What A Piece of Work Is Man

I've been moody the last two days. I suspect work stress and the weather are, in equal parts, involved.  Neither Friday or Saturday were productive days. Both of them involved long naps.  It may be that is just what I needed to try and recharge my batteries which we partly exhausted by the business travel. I do feel a little better as I slide into the evening here.

I watched the opening ceremonies for the Sochi Olympic Games - very impressive, very beautiful and, for me at least, very moving.  The Russian people have a deep and rich history that, if you are a fan of history, you can easily get lost in it.  The heights they have achieved and the tragedies they have suffered bear witness to the full sweep of humanity (and inhumanity).  I'm already enjoying the games this year.  I am not terribly impressed with NBC's coverage, but so far, for the most part, I can ignore the preening.

I didn't do much today.  I had breakfast with Bob and Tony, then stopped by Bob's house to visit for a while, then went wandering.  I made a short stop at the Barnes & Noble on Stevens Creek and San Tomas Expressway but I was only there for twenty minutes so I didn't pick anything up.  There is no way that I can make that kind of decision in a book store in that short of time.  There are way too many tempting things!

From there, I headed up to Outback Steakhouse at the Great Mall and had lunch with Don, then took a walk through that vast Temple of Mammon.  Afterwards, I came home and laid down and took a longish nap.  I didn't really get to sleep, but I did rest and zone for a while.  Dinner was a bowl of cream of chicken soup while I watched the last of the Olympic ceremony.  Now, I have settled in to watch a couple of episodes of America Unearthed, one of my favorite guilty pleasures.

TR is on travel, so I have missed her, even though she has only be gone for two days.  We human beings are amazing things.  We contain within us Walt Whitman's multitude, which is pretty amazing.  We are creatures of such complexity and yet at the same time we are also creatures of simplicity.  What did Shakespeare say..."Oh, what a piece of work is Man...".

Daily Life: The Ides of March

We never quite reached a state of sunshine over the weekend. It remained half gray and half gloomy, never quite becoming a storm, but never quite becoming spring. All in all though, it was a good weekend.

Saturday itself was pretty busy. I chatted online a bit in the morning, then went on an errand with a friend of mine to pick up a wood lathe he'd boughten. I was little more than hired muscle. After that, I was off to teach a class. From there, I socialized with friends and made the quick run home. At home, I spend some time on the phone in a great little conversation, and from there, a late dinner and then I fell asleep.

Today, I didn't really do anything. I basically just lazed around the house. I didn't have anything that had to be done and I didn't have anything that needed to be done, so I did nothing. I read, I wrote, I surfed, I watched some movies on TV, I listened to the Pogues. I went out to dinner with my friend T.S. at Frankie, Johnny and Luigi II in Westgate, then stopped at the store on the way home to pick up a new halogen lightbulb, some bread and some milk.

It is surprisingly nice to have a weekend where nothing significant happened. I noted on the calendar that it was the Ides of March. I thought of Shakespeare. I thought of Caesar. That was about the extent of any deep thoughts I managed today. I highly doubt I am going to manage to pull another deep thought out of this brain before it turns off for the evening. I highly doubt I am going to try.