Pete at Peet’s

Early in April, I gave in to maternal pressure and saw Men in Black, which I loved, especially the scene where Tommy Lee Jones goes into the cafeteria at work, where a gaggle of tall skinny French-speaking aliens are chatting, and asks, “How you doin’, fellas?”

“[Mumble mumble mumble] O-KAY!”

Another day I took the bus to Novato see Carol Joy and we had lunch at a restaurant called Toast, saw the movies Duplicity and Sunshine Cleaning back to back, had dinner at Thai Smile, and retired to her place for a game or two of Sneaky Pete.

The next day we had breakfast at Toast and played more Sneaky Pete at Peet’s before I took the bus home. I always have a splendid time with Carol Joy.

One day at work we had a fire drill. Normally we gather at a certain location outdoors, but there were signs up saying we were supposed to go somewhere different, so I went there, by myself except for two Indian fellows who were chatting with each other and soon fell far behind me.

Almost everyone went to the former location. When I got to the designated corner, there was only one person there, a guy who has worked on my floor the entire time I’ve been there, maybe four years, but whom I’ve never heard utter a single word, not to me or anyone else. He walks around staring at the ground and has an air of being extremely taciturn.

However, when I walked up to him that day, I introduced myself and he shook my hand as warmly as if he’d been waiting for me and smiled what turned out to be a beautiful, friendly smile. His name is Eric. He’s just very shy. He also is about ten years younger than I had assumed.

The next time I saw him on our floor, I said hello and he said hello back, but since then, it’s back to the customary procedure, almost as if we had never met, but now I know better than to think he’s grumpy.

In mid-April, Tom and I went to Sacramento for Easter and, if memory serves, we slept on an air mattress at Paul and Eva’s. It’s fairly entertaining to writhe around on an air mattress one’s neighbor is sound asleep on even if you don’t manage to wake that person up. There’s something endearing about a person, innocently asleep, bobbing up and down unbeknownst to himself.

On April 14, my extraordinarily sweet cat turned three. I brought Ham home the exact day he was six months old, so he’s been with me for two and a half years.

Around then, I heard a Professor Cole of the University of Michigan say on the radio that while women’s lives in Iraq are much worse, that’s not to say human rights have declined. I sent an email saying I'm inclined to think that if half the population, give or take, has been stripped of many rights, it would be fair to say that human rights in general have suffered: Women's rights ARE human rights.

Further, to separate one from the other is to fail to consider that if the potential of even one member of a family is stunted or denied, the malign effects will be felt by the entire family, the greater community, and the country as a whole.

I was having a weird problem with my iMac where it refused to go to sleep on its own but had to be instructed to go to sleep; then, if it happened to wake up on its own, like if the cat bumped it or there was a small earthquake, and then it tried to go to sleep on its own, it would get stuck and be unable to be roused. I would then have to do a forced shutdown.

On or about April 18, I figured out the problem was the hub I was using to provide more USB ports. No hub, no problem. But: no hub, not enough ports. In the end, I decided to re-attach the hub and just not use the sleep function. When I want to use the computer, I turn it on, and when I’m done, I turn it off, just as I did with my prior computers.

Right about that same time, Tom and I had dinner at Ramblas on Valencia St. with Sarah, Chris and Kristin. I’d never been there before. The ambience, food and company were excellent.