I took a vacation today. From all 'duty' really although I pulled the covers up on the bed and helped feed us supper and clean up after ourselves. Otherwise, I didn't do anything particularly useful. I worked a little at the filing and straightening in this office, worked on my journal. But these are things I wanted to do. And, even at that, I didn't do much of it. Only while waiting on my companions to get ready to goof off.

We had lunch at 34th Street (SuRu, FFP and I). We saw the current selection at a couple of galleries (Shoal Creek and Gremillion). It was a good selection, too. Shoal Creek had some Kobayashis as well as a big show of Rene Alvarados who is a guy I'd never heard of but liked right away. His work looked liked Latino Julie Speed paintings. . Gremillion had some interesting painting by Lionel Kalish. Of course, I'd never heard of him either. I would so love to be rich enough to collect art and support a place to hang it

FFP and I went to see A Mighty Wind, the new work of Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy. It was pretty good. The acting ability of these folks to stay in these comedic roles and adlib a lot of the lines is amusing. I'm not all that sure that the general joke of the 'series' (Best in Show and Waiting for Guffman) won't eventually wear thin. What is the joke? That all people are sympathetic while being laughable and trivial and taking themselves seriously. And, if you wait a few months, they will be even sillier. Maybe this works because it is so true.

In the evening, FFP and I prepared a stellar tuna steak with fresh pineapple and horseradish sauce and had some other snacks. We had a nice random wine from our motley 'collection.' Then we heard Sterling Price-McKinney and Karen Kuykendall sing and play some obscure Cabaret fare and some of Sterling's own work. It was nice to listen to this music and the small Zach stage and a quiet attentive audience made it pleasant.

Hey, wait, you are saying. What about the coherent thought that is supposed to appear here? What about extracting meaning from life. What do you think you are, a blogger?

Now I hate that term (blog). [Ed. note: we may talk about that tomorrow.] And in any case, here comes meaning. Or at least explanation.

This is what a vacation day is like from retirement. You minimize the errands and duties. Even the reading and writing, except for the newspaper and the journal. You stare at paintings, you watch a movie and a performance, you eat. You have a blank list of accomplishments at day's end. But you have art, music, a movie and food to talk about at cocktail parties. You'd think I lived to expand my appreciation of the arts. And, yep, I do. So a day like today is wasted, it is slothful, it results in no tangible gain. And it is exactly what I want to be doing.