Tuesday 09/01/2026

Went for my standard walk first thing. Back by 9 to tidy the apartment, Tuesday being housekeeping day. At 10 I joined the zoom meeting for the writers group, so that Betty could make me host and leave for a family outing. The writers were kind of slow in joining the meeting which is supposed to start at 10:45. At 10:50 we only had five. Eventually we got to a quorum and read our pieces. The cue was to write about some object that you have kept and value. I wrote about a chest of drawers, one of 3 pieces of furniture I retained from the old house.

After lunch I joined the Line Dance exercise class.

Leaving the Line Dance clase, Joanne said she felt like a walk, let’s go get iced chai latte’s. So we did, a nice walk up to Town and Country and back.

Later I looked at the Health app and found that between two walks and Line Dance, I had run up 14K steps and 6.4 miles.

Played a little guitar in there somewhere. Trying to get the right rhythm for “Angel from Montgomery”.

Monday 08/31/2026

Did my gym session at 7:30. Then drove to FOPAL and worked from 9 to noon, processing 10 boxes.

Back to CH, did some reading, watched some videos, napped. After supper, Joanne came around and we watched the next lecture in the Great Courses series we are watching, Music and Mathematics.

Sunday 08/30/2026

Somehow I spent the entire day alone. Almost. After watering the plants and doing the puzzles, I took a modest walk, and then did some writing. I looked over the notes that Prof. Deb’s daughter Anjuli had made on my talk for her father’s memorial. Good comments, and I used them to shorten the talk and add a point she wanted.

Funny thing, I went down to the dining room for the brunch service at noon. Filled my plate, sat at an empty table for 5, ate my lunch, nobody joined me. Still alone at the table when I finished up. I do not think this was personal, just chance.

Played some guitar, read a little, wasted time on the internet, served myself a sandwich for supper and that was the day. Joanne texted about 7pm asking if I was alright, so I called her and assured her it was fine.

Saturday 08/29/2026

At 11, drove to the Museum to lead a tour. Joanne tagged along as we were planning lunch and a movie after. She waited outside while I led the noon tour. Big bunch, 20+ people. Appreciative.

Then we got lunch. Would have gone to Cucina Vente across the street, but it turned out they didn’t open until 4. So we went to the Sports Page bar near the theater.

Then around to the Century 16 to see Coyote v. Acme. It’s a cute movie. I agree with Joanne that it dragged a bit in the middle, but it was fun. I had gotten “premiere” seats and it turns out, the “premiere” seats have built in effects, they bounce and jiggle with explosions and such effects. Frantically pushing buttons in the dark to figure out how to turn the effects OFF. But did it.

Friday 08/28/2026

Took a Friday morning walk with Joanne. Then went to work finishing up the beatles video. After lunch I had a meeting with Stew and Lou. Got there approval of some things I did with the video, how I closed it out. Evening, watched some TV: the CNN series “Kara Swisher Wants to Live Forever”.

Thursday 08/27/2026

Went for the standard walk in the morning, not alone but with Joanne. We had things to gossip about. Having 190 elderly neighbors means you never lack for gossip.

Spent several hours assembling the beatles video. When I added the 9-minute long video of Hey Jude it totaled just 45 minutes. But there will be 12 short intros, one per song, so it will go over an hour. But my goodness it will be a happy hour. Such good songs.

At 4 was the semi-annual resident/trustee meeting. The summer meeting is for covering the wrap-up of our fiscal year (ended 2/28) and our financial status going forward. We are fine, basically. Not going broke.

At 5:30 I was expecting to join my next-door neighbor Carolyn, to drive in her car down to the CH Museum, for a lecture event on the chip industry and AI. I had specifically invited Carolyn because she was a marketing manager for Applied Materials, a chip maker, and would probably meet people she knew.

However when I knocked on her door, she apologized, said she couldn’t go out. Because she had just gotten back from the hospital where she got a cancer diagnosis. She’ll be starting a course of chemo soon, feels optimistic, but doesn’t have the energy to go out.

The museum had made a point this was a sold-out event, please let us know if you can’t attend, so I emailed them immediately. Hope they can reuse those 2 seats.

Anyway I am now home for the evening with nothing to do and feeling depressed. Called Joanne to share the news about Carolyn; Joanne knows her and works with her on a couple of committees. So now there’s two of us depressed. Oh well. You just never know.

Wednesday 08/26/2026

In the morning I joined Joanne, Joanne the other one, Erika and Martha for a hike in the Arastradero preserve. It’s a 3.8 mile loop and today, although the air temperature was something like 78, the sun was very bright and we were all pretty hot and tired at the end.

In the afternoon I started putting the Beatles movie together and immediately ran into something I needed to fix, but by then it was time to join the AV team meeting.

After supper we had a lecture by Sarah Dean, the artistic director of the Pear Theater, on what it takes to stage a play in a local theater. Bottom line, a lot; they have to start planning 18 months out.

Tuesday 08/25/2026

Such a busy morning. I had the apartment tidied and my laundry completely finished by 10am. Amazing. Writers meeting: I read my piece. The cue was, the most unusual or interesting job you ever held. I wrote about being a “frame man” at the phone company (Pacific Telephone & Telegraph, as it was in 1966), stringing wires in the office at 430 Bush street in SF.

After lunch it was time for the line dance class. Then I walked to Trader Joe’s because I was out of bread. So got my 10K steps in.

In the evening we had a movie, Fairyland. The director of the movie, Andrew Durham, went to school with the children of CH residents Susan and Harry and considers them family. So he was here to introduce the movie and talk about it afterward. Very well made film, excellent visuals and acting. Not easy to watch for its emotional content.

Monday 08/24/2026

Frank had texted a picture of 13 boxes of books waiting for me, so I headed out early and worked at FOPAL for 4 hours to clear that up.

Back for lunch and a nap. Then at 3pm I met with Rich and two of the children of Rajat Deb via zoom. Learned about the memorial plans. Anjuli, who plans to be the emcee of the event, said she would like every speaker to keep it to 5 minutes or less. Since my planned talk was at 10 minutes, that’s a problem. Later I edited it down from 1070 words to 800, and sent it to her for comment.

Sunday 08/23/2026

Did my duty by the plants. Did the crossword. Edited my “silicon valley” talk. Went to lunch.

After lunch, Joanne and I walked over to University Ave where the annual arts festival had filled it for about 6 blocks with artist and artisan booths. Lots of cute stuff but nothing worth buying. Joanne says she doesn’t buy stuff any more anyway, at this stage of life.

One feature of the festival was a one-block section that had been set aside for chalk artists. Big 10×10 sections were marked off and various people and organizations had paid to sponsor artists. The most striking one was this scene.

To your eye walking by it looked flat and somewhat distorted. But a sign directed you to stand in a particular spot and “look through a lens”. When you did, the whole thing popped up to create a 3D look, see above. No, those bubbles are not floating in the air, they are drawn with chalk on asphalt. Quite remarkable.

Tired and sweaty we found a coffee place and sat for half an hour and planned out our social calendars for the next week, and walked home.

I ate supper in my room and got caught up on some reading.