AUSTIN, Texas, June 7, 2005 — Forrest is really retired. Oh, sure, he is still dealing with media bills and winding down and such but I mean he went with me to vote (he already did) and we bought groceries and went to the camera store and bought a new digital camera. Later in the evening we went to the club together and ate there.

Yeah, my big thing, my big change today was to work out in the evening. I only did the bike again plus a few lower back and ab things.

I acommplished some things today. I booked all the rooms for our trip later in the summer. Well, I finished doing it. And I did the family budget for May. It gives me a false sense of control over spending to do the budget. And I bought a new camera and charged the battery and took the obligatory test pictures. (I haven't read the book, just the 'getting started.')

Yeah, Forrest is really retired and so am I. When we weren't out at the grocery store or book store or camera store or the club, though, we were at our respective computers dealing with whatever. He was probably writing columns, paying bills, dealing with the winding down of accounts he's dropped. I, of course, had to do my journal and e-mail people and arrange social things and RSVP stuff and such. And look at maps and search for hotels.

FFP cooked us a lunch of salmon with lemon and capers which we had with salad. I had a chicken wrap and a fruit cup for dinner at the club.

Yes, there is definitely a different feel to the weekdays now and FFP seems to be embracing it. He fell asleep watching the recording of Six Feet Under last night so during the day he watched it in bits and pieces. We watched a recorded rerun of something we'd probably already seen in the CSI constellation while he dozed. I wanted to get started reviewing some films for AFF but didn't get to it. I definitely won't watch as many as I did last year even though I was gone in June.

I stay up too late and I don't feel like I got enough done. But I don't have to look at the family budget for another month. And I have my vacation reservations. Oh, and I made my dad yet another doctor's appointment. And I finished reading The New York Times Sunday magazine. I'm worthless but then I'm retired. In said magazine they had an article about the youngsters (forty and under, mostly) who hit it big in the dot com era, made a lot of money and are now starting companies again. The 'middle class' of this bunch has tens of millions of dollars. But they strive to have hundreds. Of millions. And they are really in it for the ego of inventing a successful product or program. Frankly, I'm happy I'm not them. I'd love to have tens or hundreds of millions to give away but it's way too much trouble to own fancy cars, planes, yachts and giant houses. It does verify a family saying we have around here, though. "Anything under ten million is chump change." Amusingly enough William Safire's language column in the aforementioned magazine discusses that alliterative phrase. In this family we are confident that we will stay in the chump lane. And we are happy to do so.