The day’s pleasant surprise: ease of travel, with no backup heading in and parking space outside the rented broom closets that’ll never feel like our missing newsroom. The unpleasant one: learning an Alden subsidiary now owns the defunct Greyhound station where I came to Oakland for good in early 1995.

I found a thing I hadn’t seen on shelves in several months, and grabbed up a bunch of it to take home. I’d seen that it might be in stock there before, but only got around to visiting and scoring today. I’d also worried about its makers’ sale last year. Now, to enjoy and see how quickly they’ll re-up.

I spent most of the day in some of the clothes I bought late last month on a whim, less to follow some particular external style diktat and more to see what a particular pair of jeans and T-shirt looked like. Verdict: way different than six months ago, even with the last few weeks’ throttle easing.

Woke up to bad dreams, and a desire not to be perceived. Didn’t turn on the camera during a video presentation. Hit the comfort snacks during my shift’s backend. There may be a 1970s/80s playlist playing nearby. Chalk it up to the full moon, invisible behind clouds committed to the rainy-night bit.

A little time for beverages, bacon and serendipitous advice at my not-so-local, followed by hanging out uphill to enjoy views before some rehearsal practice in Oakland, for a second day there after yesterday’s pop-up work-social and a surprisingly fun movie before a sadly cancelled karaoke outing.

Today’s weather kept dipping in and out of my awareness. It’s as if the rain said “I’ll come down heavily, but only when you’re home from a drive, safe under an awning, inside a movie theater or in for the night.” The clouds were, like, “cool, we’ll just handle the curtains.”

Today was simple: pay bills, go shopping, come home. We overdressed a little for the weather, but were comfy with an open balcony while the sun slipped off behind increasing clouds as afternoon wore on. In other news, we did a little tinkering on devices and settled on exciting midmonth shenanigans.

Out of our building, over and across the avenue, passing sidewalk smokers in the shade, and onto the midday greenway with clinic workers chatting away their break, a woman video-chatting at the top of her voice, and a liter ginger-ale bottle of a man lying in the path and mini-landscaping with rocks.

Today’s realizations: returning a book I’d hung onto longer than I should’ve, and picking up several more to take home for hunching over on my exercise bike, squinting at over morning coffee, or waiting out the acu needles for a few weeks. Then came a little broom closet time, and a snowy plaza view.

Back to the chair and the low rumble from the ancient iPod on an unassuming shelf, the relaxing hum of fans and a filter, the prod and spur of rain in my face and on my windshield, and the finishing of a couple of productive months with one last song coalescing from a word glimpsed outside a house.