I was surprised when I went out to get the papers this morning – it was raining! To be more accurate, it was barely drizzling – water was falling from the sky, but not even enough to wet the newspapers (which had arrived without bags). But it’s more rain than I’ve seen here in months and months, so I’ll take it as a good sign.

By the time we went to the Farmers’ Market a few hours later, the sky was clear and the sun was warm; fortunately, I was wearing my new hat and was protected from UV.

This evening, we took our after-dinner walk just about sunset; the moon was rising, almost full, and it was a very pretty sight indeed. It may be true that “the best camera is the one you have with you”, but it’s also true that there’s only so much you can do with a tiny lens.

I really like late summer – there’s still plenty of light, and sometimes, it’s not too hot. Today was almost perfect – the high was 77F, so we didn’t need to run our air conditioner.

We started the day with a walk, then drove downtown to the Fiesta de Artes to see how it had changed since 2019. There were fewer gourmet food sellers than in the past, and the screen door and fire pit merchants were gone. Sunday Afternoons Hats was a new arrival this year, and both Diane and I succumbed to their blandishments.

This afternoon, we wore our new hats to Silver Mountain Vineyards in the Santa Cruz mountains to pick up our quarterly shipment (we’ve been members for nearly 14 years) and do a little wine tasting. We split two tastings, each of which had small pours of four different wines, and came home with a few extra bottles of Pinot as well as the wines we’d gone to pick up. That’ll hold us for a while, I hope!

Both Diane and I decided we wanted to order new iPhones this year; we each completed the pre-order process on Wednesday (I’m getting the Pro and she’s getting the mini) but we couldn’t actually order until the ordering window opened at 5am Pacific this morning. There was no way we were going to set an alarm for such a ridiculously early hour for a mere phone – so we didn’t.

I woke up, unprompted, at 5:10 and went into the bathroom…and as long as I was up, I took my phone with me and completed the order.

Diane finished her order when she woke up at the usual time, and we both have September 24 delivery dates.

As of an hour ago, the delivery date for a Pro configured like mine is now mid-October; the delivery date for a mini configured like Diane’s is still September 24th. I guess it’s good I was the one who woke up early!

We saw Delicata squash in the store for the first time this season, so we picked one up and made Delicata, Radicchio, and Black Rice Salad for dinner. It’s a great Shabbat dinner meal because you can cook the whole thing early and just take it out of the refrigerator when it’s time to eat.

Shabbat Shalom!

Today was Yom Kippur, so we fasted and spent most of the day watching Shir Hadash’s live-streamed services.

The fasting went as well as we could hope; the live-streaming didn’t. I don’t know where the problem was, but there was a lot of buffering, and we even got thrown out of the stream several times. And at times, we were in a strange anomalous state – the browser claimed we were getting a delayed feed but if I clicked “back to live”, we traveled backward in time and saw the same bit of the service again!

Despite the technological glitches, the service got me to think about the year past and what I can do to be a better person this year, so I think it was a success.

I’m posting very early today because Yom Kippur starts at sundown tonight, and I’ll be offline until after sunset tomorrow. May you be inscribed and sealed for a good, happy, and healthy 5782, and if you fast, may you have an easy and meaningful fast.

G’mar Chatimah Tovah!