Back the car into the parking space, the first time I haven't pulled straight in front first and managed (how did I do this) to touch the back window against the overhanging storage cabinet above the space. Just a touch. A firm touch. The entire back window and wiper turned to little glass windshield nuggets strewn about the cement. Two minutes and I've managed a bit of chaos.

OK, what the hell. Leave the car parked, walk to the morning restaurant for breakfast, the sidewalks and streets almost deserted. Read the papers, walk home, finish yesterday's journal entry and post. Downstairs to sweep up the nuggets of glass.

Back to the apartment. We'll call AAA tomorrow on the tire, make an appointment with the dealer on the rear window, chalk it up to experience and an improvident fuzzy moment on the way to breakfast. Nobody hurt unless you count my ego and checkbook.

On to the Folsom Street Fair early this afternoon. We'll follow a strange morning with an even stranger afternoon.

Later. The head was clear, the energy good, nothing to complain about with double vision or ocular symptoms of any kind, but I did argue internally about going to photograph this Folsom Street Fair thing right up to the point I'd gotten on the bus and gone by the Broadway ATM. What the hell, on BART, off at the Civic Center stop and on to Folsom Street in the company of many, many people in various forms of dress on their way to the same event.

OK. I usually arrive at these thing too early and I consciously decided to arrive around one two hours after it had started. Mistake. I should have remembered how crowded it gets. I mentioned tens of thousands of people attend. The papers said one to two hundred thousand and I believe them. It soon became so crowded you couldn't really move, but had to move with the crowd. Not good for taking pictures.

And not good to have had a light breakfast and no lunch. Could have used some water too. What the hell, left sooner than I would have had it not been so crowded deciding this is probably going to be the last one I shoot. Stopped at a Burger King at the BART Civic Center entrance to have a Coke. Wanted the sugar as well as the liquid. Sat and drank it slowly to recharge the batteries for the trip back.

Again, not that tired, although I had to wait forty minutes for the Oakland bus. A free Zen lesson. No big deal, really, other than in a snit by mentioning it here.

Anyway, only in San Francisco? I suspect. More naked old men than you'd ever want to think about. Hundreds. Literally. People in leathers, naked women, everyone putting it on, revelling in the drama if not the reality, but to what degree? I suspect you'd have to be a participant and know the scene and even then there would be aspects you wouldn't know other than through nightmares on dark nights and sessions with your analyst.

Back now. One section plus something like ten pictures. Maybe for the best. Pick the better ones and get it done.

Until next year.

I know better than to say “never” or “the last one”. We'll arrive early if we do, though. No more of this business of being locked shoulder to shoulder in the crowd.

Evening. The afternoon spent working on a Folsom page for artandlife, adding the extra ones in between images with thumbnail links. Not a great group, but not horrible. Again, if I'd arrived earlier, I would have had more pictures. Too many opportunities to not.

Nothing on television until nine when they ran another Foyle's War. Enjoyed it while playing along on the guitar. A worthwhile reason to get to bed just before eleven.