jeremyrandall / blog /

I met up with someone cool the other day who writes a couple of blogs. One is more professional and one is more personal. We talked a bit about posting life details in a public forum and the implications. I have written here before how the public/private blog balance is a challenge (perhaps I should just blog about that all the time). I like the idea of posting a lot of interesting things about myself (since I am so goddamn interesting, of course) but I know that striking a balance is important. I believe my caution is appropriate, yet I find myself envious of the people who do feel to write more about their lives. I guess my final take, though, is that I’d rather interact with people in real life who want to get to know me than to post everything on a blog and then exist only as a virtual being. Deep, huh?

On another note, I find it completely annoying when people do nothing but complain in their blogs. C’mon people, stop complaining and go do something to improve your lives! But I digress.

My love affair with San Francisco continues. I shared with someone the other day that I am “living my dream,” here, no matter how cliche that sounds. I am really grateful for that.

We’ve had some overly warm days, but once the wind picks up and the fog starts to roll in it cools down and is really pleasant, at least to me. I’ve been here long enough that I a sweatshirt serves as enough of a jacket to keep me comfortable even when it is in fact chilly.

I’ve been riding cable cars more often now that I get a FastPass routinely each month. Sometimes I will do a long walk toward the Embarcadero and take a cable car home, sometimes I just go for a ride because they’re there and they’re cool.

I was mugged a few months ago and since then I’ve stopped carrying a backpack. Which means I don’t routinely carry a camera with me anymore. I’m really missing taking pictures when I’m out and about. I think it may be time to get another backpack (too bad those “man purses” are so ridiculous) and get a new camera. Probably a good excuse anyway since it’s been a long time since I bought a digital camera and the quality is sure to be a lot higher. I’m planning to get a bunch of my existing photos up on Flickr soon and then start building the collection with new material.

Unfortunately the camera in my new-ish phone takes pictures of considerably worse quality than even my several-year-old digital camera. Some shots from the camera phone:

This Southbound cable car has just come up the steep hill from the Fisherman’s Wharf area; the curvy part of Lombard street drops off in the background with North Beach and the bay visible.

This Northbound cable car is about to drop down the steep hill to the Fisherman’s Wharf area.

The busy part of California Street facing West toward Polk Gulch.

I’m off to work shortly, after the holiday yesterday.

I’ve done a bit of rearranging of my web site. This blog is in the same location, but it’s no longer serving as the main page. That has been moved to the wiki, with appropriate redirects and auto-refreshes leading there. It occurs to me that this overall site has been in existence for quite awhile now; it’s like a house that I just keep adding new wings on to and changing where the front door is. Not to mention all of the rooms that are hidden away at the end of long hallways, and the stored files and trinkets from years ago neatly cataloged in the basement. Is the analogy making sense?

April was a busy, fun, active, scary and difficult month. I’ve been working quite a bit, ejoying many social activities and feeling vaguely guilty that I’ve barely been sailing this year. April includes an anniversary of a family member’s death, for which I take some time off and do something meaningful to mark the occasion and remember that person.

Geez, it’s already halfway through May. Wow.

So I have been TV-free since ~April 23rd. And I am, in fact, finding that that prompts me to go out and do more things in the evenings. I basically plan or find something to do each night after work. On nights when I do just come right home, I listen to music (I bought a ton of new music), read, clean my place, rearrange things and generally be more productive than I would be with a television. So it has all worked out the way I wanted it to. I did watch The Office at a friend’s house the other day; I do miss that show.

Losing TV is just part of an ongoing self-improvement tack. I gave up diet soda to reduce my sodium intake; since I’m not a coffee drinker, I went ahead and gave up caffeine as well. I didn’t realize just how much caffeine I had been taking in; the first three days without it I could barely stay awake. I was literally sitting in my cube at work trying not to nod off. Once I got past that, it has been fine. I’ve been drinking a lot more water and I can feel the difference.