AUSTIN, Texas, June 26, 2005 — I am lucky, I keep thinking. All day long.

I am not up early and bright since I (1) stayed up late; and (2) had a martini (albeit a small one). However, by the time I'm up I am feeling fine. I mess around with my computer, writing and such. I call Dad. He doesn't answer and I think he's already headed to church. I don't leave a message but he nows it's me and calls back. Says he was in the shower. He's going to church, though. He reports when his sister left and all that.

So I find myself not getting to the gym all that early. I'm doing some tricep stuff, having ridden the bike a long time and done abs and lower back and I notice that it's almost one. I'm lucky to have the time and the health and the nice gym to have the workout.

When I get home, I eat a tuna fish sandwich. I start organizing travel stuff. I put together my travel toiletries, organize some emergency stuff for the car, organize the maps. I'm lucky to have the time to work on packing so long before a trip. I watch tennis off the DVR, too. FFP is trying to watch the UT ball game. ESPN is messing up on Time Warner. The screen is jerky and looks like an abstract painting. He is not amused. (Neither will I be if it continues on the ESPN Wimbledon coverage tomorrow.)

We get ready to go to a little reception at the Nokonah downtown. They are seeking donors for Zach Scott. It's a nice little do, but one of my friends who is one of the organizers has a fainting spell. On the way home, FFP says, "At least we are healthy." Yeah, we are lucky. By my age, my mother had a convulsive condition that made her life difficult, sometimes blacking out or losing speech even when medicated properly and very, very dependent on the medication. By my age, my sister's cranial aneurysm had exploded and sent her into many surgeries, years of recovery and permanent disability. I've just been reading about a friend who is having a bone marrow transplant for Refractory Cytopenia with Multilineage Dysplasia. I can't imagine being able to learn the name of the disease much less fight through the transplant. Yep, we are very lucky. Important to remember that.

When we get home, I watch more tennis, work some more on travel, read the magazine from The New York Times. Main article is about young people who were born with the HIV virus. At first, such kids all died. Then treatments helped them survive. Then treatments almost stopped 'vertical transfer' of the disease. So there is this one group of kids who come to maturity with it. Very unlucky that.

I stay up too late, watching stuff off the DVR, reading. I fall asleep a little fitfully. But I know how lucky I am. It's important to realize it, but feel sympathy for those you are less fortunate. Which I feel like is almost everyone.