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9 October 2007
	Yep, that's my Lila teaching basic Hapkido to Bubbie and Zadie. Bubbie is thinking of starting out, after getting a one-month-free certificate. We'll see.
8 October 2007
	We're heading out for a few hours on Muni, per a request from Isaac. This banner is flying at the Castro Street Station. The kids have decided upon an old Boston Green Line trolley car. We travel along the new 'T' line, all the way to the end, Sunnydale Station. (This is so close to Glen Park that I'm astounded there's no connection.) Back home, we head up the hill to the Corona Heights playground, where the kids ride their bicycles. Luckily Lila learned how to ride a two-wheeler just before Burning Man 2007; she saw loads more than on foot. Jake, with "pet guardian" Anthony, neighbors of ours, join us. Jake barks and races at the swings, which he eventually captures. He's one very happy dog.
Sunday 7 October 2007
	While I'm across town at the Burning Man Decompression Party, the kids are with Rose, Bubbie, and Zadie. Isaac is taking care of a bananna slug they found crawling on the dirt. Lila harvests pairs from the in-laws' garden. Once the pears have been taken, Isaac inspects the tree for hidden treasures.
6 October 2007
	The kids are at a birthday party at the Fuschia Glen in Golden Gate Park, halfway between Maclaren Lodge and the Conservatory of Flowers. It's shaded, good for games, and boasts some great tree-climbing. After seeing the Blue Angels fly from the vantage point of the Randall Museum, I notice this Harris Hawk on the near-by fence. According to the staff she's been hanging around lately, hunting. Dziadziu joins us at Fune Ya Sushi, Clement at 5th. A bowl of edamame apiece before anything else gets picked from the boats. At the birthday party I was handed a badly-cracked (and coffee-drenched) broken iPhone. I've cleaned it up to discover that the liquid didn't do any obvious damage, and once the contacts have been cleaned it takes electrical power. The glass is badly gone, but not sharp, and the touch-sensitive controls seem to work. There might be something I can do with this one.
Friday 5 October 2007
	I invite Felicia, Adam, and Ziggy to head into San Francisco to watch the Blue Angels practice. (I'm not up to braving the crowds for the week-end performances.) Here Ziggy and Isaac cavort on Crissy Field. Here one Angel makes a loop while the remnants of a four-plane separation are seen in the background. All six Blue Angels zip into the San Francisco Bay across the Golden Gate Bridge. We head over to the Hapkido dojang, arriving just in time for our red-belt test. Isaac babysits as we stretch out and sit down (at left). Here I am doing Immobilization no. 5 with black-belt John Fahardo. After months of preparation (and some nervousness) it seems all over in a flash. Lila doing her pinan no. 5 with strong stances, deliberate transitions, and audible breaths to mark out progress (so everyone can stay in sync). She does a very good job. Afterwards the test-takers head over to a near-by Japanese restaurant (on Noriega St.) to talk about the experience. We're all pretty used up. The in-laws have some sort of bean-bag that both Isaac and Lila feel compelled to wear. Funny, eh?
4 October 2007
	A panorama of our synagogue, Magain David Sephardim, during Simchat Torah (the celebration of the gift of the Torah from God via Moses at Mount Sinai).
3 October 2007
	It's Walk-to-School Day across San Francisco, and we participate (annually). Lila seems very pleased. Principal Willem Vroegh looks on as S. F Supervisor Jake McGoldrick does his stuff. He seems like a funny guy, very personable. Isaac (in yellow shirt) seems interested. It's a busy day: Lila has a swim class. Thereafter we head over to the dojang where Lila and Timothy Ma pose for me. Woo hoo! Lila gets her Notice of Intent to Promote: ifwe certify she's had good behaviors and good schoolwork she'll be allow to test for her red belt this coming Friday. Oh, she's been waiting eagerly for this (over the past six months, the required interval). On the way home - it's still light out after all that? - Isaac sees the goats on Clarendon Street. We stop while he renews the friendship.
2 October 2007
	It's a beautiful day to be in elementary school! It's "Indian summer" here in San Francisco, and our kids are enjoying it. (BTW, you can see how the iPhone camera struggles with bright sunlight and dark shadows.) Here's the wall at the Taiwanese tapioca drink store; the one that claims to be the first (in San Francisco? in the USA?) purveyor of this delightful but high-calorie beverage. Here's Isaac with his new friend, Paris. Lately, Apple has been making some ruinous decisions as regards the iPhone, probably because of the choice of getting in bed with AT&T as their US carrier. Then, the firmware update 1.1.1, which bricked phones and deleted third-party applications, worsened the problem. Apple has gone from a company that can do little wrong to one in which anything right is discounted as a mistake. Even Microsoft doesn't have this bad of a street cred, and that's saying something. Read on the Internet: Anything to divert our attention from the iPhone trainwreck slowly building. And elsewhere: Unless the surprise feature [of the upcoming Mac OS X Leopard] is an iPhone SDK, a crippled Leopard won't save apple from the whole bad decision iceberg that is smashing into their Titanic.