Friday, May 12, 2023

I visit Cupertino

Last night Ken had come by right on time, although I was worried a bit. I got my check and we hung out and talked for the usual time. He and I both think he's got a nerve pinch, but after he left I did some reading and it could be a stroke. 

A stroke means more in the future .... plus Ken keeps getting more and more overweight, around his middle because that's where he injects his insulin and that's at least twice a day, maybe after each meal.  Plus Ken's diet is a classic "one foot on the brake, one foot on the gas" American high-sugar/carb diet, which as a diabetic he should not follow. 

Ken had brought over burgers and fries for us both - he uses a coupon and gets two of each for $6 which isn't bad except that it's burgers and fries. At least  I didn't eat the buns. And I had diet 7-Up for us both. 

I listed 15 things and got some practice in. Now that I'm not poisoning myself with harmful gases each night, my ability to play long notes is improving.

I woke up at 3. I had my coffee and cleaned up and all that, and got going at a quarter after 4. I rode right to the bank and deposited my check, and it was dead-on to the penny. I should actually be paying a little fee each month if my account is under a thousand or two, but it's been a bit less than a month since I had a bit over 3 grand in there. 

I went to Whole Foods and got some vitamins and stuff, not much, mainly I just wanted some cash back. I wanted to go to a thing in Cupertino that starts at 7:30. I thought I had plenty of time so I went to TAP Plastics for a small, less than $5, purchase for one of my innumerable projects, then lazily started off. 

I tried riding down to Moorpark, thinking I'd take that to Mitsuwa Marketplace, which has the best bentos and the best prices on same, but Moorpark was closed for some reason. I went back up to Stevens Creek and slogged along until I got to Saratoga, took that down to Mitsuwa's and went in and got a nice chirashi don and ate that quickly as I'd figured out that the two hours I thought I had were not going to enough time, really. 

I tried taking a street West thinking it's major enough, it will go through to De Anza. It effectively stopped at San Tomas and there was no way to take it up to Stevens Creek as I ended up on a pure freeway on-ramp and had to wrong-way it back the way I came to Saratoga and up to Stevens Creek again, and stayed on that until I got to De Anza and then I was where I had to go. It was maybe a quarter to 8 by then. 

It was OK, the meeting was kind of fun, and what else was I going to do, mope around here for my Friday night? It was past 9:30 when the meeting was over, and as I rode out to Stevens Creek I did a time-check and it was 9:45. 

The ride back was actually rather pleasant. Traffic was far lighter, it was cool, and I was on a very gradual downhill. Everything was closed though. 

When I got back to downtown it was close to 11:00 and I took a little ride around 1st and 2nd street and the "SoFa" area, just to see what's up. It's really dead except for a few bars which are fun to the kind of people who start their evening with $100 to drink up and like thumping, pounding music. Otherwise it was dead, and well, I hope the city of San Jose is proud of themselves because they have rid the city of buskers entirely. It is buskernrein. 

Santana/Satan's Row, on my way out to Cupertino, looked a bit promising though. I've heard that are buskers there sometimes. Just the bit of sidewalk where people pass in big crowds, waiting for the lights, going between the big mall on one side and the Row on the other side, of Stevens Creek, looks promising. Tons of Asians. Of course I imagine myself playing the shinobue, a characteristic Asian/Japanese flute, and able to be heard over street noise, not a trumpet. I'd think the reaction to trumpet would be, "Who's that idiot with a trumpet there? That's noisy! Geddim outta here!". 

After making my little circuit of downtown, I headed back here and everything but everything was closed. I got back in here at 11:30 which is the same as getting in at 2:30 in the before times. 

So I put in 4 hours on the bike today. In the past this might have tired me out but as I wasn't time-trialing it, it really wasn't very tiring. This is why once I'm back in Hawaii I can easily imagine doing something like riding around the island of Oahu on a bike, including Ka'ena Point. I could even make it a 2-day trip, take one day to go out around Pearl Harbor and around Ka'ena Point and on through the North Shore to the Kuilima (or whatever the Kuilima is called these days) then on the second day do the windward side around to Waimanalo to Hawaii Kai, Kahala, etc. and around to home. Two days would be neat because I could stop at places and explore a bit. 


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