AUSTIN, Texas, August 13, 2005 — I work out almost every day. Today I skipped. It's nice to change something. But scary, too.

We aren't going out either. Maybe I won't leave the house all day. Our bookkeeper and friend is going to cook here for us, a couple of other friends, Dad and FFP's parents.

We sleep in. All of us. Oh, we are probably up by eight. I strip the bed and we get into laundry mode. I take out a load of clothes when I change the sheets into the dryer. FFP supervises finishing that. I fold, I make the bed again with his help. I spend a lot of time finishing the

journal for yesterday and proofing it. I don't always proof things very much here. It's untidy I know but just getting a paragraph or two published every day can seem difficult. But since proofing was sort of a theme, I thought I'd proof. Then I'd add and change things and probably introduced more typos and unfortunate misstatements of fact.

Yeah, we decided along the way somewhere not to go to the gym. FFP sorted through newspapers that were on the dining table, the ones that came while we were gone on our trip. I'd read a bunch of them. So we got a lot into recycling after he decided he didn't want anything from them. I added a few remaining ones to a stack in my office that is over two feet tall. Ah, well. It makes a nice companion to the two feet of magazines.

I cleaned out the frig a little, too. As a result I tossed several science experiments but I also ate some queso, some hot sauce, a salad and some tofu no-egg salad. There was just a bit of this and that, still good, so I ate it. When someone else is going to cook at your house, it's good to make a bit of room in the frig. I dumped out the ice trays, too. (We are the last kitchen in America with no ice maker and a portable dishwasher. Not really, I know.) I made a pitcher of tea to make iced tea. (No one drank it, though. Water or wine this day, as opposed to water into wine.) We cleared the counters and cleaned them a bit.

I fooled around with my computer and then decided at some point to download Google Earth which I'd been reading about in the paper. Big Mistake. Showed it to FFP and he, too, pronounced it a great time waster.

But...there is something about seeing an aerial view of your house after starting with a globe revolving around to North America that is insanely intense. (Note the Eco-crete driveway with the different texture and the rows in the northern neighbor's vegetable garden.)

Yep, it's an insane time-waster. With interesting discoveries. While wandering the foothills park of the Denver area looking for where my relatives live, I saw that there is a ritzy area with lots of private tennis courts and this amazing maze that someone had pinpointed. (Note that if you were flying south it would say 'HELP.')

The WEB is a great place to waste your life, I suppose. FFP is blaming me for introducing him to it.

I watch some AFF films (what are the odds that I would have, this year, reviewed two documentary films about tango orchestras?). I shower and groom. A little after five, our friend and bookkeeper comes over with all the makings of dinner. Soon she has FFP tearing salad (she says he is choking it!) and she is baking spinach puffs. She puts out chips and shrimp ceviche. She starts the final bake of chicken enchiladas and heats up flavored brown rice. Dad, a couple of friends and FFP's parents come over. (FFP's Mom brought a fruit salad.) We drink some Benzinger Syrah and we visit and eat and have a great old time. Some other friends come by after one has officiated a wedding.

At some point FFP tries to turn on the TV in the big room and it has one line down the middle. HMMM. Maybe it's time to trade out that monster old school 35" TV for a flat screen of some sort? In the front room we have a console Sony that, in spite of a slightly off picture is still watchable. It was purchased in the late '70's I think! In the kitchen we have a Sony we bought in '77. They don't make things like they used to! I really hate it when something breaks that is too heavy to lift! But that's life. Failure and breakdown and death...it's what moves things along. Without those things, nothing new has room.

The group breaks up and everyone goes homeward. We've already washed up mostly. We retire. I finish watching a movie, reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close at the same time, a book I'd put down for a while. We stay up too late, really. So it goes. Always with the too late and too much wine!