Another Nice Day In The Bag

Another nice day in the bag.  Breakfast at the Hickory Pit (ah, the power of habit).  From there, I took a walk through of Best Buy and then swung by the Apple Store at Valley Fair.

I find the Apple Store to be a cult like place, full of people with glazed eyes - none of which stops me from owning an iPod and an iPad and considering buying a MacAir.  My friend Tony is also looking at the MacAir. I like the idea of the ultralight laptop and the MacAir seems to be the top of that breed.

From there I stopped at Safeway to stock up on groceries for the coming week. 

Then, I headed home. I had planned on watching a movie off the DVR but ended up spending the afternoon on a pair of family calls. I tried to take a nap, but couldn't quite get to it. Dinner was Patxi's and then a walk through Barnes and Noble, where I actually managed to get out without buying anything. 

The evening finds me with my feet propped up, watching the SyFy Twentieth Anniversary Special.  I plan on writing a little and reading a little and easing into the night. I feel like calling off sick from work tomorrow, except of course I am off work all next week, so I probably won't. 

Oh, I am also on call for Jury Duty as well.  I already called in for Monday and now I have to call in between 12:00 PM and 1:00 PM tomorrow and work my way through the entire week on call.  I kind of hope I get called in as it will be a nice break in the routine of the last couple of months.

A Need For A Magnificent Obsession

One of the things I've learned about life is that life is always an unexpected journey. We never know the direction we're going to end up traveling in. It is guaranteed to be a surprise. Sometimes it turns out to be a lucky surprise and sometimes it doesn't. I think the ability to embrace whichever turn of fortune rushes towards you is a gift. I think that as long as you look at it that way you will make the best of the circumstances whenever they happened to be. Lately my life seems to be comprised of twists and turns. Not only my life but the life of the people around me. Maybe it's just a heightened sensitivity on my part or maybe we have entered into a season of twists and turns. I kind of like that idea. After all, life is the ultimate force of nature.

As I mentioned earlier it was a crazy, busy, week at work. I worked way too many hours in way too short a period of time. Today, which was my day off, was rewarding. First I slept in a bit, then I met Tony for breakfast over at Goodies II. After that I ran a couple of errands, including a rather fruitless search for a special type of VGA cable. Then I met my friend Marjorie, from Southern California, for lunch over at Hobbies. I only get to see her every couple of years when our paths cross either here in Northern California or down south. So was very nice. 

From there, I stopped at computer central, and then Best Buy, all in a fruitless search for that VGA cable. There is a design flaw in my Sony laptop. It has to monitor ports, a VGA port, and an HDMI port. Unfortunately, they are side-by-side, and separated only by about a quarter of an inch. Take a look at your VGA cable and notice just how wide the connector is. Do you notice the little screws that secure it to the VGA port? Do you notice the little flange at the edge of the connector? Well, that little flange is enough to prevent you from plugging in two monitors. Now, I've seen VGA cables without that flange. I think they're one point I actually had one. It might still be around here somewhere. But, from this moment in time, it looks again going to have to do surgery on a VGA cable so I can hook up both monitors to the Sony VAIO. Well, I guess it's nothing my Dremel tool can't fix.

I don't really have any special plans for the weekend, other than the routine stuff, I think I'm going to try to take it easy through the weekend. I need some quiet time. I need some time to listen to the silence. I need some time to be alone with my thoughts. It always kind of amazes me how difficult it is in the modern age. We run, constantly, and we never stop. Even when we think we’re stopped, we’re not, we’re running. It's like we are the servants of the mad master and we don't even know it. Well I'm going to try and shake that master for a bit this weekend.

About four years ago I was in a strange place. At the time I characterized it as seeking a magnificent obsession. That is about as close as I can come to explaining it. I think I'm slipping back into that time and space. I think that's part of the journey of life that, periodically, it takes us back over familiar territory. It takes us back to those places where we still have a lesson to learn. I am not sure what that lesson is, I didn't know then, and I don't know now. All I know is that inside me there is a need for a magnificent obsession.

Oh, and speaking of Magnificent Obsession - I happened to turn on the TV tonight and stumbled upon Casino Royale, the old one, with Woody Allen, Peter Sellers, David Niven - and the very beautiful Ursula Andress. This is a picture of her from the first movie I ever saw her in "She" as "She Who Must Be Obeyed".