Were my dogs tired

Last night I put in my first-ever non-training real-live full shift at the l.c.n.b.. An hour repairing the alphabetic order of part of of the fiction section, followed by two hours at the cash register, then an hour off for "lunch" (though it was 7 pm), part of which I spent on my feet as well, actually shopping in the store -- for it was Employee Appreciation Day and we got 40% off. Then I spent two more hours at the information desk, another hour "on reg" (on the cash register, that is), and a final segment putting away magazines that people had scattered about the store all day long. At midnight I left, footsore. I'm going to have to buy a new pair of sneakers for this job, the cushier the better. And take Ibuprofen before and during.

Thus I spent the last hours of a warm, sunny day. Then this morning the fog was in and the sky was cool and gray. I don't think I'll ever get tired of the sequence of warm summer days followed by cool gray summer days during which the sun comes out maybe from 11:15 to 3:00. Nor will I cease being grateful for the coolness, a soothing breath that comes without fail after two or three days of "heat." That's in quotes because a hot day for San Francisco is when it gets up to 85. If it gets over 90 the people just lie on the floor with a cool cloth over their forehead. At least I do.

Here's what I bought on Employee Appreciation Day: The Book Against God, a novel by James Wood; Advertisements for Myself, a 1959 collection of magazine pieces by Normal Mailer, which includes his famous piece "The White Negro" as well as other meditations on pop culture -- he was being sardonic about that stuff a decade before Tom Wolfe; and The Unconquerable World, the new book by Jonathan Schell.