. Some thoughts on the photograph up top. I took two pictures of the young woman for reasons I'm conscious of, for some I'm not. Yes, she's pretty, I often photograph pretty women, often Asian women, looking for them (looking for all my subjects) at a time when they're unaware of the camera or unaware they're being observed. You get a more natural expression that conveys more information, more real information, than you get when the subject has put on their public “they're taking my picture” mask.

Now I took two pictures, one right after the other, and the one on the left behind the link is the one I prefer. Why? Not because she's unaware of the camera in the left photograph, I'm not certain she was, but she's had less time to react. A better picture was there about five seconds earlier but I was too slow to catch it. She's clearly aware I'm shooting her picture on the right, if only because I saw that she'd seen me with the camera, and has had time to adjust. The pictures are very similar, yes, the one of the left isn't great, but the one on the left is much closer to defining my particular photographic bent.

Later still. A pretty good walk back from the downtown this morning when I went to pick up that new prescription. They didn't have the pills in stock so I'll have to return tomorrow. No complaints. Another opportunity for a walk. Another session drinking coffee sitting out at one of the tables with a camera in the City Center.