AUSTIN, Texas, September 14, 2005 — I felt better yesterday, after keeping away from the TV a little and actively doing something, however trivial. I'm going to try to keep that going today.

I stayed up a little late so I'm not real eager to get up but I get to water aerobics more or less on time. We talk about our instructor's daughter's Tulane volleyball team (they will play a tournament in College Station this weekend); about coverage of Frankencurbs (apparently it was on the TV news last night).

After the class, I go in the gym and do twenty plus minutes on the bike and a few other excercises. Not enough. Something.

At home I work on some of the computer stuff that I'm getting tidying up for FFP while I'm gone. I'm trying to make it as clean as possible for him. Trying to anticipate things is hard. I fool around a little getting organized to pack for my trip. Then I shower, have some lunch. I call the barber and she says she can take me. Want to leave on the trip with a good trim but not put it off until the weekend or Tuesday. I go over there, wait for a guy to finish his cut and shave and then I get my cut. There is a blurb on TV about a court striking down reciting the pledge in public school with the phrase "under God." This sets off Jane who believes that our country is and always should be Christian. Her brand of Christian. As it always has been and ever should be. Get things back to when they were right. (When was that exactly?) The things people believe amaze me, but I'm in the minority. Most people believe in a higher power and believe their HP is the one. At one point Jane tells me she knows what is going to happen to this country. Predicting the future is a great skill. I ask her if she really knows, if she's a prophet. Yes, she says. It's funny about prophets, though. They seem to do better at analyzing the present and hashing the past. Anyway, Jane amuses me. She hated Clinton but she's mad at Bush about making Israel pull out of Gaza. The Bible says the Jews should be there. I try to get her to reconcile her beliefs ("Jesus is my God" she'd said earlier) with supporting the Jews who are still waiting for a Messiah. I don't quite understand her response. I suppose it's a coincidence but FFP had located an amusing Atheist site and e-mailed it to me and it was sitting in my box when I got home. I am curious about what all these people believe (atheists included) and how fervently they hold their beliefs and what they will do to win the day. I think it's very important to our future, regardless of where your own beliefs lie.

But one thing I know for sure...my hair is shorter now.

I go around the house then organizing my toiletries and packing a few things. I get out the luggage I'll use, what I'll leave for Forrest for his trip. When I'm bored with that it's dinner time. I read after that, watching a program about Renée Fleming on Ovation. FFP and I watch a Law and Order which is ripped from the headlines...a rehashed version of the Atheist murders, oddly enough. They only kill off the head (the Madalyn Murray O'Hair character) leaving the son and granddaughter alive as part of the drama of what happened. Definitely segued from that story, though, with the son who found a god.

That's all the conventional TV I can take (we watched a snippet of local news with dinner which couldn't have been more insipid). FFP suggests we watch a Netflix. He's rented one mentioned by some people he interviewed as one they helped distribute. It's a Lesbian drama. We realize that we've seen it before. It is a well-made low budget film. I think we saw it in a local AGLIFF festival. We watch it until the end.

More newspaper reading...about food from Iceland and stories from the great deluge from every angle...business, personal, government. And technology companies merging. I feel better when I don't watch too much TV. Movies are OK. Especially obscure, undemanding indies in B&W. Yeah, I'm feeling weird. Getting ready to go on vacation from retirement while millions have their lives disrupted and desperately look for work is probably the reason. I sleep.